Well, this is my first ever blog post. I've done a lot of writing over the years, but I've never "blogged." And quite honestly, I'm not a fan of the word blog, and I'm not sure why. But that's why I changed the name of this page to simply, "Ramblings." It's more of a true statement anyhow.
And I'm not sure how often I'll do this, but on to the real conversation; how we started this podcast.
This all started two years ago, when the worldwide pandemic started. Everything got shut down, everyone's lives changed and that included all of us that are in recovery. Those of us that used to go to meetings in-person, no longer had that. Granted, the recovery community adapted just like everyone else and Zoom meetings popped up which we're pretty cool, and obviously convenient.
I did zoom meetings for quite a while, and when I was back in Cleveland visiting friends I went to in-person meetings. I never changed my daily routine and with several years under my belt, I was able to stay sober.
But something was missing. I didn't feel like I was complete anymore and it took me months to figure it out, but I needed to add something to my recovery.
In October of 2021, Dave Grohl of the Foo Fighters released a book, and since I've been a fan of his and the band for years, I ordered a hard cover copy. About a day or so after I got it, I also found out that it was on Audible, so I started listening to it on my way home from work. It did a couple of things for me; First of all it was a great book and a great story, but it also occupied my brain and reduced some of my commutig stress on the way home. It was one of the coolest things that I ever chose to do.
When I was done listening to that book, I had a thought. I wondered what audio books might be available about recovery? I did a quick search and I found a podcast that I started listening to. The episodes range from 40 minutes to 55 minutes and my commute on the way home is roughly 30 to 40 minutes. So I could listen to a full episode every day or part one day, and finish it up the next, and then start on a new one.
What I ended up doing, was setting up a mobile meeting for myself, every single day. It was perfect. It filled the void that I had, and I'm still doing it to this day. (about 5 months later)
As I'm listening to this podcast, not only am I getting great recovery information, but I had another thought:
"Hey! Mike and I could do this!"
And so it began. I can't remember when I mentioned it to Mike, but it might have been at Thanksgiving? And he was all for it. Either way, I kept listening and pulling together ideas. One of those was joining Instagram, because I heard that there's a lot of recovery people on there and that it's a great way to build followers for a podcast. So I did that.
I set up one page, then we talked about a name and I set up another page. We started promoting it, and then we found a website where we can produce it. Then there's all the editing, how to hook it up to Spotify and how to get it on other podcast sites like Google Podcasts and ultimately Apple Podcasts.
We recorded one episode, then another, and another and now we're up to 5 episodes as I'm writing this. We now have a dedicated website, a YouTube page, a Facebook page and we're slowly building content on all of them. It's been a hell of a run so far but I'm going to be honest. It took a little bit of money (not much actually), and if I add everything up, it has taken a hell of a lot of time.
However, every single dollar spent and every single minute spent has been well worth it. We are having a great time doing all of this and it has filled that void that I talked about earlier, even more.
So what now? What do we want out of all of this? That answer is simple and I can say it without hesitation. More.
I always wanted more when I was drinking, and when I got sober I wanted more (and still do) and after we started this and things started progressing, the same thing applies. We want more.
We would like more followers, more listeners, more growth in maybe areas that we don't even know about yet.
And hopefully this goes without saying, but we want to be able to help people. Even if only one word or one statement or one story out of every podcast helps one person, then that's all that matters.
So what do you think? Do you want to start a podcast now? Do you think it's worth it? And what will it take?
I have a simple answer that is very popular in the recovery community. The answer to all of those questions is...
What are you willing to do? It's just that simple.
