(Warmup) Practice Session #2

Thanks for checking out my show notes! I’ll be utilizing this to clarify and elaborate on points that I didn’t convey as well as I would’ve liked to. I’ll also provide links to further information and resources.

Intro.

I’ll be interspersing all of this with the transcription from the audio, which will be displayed like this:

[00:00]

CK: Heyo. I’m CK and you’re listening to Practice. This is my podcast where practice is not just the theme of the show, but also the purpose behind it. I’m basically practicing podcasting and speaking in general. I’ll be talking about my experience with this process, along with various lifestyle practices, as well as theories and ideas behind the virtue of practice itself.

What you’ll be listening to here is my second recording for this podcast, which was originally recorded on the 8th of March, 2020. Going along with the whole theme of practice, I have since determined this to be the second of three warmup episodes, and the others as well as the first real episode should be available in the feed shortly.

As I mentioned in the first warmup episode, I’m borrowing from the agile software development methodology and adapting on the fly. Aside from this intro and the outro, everything will be unedited, so my progress will be fully transparent. So I hope this will be of some interest, especially if you’re curious about getting into podcasting yourself or if you’re looking to broaden your perspective on self-improvement.

For more details, check out ForcesOfEqual.com/Practice and feel free to hit me up on Twitter @cKdisco. And with that, we’re on to the second warmup episode.

I created that intro the week after the third recording session, which is the episode where I decided to designate the first three episodes as warm-up episodes.

Let’s get it on.

So, here is where the original recording starts:

[01:13]

CK: Okay. Hello and welcome back to Practice. This is the second episode and we are winging it again. So, I have Pam back on with me, and we’ve agreed to have her on officially as my sidekick.

Pam: Hey, everybody.

🙌 Thank goodness! As we go on, you’ll see how much help she is for me in terms of keeping me on track. The added perspective she provides on my half-thoughts also help me remember other vectors of those thoughts that I want to convey.

[01:38]

CK: So I guess does this being episode 2 make it officially a practice now?

Pam: Um, I don’t know. What’s the definition of a practice?

CK: I’m not sure. Should we look that up real quick?

Let’s see… Oh, I had to unplug my keyboard.

😬 Great start to the episode, eh? My workstation setup is all out of whack right now with all the music and podcasting hardware I’m trying to figure out. So, please bear with all the technical issues!

[01:57]

CK: Okay, here we go. Well, let’s see… fIrst result on Google in the onebox says “the actual application or use of an idea, belief or method as opposed to theories relating to it.”

That’s… .

Pam: I don’t think there’s going to be an answer to this…

CK: Yeah…

Pam: We’re going to get a bunch of results of how long it takes to form a habit, but not…

CK: Right, right.

Pam: …what it takes for something to be considered a practice.

CK: I mean… “the actual application”… We’re actually applying what we’re wanting to practice. So I guess. I mean, that would make the first time a practice too. So maybe this being the second time is putting it on its way to becoming a habit.

Pam: Sure.

CK: Yeah. Well… Yeah, we’ll hash that out more later.

😨 Holy cow… My brain was running through so many tangents about practicing and habit formation, and then the synapses to my vocal system got crossed right there. This tends to happen, and it’s one of the things I want to improve upon with this process.

💡 I suppose the fundamental distinction here is theory versus application. The application is the practice.

Let’s get right into pushing my brain’s bandwidth to 100.

[02:52]

CK: But I guess I’ll start out by saying this whole quote-unquote “practice” for me and how we’re approaching this as a podcast and just kind of winging it live and just doing it and getting out there… It’s really on the complete opposite side of the spectrum of how I typically operate. And especially in any kind of fashion where I can be evaluated like this, where you know it’s going to be going out to the public.

So it’s really interesting to just put myself out there like this and it’s- I can already feel that it’s doing something. It’s working something, and it’s kind of sparking something in my brain because I’ve really been eager to record this ever since we stopped recording last week, and I’ve been kind of amped up about the whole project.

So that first night after the first episode, I couldn’t even fall back asleep when I woke up, like at three 30 in the morning. And so typically, uh, over these winter seasons, I tend to get up in the middle of the night and I found that, you know. I’ll stay up for about an hour, hour and a half or so, sometimes longer.

