BONUS: "When you put it down on paper, you put it down..."

In the spirit of the new year, we're sharing our aspirations. What are yours?

In a recent production meeting, Michelle, Amanda and Joan asked: "What's your hope for this podcast?" This BTS bonus episode begins to answer that question... 

Some highlights below:

Joan:
"It had to have catharsis, but also have catharsis with meaning [outside of us]. I feel like just a bitch session for us would not be meaningful to listeners and also readers...So it's important to like to meaningfully share something, to establish who we - all the three of us - are, actually, to see if people want to continue on this journey with us and to bring people along as we go. But people are now listening to the foundational episodes and I think that's important to establish character and experience and see if anything resonates with people."

Amanda:
"I've been thinking about the catharsis that comes from creation a lot within the past, actually the past 24 hours, 48 hours. I was speaking with a friend of mine who's an author and we had brunch and it was really nice and we were talking about how well. I'm writing memoir right now and how there was one piece in particular that I had been carrying around for a really, really long time about a situation when I was very young and I wrote it and a very strange thing happened to me at least that you know, I think people talk about but they don't talk about as openly as they should is - that when you put it down on paper, you put it down and you're able to carry on."

Michelle: "But you know that's a process, for lots of things is to just... put it down and then see what pieces of it you wanna pick up to go on your next journey, and that's for me it's very much that process. And then the bonus of seeing where it can go and what it brings out in people and if there's a community that we can help foster or connect to other communities talking about similar things, that's really exciting and it's been exciting to not be afraid to put our whole selves out there."

Find more at proofingstage.com
Follow us on Instagram and Threads @proofingstage

See Buzzsprout's Privacy Policy for listener privacy and read our disclaimer here.

Transcript

Amanda: 0:00

We were talking about our hopes for the podcast that I'm interested in what you guys have to say because you know it's your baby.

Joan: 0:09

To some degree, I feel like the nexus, the beginning point, is more of like a baby or the other thing that we have done. It had to have catharsis, but also have catharsis with meaning [outside of us]. I feel like just a bitch session for us would not be meaningful to listeners and also readers. Hello, transcript people, we care about you too.

Joan: 0:27

Amanda: "Hello, Joan: we give you a lot of time. So it's important to like to meaningfully share something, to establish who we - all the three of us - are, actually, to see if people want to continue on this journey with us and to bring people along as we go. But people are now listening to the foundational episodes and I think that's important to establish character and experience and see if anything resonates with people.

Michelle: 0:47

So you gave a very answer, like you gave an answer very much for the audience, which is good. Joan: "It's motivating, My, I mean, if I'm gonna be transparent, I will say that you know we've reached this point. I think, like we talked to you about when we first started, where the next step wasn't clear. Though when is the next step ever really clear? These are obviously conversations and thoughts we've had for years, and so the intent was always to capture them in some way. But it wasn't until our chat with you that it was like oh, maybe, instead of like writing this all down, maybe we can do a pod or maybe it can be more open and have an opportunity to invite other people in. But to me, like it's equal parts capturing, like where we've been and what we've done, both so that we can leverage it for future opportunities, whether those are for BUB or for BUB- adjacent or stepping stones to a career that combines all of our past lives, for whatever's next. But it was also just to be able to move on from some of these things too, like that, and I guess that's where the catharsis piece comes in. It's like just knowing that some of this stuff has been put to paper or put to voice is important, I think, for both of us to be able to say, okay, like you know not like been there, done that, it's over.

Michelle: 2:15

But you know that's a process, for lots of things is to just like put it down and then see what pieces of it you wanna pick up to go on your next journey, and that's for me it's very much that process. And then the bonus of seeing where it can go and what it brings out in people and if there's a community that we can help foster or connect to other communities talking about similar things, that's really exciting and it's been exciting to not be afraid to put our whole selves out there. That's something we often talk about. Joan is better at doing than I am and it's been interesting for probably the first time in my life to be like. This is what it is. You know it's not the best thing, it's not the worst thing. It's what it is, and if it works for you, that's awesome, and if it doesn't, it's still worthy, you know.

