Project Purpose
I wanted to complete a project of some sort that would really push me out of my comfort zone. I decided a great way to do that would be to make a podcast. I had thought about doing something like this for the last few years but never quite got the courage to start. This year I decided that I was going to change that.
For the past 5 years, I have been through so many different challenges and experiences in my life but prioritizing my health is what got me through them. I have been through different diets and workout regimens to try and figure out what works the best for me. I have been able to make so many different discoveries along the way and wanted to share them with others.
At the start of the podcast, I was hoping that this would help me to find a platform where I felt comfortable sharing the knowledge that I have gained through my health and fitness journey. I wanted to feel comfortable and open talking about the different situations that I have been put in and how they affected me. I specifically wanted to focus on building my story telling skills and being comfortable speaking in front of an audience even if I can’t see them.
The project
Challenges I Experienced
I experienced a few different challenges along the way that I was not expecting. The first problem I ran into was how to actually record my podcast. I didn’t know how many different platforms were available for recording and the benefits of using each platform. I had to do a lot of research into figuring out what the most user-friendly platform for a first-time podcaster was going to be.
The next thing that I wasn’t expecting was how time consuming creating a podcast would be. I like to put everything I have into what I do, and I just did not have all the time that I wanted to put into this podcast. From researching what I wanted to talk about to writing a loose script for each episode to actually recording and editing each episode, all of it was a lot more time consuming than I thought it was going to be.
My biggest struggle was just the anxiety of creating a podcast where I am just talking to myself. This was a very strange thing for me to get used to because I was holed up in a room just recording a conversation with myself.
Project processes
At the start of my podcast, I made a pretty large list of topics for different episodes which allowed me to have a bit of ease figuring out what to do a podcast about. From there each podcast was a little bit different but they all had roughly the same process.
I would start with choosing my topic for the episode. Then I would begin researching that topic to get myself in the right mindset and thinking about what I really wanted to discuss during that episode. During this part of the process, I would take notes and make pointers about important specifics I wanted to mention. After I had done the research that I wanted to, I would start to create a very loose script for the episode. Finally, I would start to record the episode using Anchor. This allowed me to record segments of each episode which made editing easier for me. I would go back and listen to each segment and decided how I wanted to order everything, if I wanted to cut parts out, etc. Once the episode was recorded, I created a description for it and then posted the episode.
Overview
Overall, I really enjoyed creating this podcast and I learned a lot about myself while doing it. Through each episode I was slowly able to get more comfortable with recording myself and talking “off script” to allow my episodes to sound less rehearsed. I was able to share the podcast with a few of my close friends and family which was really encouraging for me because I received a lot of positive feedback from them. It has also helped me to develop a lot more respect for people who have create successful podcasts because there is a lot more work that goes into them than people think.
Project Insights
I would love to continue on with this podcast, but I want to have more time and a little more money to put behind it before I keep recording. First, I want to get some equipment that will make my audio sound a bit better. I also want to get a decent camera to record each episode so that I can also post to YouTube. Then I want to make sure I have the proper time to put into recording at least 10-minute episodes each week.
Aside from the logistics of recording a podcast, I have also learned a few other minor things. The biggest thing I learned was the importance of not waiting to start something that you want to do. There is never going to be a perfect time to start a podcast but just taking the first step can be super empowering.