Sometimes I’m not able to get back asleep, but it’s been working out where it’s been- become such a routine that I figured, you know, I might as well take this hour and do something with it, because if I’m going to be up for that long, you know, I don’t want to be just lying there trying to go to sleep.

But on the night after the first episode. I was up and you know, I was up for awhile and I couldn’t fall back asleep because I was just thinking about what else we could be doing. And you know, I was, you know, kind of rehashing and reviewing what we talked about… As you do.

And the- I started realizing, you know, about two hours passed or so, and it was becoming, you know, five-thirty or six o’clock, the sun was about to come up. And I saw the sky starting, starting to get brighter, so, and usually I would have tried to stay in bed and get like another hour of sleep or so, but something about the whole thing, and starting this whole process made me realize that, you know, I might as well get up. I’m up already. This is- I, you know, I’ve gotten around- I’ve gotten up around this time before anyway, and this way I can force my body into a mode where I add more sleep pressure so that I’ll sleep more restfully the next night.

So I was thinking ahead towards the next night, instead of, you know, trying to go back to sleep and trying to feel better right there and get that immediate gratification. So I don’t know if it was from this whole process and like, I might be just overthinking it, but-

And that’s just kind of a random example. But, I’ve been totally productive this entire week. I- so, you know, one of the things that I wanted to get out of this podcast was to force me into more of a productive mode. Well, not necessarily “productive” because I’m generally productive and I stay on top of my practices that I have in place for that… to remain productive.

But now I’m in more of a production mode. And not necessarily publishing yet, but I’ve been producing and I’ve been in that creative mode and I’ve been getting things done and I just have everything- everything seems to be coming together, and the gears are working and functioning and just kind of pumping along and…

Where am I going with this?

Pam: You were saying that just recording the first episode is already having a positive impact on your output and your mood and everything kind of working together.

CK: Yeah, exactly. Thank you for getting me back on track. That’s why we have you on here.

😬 Eeeeeek! This is why I need Pam with me!

So, that was a result of my brain going on to make another tangent salad. While all those words were coming out of my mouth, I was wondering how deep I should go into sleep science and whether or not I was being pedantic. That’s why it came out all disjointed and inarticulate.

👉 The whole point was supposed to be that I’m already experiencing a shift in my mentality.

Keeping it agile and adapting on the fly!

[07:28]

CK: So… to continue along with that. I haven’t even published the first episode yet, so we’re doing this… It’s the next week, and this is the second episode. And I meant to publish it. I was hoping to have it out sometime over the past week, but I knew it was gonna take me a while to get things out there because really we just threw it all together in, you know, the whole thing, like I mentioned, or like we mentioned last weekend that, you know, I warned you like 45 minutes in advance of when we were starting to do this.

And so I’ve been kind of looking more into the whole podcasting process. And you know, this is- this is what I do. I start something and if I’m getting into something, I want to know everything about it. And I want to- if I’m going to do it, I want to do it perfectly.

But, you know, this process of practice and getting things out there… according to a more agile process, like I mentioned last week with agile development in terms of getting things out with a minimum viable product and just kind of iterating on the fly. So I guess I’m kind of doing that and it’s kind of a hybrid because, you know, I can’t help doing all the research and analysis that I am used to doing.

I mean, that’s just my baseline. So, you know, we’re- I’m going to try to do this on the fly as much as possible, but inevitably I’m going to be prepared in other ways and maybe moving forward, I’ll have more of an agenda, but this is only episode two and we’re adapting as we go along. And so I guess we’ll see how it goes.

✔️ A key point here is that creative productivity is all about the progress principle.

It’s all about energies and feedback.

[09:19]

CK: But I guess when it all comes down to it, the whole thing I’m trying to get from this is. Some kind of feedback, whether if it’s just feedback from Pam and it just ends up being us two, but hopefully not because I am going to publish this.

So hopefully I’ll get some feedback from listeners and others. But it’s just more of putting myself out there and getting my ideas, opinions… Just getting my voice heard. Because that’s just something that I really haven’t been doing over the past couple of years.