Amanda: 3:12

That's right. I was thinking about. I've been thinking about the catharsis that comes from creation a lot within the past, actually the past 24 hours, 48 hours. I was speaking with a friend of mine who's an author and we had brunch and it was really nice and we were talking about how well. I'm writing memoir right now and how there was one piece in particular that I had been carrying around for a really, really long time about a situation when I was very young and I wrote it and a very strange thing happened to me at least that you know, I think people talk about but they don't talk about as openly as they should is - that when you put it down on paper, you put it down and you're able to carry on. And you were talking about those. You know those moments of catharsis during the pod where you were able to talk about something and learn about the things and it almost feels like you put it out there, it's created, it's dropped and now I can. It exists somewhere, it doesn't have to live in my head anymore, so I can move on and take the next steps, and I think that that's a real gift that writers have in particular that.

Amanda: 4:20

And journalists I'm not a journalist, I'm journal keepers, people who you know, who write memoir, or it's a gift because it - much to your point. You know I'll put it out there. If you don't like it, it's fine with me, because ultimately I'm the first one who benefits. And if you know, but you also find out that you put it out there and other people, it does resonate with other people. It kind of renews your hope that we are all connected in some way and can relate in some way. That's very human and it makes us feel, you know, maybe more compassionate towards one another or just simply more connected to one another. So yeah, I think the creative process for people who don't feel as though they're creative, they should just try it for the sake of mental sanity. Michelle: "Yeah, mental sanity and growth, doesn't matter how it turns out.

Michelle: 5:13

That's right, and I think too, this form of creating. Creating, too, I think, when it comes to, I mean, obviously, meeting you and talking with you, but then thinking about our story and thinking about all of these things that we've wanted to capture, you know, at one point we're like maybe it's an op-ed or maybe it's a book or you know, and it might still be those things. But also, knowing Joan's strengths and desires as a creative all her own, I think this format is wonderful for giving people a little taste of that and seeing where it could lead in other ways as well.

Amanda: 5:55

That's right.

Michelle: 5:58

So, all over, well, what are your? I mean, you were.

Amanda: 6:01

Oh, I was hoping I was going to dodge the question.

Michelle: 6:03

I mean no, you're in the. Joan: "I mean, we're in the same room you thought

Joan: 6:07

You could, like, chop me in the larynx.

Amanda: 6:09

Joan: "You know ch-chop and like bounce I mean I could cut it from the edit. But yeah, I think you know I did a pod around this time last year. I released it and I'm thinking about re-releasing adding some more content to it. It's, it was called aspirations and what become of them, and a lot of it was wrestling with my own choices many years ago, deciding that I didn't want to go into radio as a career, and it was something that all throughout college it was.

Amanda: 6:42

You know, it was in the back of my mind that, you know, I'd possibly go to a radio station, try to find a place that might want somebody like me, and it became glaringly apparent after I graduated that it just was not going to work out. Satellite radio was coming into vogue and radio stations were dropping left, right and center. I, you know, didn't feel as though I could find very strong mentorship. You know, perhaps if I had a dick I would have been okay, but a lot of times I put myself in positions where I'd say, "oh, I want to do this, this and this, and you know the person who looked back at me said, well, you can do a voiceover, but you have to raise your voice a little, you have to kind of sound sexy and you have to do this, and I'm like "I don't think this is going to work, like I'm just trying to be myself.

Amanda: 7:30

So I packed that away for so many years and then I came to Ohio where I was left with basically nothing I had. I had Mended, which at the time was solely web design, marketing, that kind of stuff, and I didn't have any friends here. I had my kids at home because of COVID and all of these other, you know, things that were kind of thrown in my way. So I decided to begin to focus on the passions that I had had years ago to see if I could find something. And it started with joining the May Festival Chorus. So I sing with chorus that performs with the Baltimore Symphony. Ugh, the Baltimore Symphony

Joan: 8:10

You mean?

Amanda: 8:10

to me the Cincinnati Symphony. So we performed the Cincinnati Symphony in Pops and, you know, that's been wild because I thought that I was a pretty good singer and damn, this thing has schooled me left, right in center and I've learned so much. It's so great to be in my, you know, coming into my late 40s knowing that there is so much to learn about something that I love has been wonderful.

