We’ve all heard the expression, “Find something you love, and you’ll never work a day in your life.” (As a quick aside, I had to laugh recently when someone said that to me in a “My mother used to tell me” way. I didn’t want to burst their bubble, but it was everything I could do to not say, “You know your mom wasn’t the originator of that, right?”)
This past Saturday marked the ten-year anniversary of the weekly “Now Hear This Entertainment” podcast. As I’ve told people about that, I haven’t once not included the fact that I’ve never missed once in all that time. In other words, on-time, every week since February 17, 2014.
Clearly, I’ve found something I love.
What about you? Do you love what you do or are you just okay with it? Because it’s one thing to cite expressions that have been around for some time, but it’s another to actually live them out.
Needless to say, I absolutely posted about the milestone all over social media: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Stage32, and Instagram, to be specific. And the comments that came back were just the cherry on top, although it meant a lot to me when I read words from the people who recognized the consistency and the devotion.
But it’s also my hope that they listen to and hear the quality of the show. By that I certainly mean the audio production, and it’s also hard to overlook the great guests that I’ve been fortunate to book. However, if you create music or if you too are a podcaster or perhaps you’re a YouTuber, do you listen to (or watch back) what you put out there? Assuming that you do, do you like what you hear (or see)?
There have been times when I’ve been listening back to a “Now Hear This Entertainment” interview and I find myself saying, “This is really a good show.” I’m proud of it. I feel that it has stood the test of time. I haven’t gotten lazy as the years have gone by. I’ve resisted putting it on autopilot and just mailing it in all for the sake of being able to say, “Well, at least I never missed a week, though.”
It’s part of loving your craft. It goes hand in hand with, “Find something you love, and you’ll never work a day in your life.” Yes, there is a lot of time and labor that goes into putting together each and every episode of the podcast. There’s no question about that. But it comes with the territory. If I were to take shortcuts, the final product would suffer, and I would be short-changing the audience.
So, I ask you again, are you all-in and have passion for what you do or are you just okay with the path you’re pursuing?
I often think of a TV show like, “Jimmy Kimmel Live.” Viewers keep coming back to his show night after night because they like him, they know there will be good guests, and it keeps them entertained. So, when someone asked me recently (upon hitting the ten-year anniversary milestone) if I ever think of quitting, I thought, “Why would I?” (Truth be told, I also thought, “Why would you ask that?!”) After all, having gotten listeners from 163 countries around the world and with NHTE being one of the top two percent most popular shows out of more than 3.2 million podcasts worldwide, I’d like to think that the audience keeps coming back to my show for the same reasons they remain loyal to Jimmy Kimmel – they like me, they know there will be good guests, and NHTE keeps them entertained.
Have you recently hit a milestone? Is there one coming up? Or do you find yourself saying, “Oh gosh, I better not still be doing this x amount of time from now?”
Hit me up on a ten-minute call and tell me about your passion for what you do (and maybe a recent significant accomplishment or one that’s upcoming) OR what you’d rather shift to instead of what you’re doing now – and why. For twenty years now I’ve been helping indie music artists, authors, actors and actresses, small businesses, entrepreneurs, and podcasters from around the U.S. Take advantage of all my experience to better position yourself to fuel the passion for your craft.