And you know, I haven’t been putting myself out there. I’ve just been collecting knowledge and studying and researching and analyzing and theorizing, hypothesizing. So I, you know, like I was talking about last week with the trans- trans theoretical model of behavior change…

You know, I want to take that next step from preparation to action. So this is me putting stuff into action and putting stuff out there. And hopefully some of it sticks and hopefully other things, you know, I’ll get some good feedback on and we’ll keep on iterating and improving and, and advancing and progressing.

So that’s basically the foundational principle of what I want to do, is just to put myself out there and get my voice out there and get feedback on it. And hopefully it’ll help in the general sense somehow. But. I know that this is going to help me because it already is.

And hopefully we can just make it a community type thing and you know, get these ideas out there and maybe someone will get some kind of influence from this and help- it’ll help them in some way.

So what do you think about that?

🤔 The concept of feedback in terms of a fundamental aspect of life is something I’ve found myself pondering a lot lately. I’m kind of trying to go toward first principles with this, and considering how systems (holons) interface with each other. There’s a lot for me to hash out. Hopefully, I can start making sense when I talk about this stuff.

[11:28]

Pam: Um, I think those are all great points. I think that there is a certain, um, energy and um, force that comes along with actually creating and producing something rather than researching how to produce it or thinking about it, or even, like, even doing the groundwork and putting stuff together, which, you know, we’ve both been doing quite a bit over the last year for our other podcast Equanimity.

I’ve spent tons and tons of time learning how to do storytelling and how to write for audio and all this stuff. And I- I know that I was making progress, but now that I’m like every single day sitting down and putting in 30 minutes of actual writing time and seeing something actually happening, it is creating a completely new energy in the rest of my day,

I’m getting tons of my regular work done because I want to have the time and energy to put into Equanimity. So it’s like, you know, get that done. You know, and obviously still do a good job, but like get the work done so that you can do the fun stuff.

Um, but also having the creative energy. Is making me more creative in everything else.

CK: Exactly. Yeah. And that’s what I think that this project is doing for me. It’s catalyzing that creative energy and putting me into that production mode and getting me more comfortable with publishing stuff. Which again, I haven’t done yet, but I will, and I’m getting more comfortable with it.

Updates on the Practice podcasting process.

[13:01]

CK: So maybe on that note, I’ll kind of explain some of the ideas that I’ve had. So right now I’m working on the web presence for this project and our creative- constructive media umbrella in general. So our- We’re calling our podcast or create- constructive media group Forces of Equal, and that’s for Pam and I. And under it we are going to publish Equanimity, which is the other podcast we’ve been talking about, as well as this podcast Practice.

And that rings a bell… just to reiterate the whole process of putting myself out there, like you were saying with Equanimity… We’ve been working on that for like a year and a half just about now, and we’re still in like development mode and we’ve been doing a lot of preparation for it in terms of, you know, how to develop podcasts and stories and even editing and production and all that kind of stuff.

So we’ve been in preparation mode with that for the past year and a half. Whereas this, I pretty much got, it’s started up in a couple hours. And so like I was saying with the thing being on the completely opposite side of the spectrum of how I typically operate, that’s the perfect example.

But to get back to my… process of building the web presence. So I’m building the website for Forces of Equal and that will house Equanimity and Practice. And what I’m doing is I’m going to have the episodes as individual posts and we’ll have a transcript for every episode.

And within the transcript, what I’m going to do is kind of intersperse additional information. That, you know when I go back and if there’s something I could clear up or provide a reference for or elaborate on, I’m going to do that right within the transcript for the episode show notes. So you can go to ForcesOfEqual.com, eventually, when I get this up, and get all the information there and any additional information or follow up.

So that kind of actually helps me get over some anxiety about doing this live as well, because it gives me an opportunity to go back and edit, per se. While, you know, we’re kind of doing this live and putting everything out there… You know, that’s, on one hand, I love that process for getting me over my own fears or struggles with talking and speaking or whatnot. But on the other hand, I’m stoked to have this option where I can follow up and provide additional information.

So the show notes are going to be pretty detailed in that effect. Eh- I’m not necessarily going to be adding much more information, but I’ll be linking up a lot of stuff and providing you with resources to check up on things or find more information yourselves.

On discovering some awesome podcasting software.