Amanda: 8:37

So I did that. I joined a group called Women Writing for a Change, which was when I started writing memoir, and they're a women led writing organization in Cincinnati as well - I was taking online lessons. And then a Seth Godin offering came through for learning how to podcast. The price was right and I'm like let's let's see what I could do with it. So it's been like this exploration of what I can make on my own, and it's interesting to be away from the forces that I would have felt really embarrassed to do this in front of.

Amanda: 9:12

I didn't realize as much as I love Baltimore, I love, love Baltimore. What was sitting in front of me there was keeping me and stifling me from expressing myself as myself, because I was very different than a lot of the people. I am very different than a lot of the people that I had come to associate myself with through, mostly through relationships with my children. I was not the - you know, I had a lot of like alpha females around me and I - that is just not me. And, you know, I felt embarrassed and stifled and you know my husband was traveling a lot too, so I couldn't leave the house to do certain things because I'd be - I was with the kids.

Michelle: 9:54

Yeah.

Amanda: 9:55

And that's really been just growing my abilities and, you know, it's kind of like a really great quilting project, right? Or something like a hobby that you're like well, I'm pretty good at this and I can make the stitches, but can I do this paneling? Can I do this? You know, it's just how good can I get this to be. And that's solely personal. I also love exploring the, the ideas of work and what people do for work. Whether work needs to be meaningful. That's a very new construct in society - is work as meaning, work as joy? That that is a, and what. What is that? I mean? Do I teach my children to look for joy in their work or do I teach them to just do work that's good and separate, you know? So those kind of themes I'm really, I'm really excited to explore and always love to explore. So you know, this kind of this project definitely scratched an itch and continues to do so.

Joan: 11:03

Yeah, thank you for sharing that. It was very thorough and well thought out for someone who was going to pass on this.

Amanda: 11:10

I've always got something packed in there. That's the problem with my brain. It's never really resting.

Michelle: 11:19

No, I hear that. [I] Got two hours of sleep last night.

Michelle: 11:22

Yep no, but it's so true and your last point really sticks with me too, about meaning and work and joy and all of that, because I think that's part of at least the point that I'm in right now is that I've never approached work from any other vantage point than that. And so there is, you know, there is a little bit of a reckoning at a time when more people are on board with that, but it seems like, well, I guess it depends if you've been in the workforce a long time. There is some deeper maybe. There has never been that approach and now it's time to like. You know, there is a reckoning post COVID and all of that.

Michelle: 12:06

I feel like younger workers, you know, are thinking that because - why not - and the world has changed. But also younger workers are often more idealistic at least in the fields that I've been in are more idealistic and more searching for that from jump. And then, you know, reality sets in a little bit, but that's a lot of what this time is, too, and I feel like, what did you say? There's like 1000 podcasts, or I, there's a stat, there's like 1000 podcasts [launched] an hour or something, but I feel like there's still room for people's voice. I mean, that's the point, right, there's still room for people's voices and people's stories, and I think that's a beautiful thing. I mean, there's tons of garbage, of course, there's garbage everywhere, but even that has its audience right? So it is an interesting time. I'm excited to see where this can go beyond just the story of our entrepreneurial journey thus far, and you know larger, larger topics and guests and who knows.

Joan: 13:07

I do like the fact of like there's so much that we don't say in every episode where you can have a separate episode, unpacking a specific thing by kind of like understanding what people want to hear before just putting stuff out there. I mean, you could, I, you know, I definitely have visions of writing up a screenplay, or other type of work that's gonna be mostly comedic about a shared kitchen, because it's just like people love workplace stories, and I feel like it's something so unique and different and this would not be like shows was like The Bear - which I have not seen and don't intend to - but, but there's just so much that we're like that we're leaving, but I would rather have them be a little more jam- packed. And then people can, we can like zoom out of something it's hard to like. I mean this is like years of work and experiences and then in anywhere from like 45 minutes to like an hour 15, come on.

Amanda: 13:56

Yeah.

Michelle: 13:57

Yeah, and everything you just shared, right, like I mean where's the? You know that's its own thing. I mean there's just lots, there's lots.