254: 8 Lessons Learned from 8+ Years of Podcasting (Pivot Crossover)
Free Time with Jenny Blake
Navigating Dips and Plateaus in Long-Term Creative Projects: Falling in Love Again
Exploring the ups and downs of a long-term creative project and rediscovering the passion and curiosity needed to keep it going.
Today is a crossover episode from the Pivot podcast celebrating eight lessons learned from over eight years of podcasting.
The Free Time podcast is now approaching its third birthday—I launched it on March 21, 2021—a year prior to the book coming out. I encourage you to grab your copy if you haven’t already, or even better—🎁 give the gift of free time to a loved one in your life for 2024!
As we start to plan the year ahead, I hope that you can apply some of these pointers to the creative projects that you're working on. Happy New Year, and I'll see you on the other side!
🌟 8 Key Takeaways
- Ride out the inevitable dips and plateaus: Ask, how can I fall in love with this again? Keep the bar high—strive for jump-out-of-the-chair-with-glee-to-record level of guests and topics.
- (Re)connect with the even more meaningful metrics: Don’t obsess over download numbers or charts. They can be instructive, but they don’t have to be the one-and-only indicator of whether or not to continue.
- 51/49: My antidote to inexplicable nerves and overthinking: 49% fear and anxiety, 51% take one small step forward. Just tip the scale toward action by two percent.
- Eyes on your own paper: Don’t get lost in what other people are doing or how fast they are going. Remind yourself what’s in it for you, regardless of what “the competition” is up to. There may even be downstream benefits of having others in the same space.
- Keep up with new software, don’t worry too much about sunk costs: While you want to avoid chasing shiny software objects, don’t be afraid to jump from one lily pad to the next when it improves your systems and process.
- Hire help! To truly achieve consistency escape velocity, hire a team so that someone else owns the outcome and you can show up and do what only you can do.
- Go your own way: Be aware of diminishing returns on shiny shoulds that, if you were to chase them, would stop you from doing the creative thing you enjoy altogether.
- Keep experimenting—one might say pivoting! There is no there there. The project will evolve alongside you, even when you lose steam for a little bit. You will always find a new way forward. And if you’re so stuck you truly can’t see straight, it’s okay to call it quits too.
🔗 Resources Mentioned
- Articles: Rolling in D🤦🏻♀️h—The Business Yips & 51/49
- Tools: Substack app, Kajabi, Notion, Riverside.fm, Descript
- Loom Walkthrough: Day in the Life of a Podcast Episode
📚 Books Mentioned
- Free Time: Lose the Busywork, Love Your Business
- Pivot: The Only Move That Matters Is Your Next One
- Life After College
🎧 Related Episodes
- Pivot: 281: Feeling Impostery? Become a Qualified Curator Instead of an End-All-Be-All Expert
- Pivot x Career Pathfinder podcast episodes with Adrian (Spotify playlist)
- 346: Finding Clarity While Navigating Change with Marc Lesser
- 342: “Whatever Comes Through Me Comes for Me First,” with Nicole Antoinette
- Free Time: 241: Finding Freedom and Financial Reciprocity through a Paid Newsletter with Nic Antoinette
- 181: Be Irreplaceable with My Creative Coach Jay Acunzo
- 223: The Confidence Trap: Why You Don’t Need It to Do Big Things (SPARKED Crossover)
- 180: 📉 Diminishing Returns and the True Costs of Shiny Shoulds
- 138: ⛵️Stop Sailing the Sea of Shiny Shoulds
- 196: 🍩 What Do Donuts, Coffee, Conversation, and Energy Cliffs Have in Common?
- 130: Day in the Life of a Podcast Episode + How I Prepare for Guests
📝 Check out full show notes and share with friends: https://itsfreetime.com/episodes/254
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