So… working on the web presence and… Oh, I discover new software, which is just totally blowing my mind right now. But I think one of the things I want to do with this podcast in general is to have a segment, or at least cover the- my progress with podcasting.

So with the first episode, we just got up like within an hour, and we’re using a software called Squadcast, and this basically allows me and pan, so we’re in the same house, but we’re in different rooms recording this.

So here’s a little sidebar. Here’s another example of how much we’ve been preparing. I think we’ve bought our microphones, like I would say…

Pam: Well, we were going to have another podcast. Well before we even knew about any of your anxiety or anything like that. We were going to do the health one. So it’s at least five years ago, if not more.

CK: At least… I’m thinking like 2013 or 2014, something like that. So we originally bought microphones to do a, uh, another different podcast around health in general, five/six/seven years ago. So we’ve had microphones and now we’re finally starting to do something with them. And so last week we got up with Squadcast, which allows us to see each other on video.

And it puts us on- we’re each using our own mics. We’re using Blue Yeti mics, which are arguably the best USB microphones out on the market right now – or the most practical for the price. And basically, that’s it.

That’s, you know, that’s all we needed to get up and going with the podcast. And so throughout the week, I’ve been trying to figure out, you know, how to publish and how to get the podcast transcribed. And I hit up our friend, Darryl King – @ireckon on Twitter – who we were talking to before, and he mentioned this awesome transcription service. And so I hit him up and he told me about Descript.

And if you guys are podcasting or doing anything that needs transcriptions, you guys need to check this out because it is awesome. And it’s- there’s a free option, which is what I’m using right now, and just check it out.

There’s a feature that they have that hasn’t come out yet, but it’s called Overdub. And what it’s basically gonna be able to do is… You’ll be able to edit the text within the transcript and that will edit the audio.

So. It uses AI to collect your voice and like your tone and your vocal inflection, and you know, everything. So it’s kind of like deep fake for your voice, for your own voice. So you’ll be able to go in and edit the text and it’ll just edit the audio.

Pam: So if you mispronounce a word or say the wrong thing, you can edit little mistakes like that to make it clearer for your listeners.

CK: Exactly. It’s mindblowing and that feature isn’t out yet. I believe it’s in beta right now, and I’m just learning about this whole thing, and I’ve just been using the service for a day or two right now, but it seems amazing. The UI is great, and the transcription part of it is awesome. It’s free. So, uh… What I’m using is free anyway, and what I’ve gotten from it is great.

I can’t say enough about it. I don’t think they have an affiliate program and this isn’t sponsored or anything. You know, this is just me finding an awesome product, but I would definitely check that out. If you’re looking for any kind of transcription and podcasting service along those- along that realm.

So, to sum that up, all we needed to get started with this podcast are:

• Blue Yeti mics
• Squadcast for recording from more than one source
• Descript for trascribing and editing/production

I’m going to be writing up a post on getting started with agile podcasting, so stay tuned for that!

Do I have to talk about myself?

CK: So let’s see, what else.

Pam: Do you want to talk about why you weren’t able to publish the first episode yet? Like were there technical things that you needed to learn or like what was that process like?

CK: Yeah, I guess for one, I got kind of ingrained into the web publishing stuff, the web presence. So building out the website and stuff like that.

Maybe we should talk about like my background and what I do. Should we go through that? Okay. So my main job for the past decade-and-a-half has been in online marketing.

And I’ve specialized in search engine optimization, but I kind of take a more holistic view per se. And like everything else I think- I see and think of things in complex systems and I see things functionally. And I like thinking in like systems and function and integration and first principles and stuff like that. Like bottom up processing.

So I basically take that idea and use it with my online marketing. So I like to build websites on the WordPress platform and optimize those websites for performance in search. So when people search for websites, and usually that means Google in the organic search area.

Pam actually does paid search… along with a whole bunch of other things.

Pam: I put ads in your Facebook feed.

CK: …Among other things.

Pam: …Among other things.

CK: So that’s been my main thing. But coming out of that, I’ve been working on a lot of health- a lot of things in the health realms and the health aspects. So I’ve been building a program on functional health, and hopefully this project will help catalyze (Practice) and help kind of help me get back into that project and get that out. Because there’s- I put a lot of work into and there’s so much good information and people should have it or have the opportunity to get it.

