Dreamer and Creator
I Created a Podcast!
December 26, 2022
It's human to envy successful people and try to mimic them without considering what they went through to achieve their goals. Then when we start doing the same, we feel disappointed when we fail on our first try. In today's podcast, Gabriela Brunner of The New Firm reminds us that there's no shortcut to success. It takes grit, confidence, some cheerleaders, and letting go to see the magic unfold. If you need a little motivation to get back on track with one of your goals, then keep on listening.
[00:00:13.390] - Gabriela Brunner
How are you today on this fantastic Monday? I am sitting here in my new home. I think it's funny that ice cream right here because ice cream makes everybody happy, right? My babies are down for a nap. Fingers crossed that they stay down for a while.
 
[00:00:33.170] - Gabriela Brunner
And I really felt inspired to come on and share a little bit about the actual process of how the podcast came to be. One of the things that I've noticed throughout my 37 years on this Earth is that we don't always see anything but the end result. And so then it makes us feel like we should be able to do something or we have to do something or it needs to look a certain way because we never get to see how it actually happened or how long it took somebody. It literally feels like from 1 second to the next, there was no podcast. And then there was or, there was no retreat and then there was or book or whatever, right?
 
[00:01:22.190] - Gabriela Brunner
So first of all, the very first thing was that of course, the moment that I became aware of podcasts, I thought, wow, I'm going to have a podcast and I'm going to do this and I'm going to do this and it's going to be this, and it's going to happen on a weekly basis and all this kind of stuff. And then I just kind of let it go because I just wasn't ready for it. Probably had other things to do. And then fast forward to when I joined Angels of Intuition, the sisterhood and mastermind in 2016. And one of the women, Tyla, was creating and launching a podcast with one of her best friends, Sally.
 
[00:02:02.150] - Gabriela Brunner
And I must admit that I got a little podcast envy, right? Because I was like, well, if they can do it, I can do it. And essentially what was happening was I was mimicking what they were doing. So you know how that happens. Like when you see somebody who's having success or you perceive somebody to have success, they do.
 
[00:02:24.220] - Gabriela Brunner
But when you perceive somebody to have success, it's like you want to have success as well. So you try to do what they're doing. You don't really even know what they're doing, but you just try and do it. So in my mind, I was taking up a lot of space and energy thinking, well, I am going to create a podcast. I'm going to have weekly guests.
 
[00:02:46.860] - Gabriela Brunner
Mind you, at the time I was working full time, I was running my business. I have two young kids, really. There wasn't very many hours left over in the day. And so I was putting a lot of pressure on myself and I actually thought about it a lot more than I probably cared to admit. And I beat myself up a lot for it because I thought, well, why can't I do it?
 
[00:03:11.650] - Gabriela Brunner
Why isn't this coming together like it is for them? And why can't I make something look as good as they're doing? And blah, blah, blah. So with some time and with some support from my sisterhood and my coach and all that stuff, I started to let go of the idea that I had to have a podcast and I would kind of hold on to it, again and again, every now and then. But I kind of started to let go, just in general of my process of learning to let go and let things happen in their own time.
 
[00:03:48.350] - Gabriela Brunner
I started to let go of the idea that I had to have a podcast and it had to look a certain way, that it had to be weekly, that it had to blah, blah, blah.
 
[00:04:00.950] - Gabriela Brunner
Other things started to happen, other things started to fall into place. Like I wanted a specific logo made and the way that that came to be. And then I kind of didn't really use it for anything. And then it turned out several months later that it was the logo for the podcast. Then all of a sudden, I remember getting an idea to invite one person, like the names of people, the people that I wanted to be on the podcast, like, all their names started to pop into my mind.
 
[00:04:29.670] - Gabriela Brunner
And so I literally kept a note in my phone and just put down all their names as I came to them. And then it stopped at eight people. And so it was really interesting because I was like, of course there's like a billion people that I'd love to talk to. But it was like a number that felt really good. And so it felt like, okay, can I even pull it off?
 
[00:04:50.510] - Gabriela Brunner
Just being a short-term podcast, right? Just like eight weeks, maybe never being more than that, maybe yes, maybe no. And then I just had to let it be. And I reached out to the first guest and he said yes. And he gave me a lot of really good information.
 
[00:05:10.300] - Gabriela Brunner
He's like, how are you going to market it? How are you going to do this? How do you blah, blah, blah. So all of them, my wheels are turning. And then I started to understand that again, I was like gripping and trying to hold on to something that I had no control over.
 
[00:05:25.310] - Gabriela Brunner
Then I started scheduling the podcast guests and I thought that I was going to be done, that I was going to do the podcast in June and we'd be ready to launch in July and it would be fantastic. And then nobody was scheduling the first person schedule until the end of June, the very last day of June, actually. And then that first day I had three people scheduled and I get all ready for the first one. I learned how to use the system. My dear friend Sally, who's one of the hostesses of a year ago Today podcast, she walked me through it.
 
[00:06:04.120] - Gabriela Brunner
She taught me. I had copious notes. I'm like, okay, we're doing this. We're doing this and doing this. And then we get to record.
 
[00:06:10.370] - Gabriela Brunner
And the guests could hear me, but I could not hear her. And I was like, what is going on? I have three people scheduled today. This is crazy. And it's amazing because I reached out to Sally and she was like, okay, this is what I'm hearing.
 
[00:06:26.490] - Gabriela Brunner
You need to have a dance party. You need to reevaluate why you're doing this podcast. And she said, don't reach out to me until you've done those things. So I actually put the music on really loud. Ricky Marting in Maluma put the music on super loud in my ears.
 