And let’s see what else. So I also do a lot of other things. I mean, I have so many hobbies. I’ve been big into soccer for awhile. And just health and fitness in general. And I volunteer. I’m the webmaster for Orange County Mensa, and I’ve been in Mensa since 2007, I believe. And through Mensa I got an opportunity to join a think tank per se. So every once in a while I’ll get projects for them and connect with other likeminded individuals or other people in the field to kind of brainstorm on different projects from corporations- various corporations.

So I have my hands in a lot of things, mainly online marketing in health. And so that’s why I’m big into the websites and building a web presence. And that’s kind of what occupied me in terms of this project over the past week.

And so maybe I didn’t have my priorities lined up, but I feel like I needed to get the web presence built up or you know, some kind of home base where people can visit and find out more about the show before I actually publish the show.

So that’s where I’m at.

😅 Well, that was difficult. I never really talk at once about all the different things I spend my time on, but I think I actually covered all my main pursuits there. For a better overview, check out my personal website at cKdisco.com.

Experiencing the transition from preparation to action.

[24:49]

Pam: I don’t think that that’s the wrong priority. Um, I think that you do need to have a home base, so if people want to find out more information, there’s somewhere for them to go.

But there’s also, on the other hand, something to be said for, um, when you’re learning something new and you’re trying to do something new, if there’s something else that you can do that you know how to do, you will do that other thing. So even though it was important, it probably, there was probably a part of you that was like, but I know how to build a website so I’ll build a website cause that other thing is new and hard.

CK: Yeah, that’s a great point and I think there may be some truth to that in terms of my decision-making around all this over the past week, but I’m okay with it. I’m having fun with it, and I know I’m eventually going to get around to getting this published. And I’m really stoked with the stuff that I’m designing on the site, and some other content that I have ideas and notes and drafts on.

So that all that stuff is in the pipeline. And let’s see, what else can we talk about? We have like five more minutes.

Pam: I dunno. I’m just, I’m really looking forward to seeing you in production mode and getting things out. I don’t, um, we have a history with this. Um, because you started developing a new website for your marketing consultancy about four years ago.

CK: Uh, yeah. At least.

Pam: At least that long ago. So, uh, and it’s still not live, and I think it’s probably been abandoned at this point, and you’re probably gonna start over from scratch probably when you get back to it.

CK: Well, actually, so that’s kind of been a part of what I’ve been working on over the past week as well. So this whole building of the web presence for “Practice” has gotten me building. Or revisiting my other things that I should have been working on or should have or have been working on for so long.

And it feels like, I mean, this is like- I keep trying to say everything- it sounds like, it seems like everything’s just coming together right now. It just seems like the perfect time for everything. And maybe on one hand it’s just all the preparation that I’ve been doing and me finally getting into this mode where I’m comfortable with putting stuff out there.

And so the more that I think about it, I just think about all the work that I’ve done and have continued doing and, you know, not having others, you know, see it.

So, yeah, I think this whole process has helped me. And you know, I’ve touched all like four of my website projects that I have that I want to get out there. Whereas, you know, three of them had been kind of on the wayside for, you know… weeks or months or…

Pam: A long time.

CK: So, yeah, this is so, yeah. Uh, I’m gonna have a lot of stuff coming out on the web all over the place. And yeah, this is definitely helping me in that respect.

So yeah, I mean, it’s already working and we haven’t even published yet. So, which isn’t, I mean, that’s not saying I’m not going to publish, because that’s part of the process, and that’s part of the point of this is to put myself out there, but it’s just kind of amazing that, you know, I’ve been able to get over some mental blocks or mental hurdles with this- a process this simple.

Stumbling into Stoic philosophy with Practice.

[28:40]

CK: And you know, actually one thing I did want to talk about is, uh, something that I’ve gotten back into recently is stoicism or the stoic philosophy. And it’s just an ancient philosophy… and I don’t know if I have a good enough grasp of it to explain it, but it’s back in the days of like Socrates and Marcus Aurelius and Epictetus.