[00:06:43.770] - Gabriela Brunner
And I was dancing in the middle of this private room in the library. And I remember connecting and just asking the question, what is the heart of my podcast? And very clearly, I heard, it's not about you, it's about your guests. It's about showcasing your guests. It's about hearing their story and portraying their story in the best light possible.
 
[00:07:11.190] - Gabriela Brunner
And then I was guided to take a break, like, go eat, go do something, because I was going to go back to back to back. And then the second episode, who was actually the very first person that I had reached out to. I take that back. So there was one person that had to cancel. So it would have been the first episode had to cancel.
 
[00:07:33.120] - Gabriela Brunner
Then the day that I had three, that person couldn't hear me. And then I get until then, the person who would have been the third interview. So the first one that I reached out to was always meant to be the first episode. And so I feel like that's why that worked out that way. We recorded two episodes that day.
 
[00:07:51.220] - Gabriela Brunner
We had some technical issues. I remember recording Philly D's episode, and towards the end of it with batteries, and his headphones died, so he couldn't hear me. I could hear him, and he could still record. So I was like, typing the questions by the chat, and then he would respond. And then the amazing sound editor pieced it all together.
 
[00:08:13.350] - Gabriela Brunner
And so it was just so funny because amidst Internet issues and with Caitlin Edgar's episode, we had the same thing where I recorded a perfect episode in the morning and then in the afternoon, the Internet would not work. And so I had to reschedule Caitlin. And it was funny because it's like her episode came out so beautifully that I know that it was for a reason, right? And I remember having a conversation with Sally, and a year ago today, podcast has about almost 50 episodes. And she said, you know, out of the 50 episodes, we've had technical issues with maybe one or two of them, maybe three.
 
[00:08:55.080] - Gabriela Brunner
She said, So I really don't anticipate you having a problem. Well, let me tell you, every single episode I recorded, had a technical issue. And some of them I literally just had to pray that the sound quality would end up right, would end up audible on the other end. I remember recording Morgan Hamilton episode, and then at the end, that one got cut off at one point and we had to start over again or pick up from there, but start a new recording. And then I remember at the end her saying there were times where you were kind of in and out.
 
[00:09:32.700] - Gabriela Brunner
And I was like, oh my gosh, this episode is so amazing. What's going to happen if they can't hear me or if my voice sounds weird? And I was like, you know, I'm just going to trust that it's going to be good. I'm going to trust that it's going to work out.
 
[00:09:50.710] - Gabriela Brunner
And it did. And the reason why I'm sharing all of this is that so often we think that it's just super easy and super seamless and flawless. And one of the episodes, the platform just cut off the last three minutes of it. So my sound editor worked his magic and made it flow so it didn't sound like it just abruptly ended. And the thing, you just got to laugh and you got to go with the flow, and you got to realize that it's all part of the creation process and it's all here to guide us and teach us something.
 
[00:10:25.810] - Gabriela Brunner
And when you can do that, it just makes the whole thing that much sweeter. And even up until today, I was stressing out because I wanted to launch it on Friday, which was my mom's birthday, and I had all of this stuff ready, and I didn't have Internet in my home yet. And when I was home with my kids that day anyway, and I was trying to do things on my phone and really stressing myself out, making things more complicated than they needed to be. And then I just not very gracefully tried to let it go, but I still had it on my mind.
 
[00:11:05.270] - Gabriela Brunner
And then it turns out that I post everything and get it out there and then the link doesn't work for some reason because iTunes had hidden it and I couldn't figure out how to unhide it. And then I was trying to do it on my phone and that didn't work. And I just was stressing about the whole thing. And then last night I was like, I'm just going to go to bed. I'm going to let it go.
 
[00:11:28.920] - Gabriela Brunner
And then this morning, one of my dear sister friends told me that you can use your phone as a hotspot. And I had no idea that you could do that. And so I did that and was able to unhide the episode on my computer.
 
[00:11:43.670] - Gabriela Brunner
And then I was like, getting a couple of beautiful souls to test it for me to make sure that it worked. And so you got to take it all in stride, right? But I wanted to share all of that with you guys. Not to intimidate you, not to make you think that you can't have a podcast if that's something that you want or anything else, but to show you that when you hear it all beautifully put together, when you see the beautiful images, when you see the conversation flowing naturally, all of that is part of the creation process. And if you want to make it sound that way, you can.
 
[00:12:22.660] - Gabriela Brunner
You just have to keep going and get support and surround yourself by people who know what they're doing so that you don't have to unnecessarily stress yourself out with something and you can just focus on what you're creating. You can open up your creativity and focus on what you're creating and then let other people around you help you with the rest of it. For me. That was Sally. For me, that was Josh, the sound editor.
 
[00:12:45.060] - Gabriela Brunner
I almost did not have a sound editor because I thought, I'm not going to spend the money on it, I can do it myself. And then, oh, gosh, deeply celebrating that I hired somebody and that he turned out to be so amazing, and he's the voice of the intro and the outro for me. So it's just so many things. And some of you are curious about the podcast creation process, and please reach out to me if you'd like to know more about that. But I just wanted to talk to you guys about the process in general and kind of what I experienced over the last two months to really get this going and really more over the last year because it was kind of like a seed and then it started to drop and then to bloom, and then it became what it is now.
 
[00:13:29.470] - Gabriela Brunner
So thank you so much, you guys. Thank you for watching. Thank you for listening to the podcast. If you choose to, if you like it. Apparently it's a good thing to have a lot of five-star ratings, so I appreciate those if you really like it.
 
[00:13:46.060] - Gabriela Brunner
And yes, hope you guys have a beautiful day. I'll talk to you guys soon. Bye.