And it’s basically just this ancient philosophy that is big on the ability to reason and ration- rationalize, or not rationalize, but be rational. And I want to say take the emotion out of situations to be able to see things as they are and…

Pam: Want want the definition?

CK: Oh sure.

Pam: It is the endurance of pain or hardship without the display of feelings and without complaint.

CK: Yeah. So… Yeah, that is a definition which I kind of push back against because it emphasizes like the process of thinking about the worst that could happen. Which is a good tactic, but I don’t like that being the emphasis of the philosophy.

So, you know, on one hand there’s a lot- a lot of evidence on mental contrasting and thinking of the worst outcomes and thinking about your obstacles and planning for them, which is kind of what that definition of stoicism is. But I like it- I like to think of stoicism more as like what I was trying to say, as kind of seeing that those things can happen, but also it’s the- it’s the emotional aspect of it that may prevent you from seeing the like those things, or, uh, like, you know, thinking about something that can happen in the future.

Um…

Pam: So like observing that something is or could be happening, but creating a space between the thing that is happening and your reaction to it.

CK: Yeah, exactly. Like, creating a space is a great way to put it. And, you know, there’s a lot that crosses over with like mindfulness and even meditation. Marcus Aurelius’ text is referred to as “Meditations.” So yeah, that’s a perfect way to put it. That’s kind of like the basics of it that I take from it.

Okay, so there were some wires being crossed there. The definition that Pam gave is the dictionary definition of the noun: “stoicism”.

Stoicism as a philosophy is defined as: an ancient Greek school of philosophy founded at Athens by Zeno of Citium. The school taught that virtue, the highest good, is based on knowledge; the wise live in harmony with the divine Reason (also identified with Fate and Providence) that governs nature, and are indifferent to the vicissitudes of fortune and to pleasure and pain.

I like how Wikipedia introduces Stoicism: a philosophy of personal ethics informed by its system of logic and its views on the natural world. According to its teachings, as social beings, the path to eudaimonia (happiness, or blessedness) for humans is found in accepting the moment as it presents itself, by not allowing oneself to be controlled by the desire for pleasure or fear of pain, by using one’s mind to understand the world and to do one’s part in nature’s plan, and by working together and treating others fairly and justly.

I also started going into some other cognitive tools, which I’m sure I’ll get into more as I get better with articulating my thoughts.

[31:34]

CK: Um, oh, so what I was, uh, what I wanted to get to in terms of Stoicism is that this whole process is kind of an expression of Stoicism in itself, because one of the big proponent- or one of the main principles of Stoicism is like journaling and reflection.

And journaling is actually something that I’ve been trying to get into for many years. You know, I’ve done it before and I’ve done it maybe for three months at the longest every day. And you know, I, for some reason, I just can’t. It’s not a practice that I’m able to sustain. And you know, as, as much as I want to do it… as much as I understand the benefits of it, I haven’t been able to journal, you know, pen to paper.

But I’ve gotten into journaling in different ways. And it’s not necessarily journaling in the conventional or, you know, dictionary definition sense, but it’s more just putting my- kind of putting my thoughts into a different format so I can reflect on ’em. Or, you know, even just reciting them, whether it’s through speech or you know, if it’s written, even just the process helps you reflect on, you know, what you’re outputting.

So I’m. Kind of seeing this process as kind of like a journaling process per se, in terms of putting my thoughts out there and reflecting on them. So I like how that aligns with my philosophy, my philosophies. But yeah, I mean, I think that’s all I want to say about it. I just want to make that point.

Okay, let’s bring it home.

[33:21]

CK: And with that, we’re over half an hour, so man, there’s so much more I could talk about, but maybe next time I’ll come up with a little bit more of an agenda so we can keep things organized and have some talking points so I’m not all wondering what I’m talking about.

Pam: I think talking points, and I think when I listen to shows where it’s just like people talking, I like to know that there’s like sections, so I know this part is going to be about this kind of thing, and so it kind of like breaks it up a little bit, so…

CK: Yeah. Keeping it agile and we’ll adapt. So, okay, until next time we will see you then. I’m so bad at these sign outs. Yeah. Toodaloo!

Outro

[34:09]

CK: Okay. I need to work on that. Sign off. Anyway, thanks for listening to the second warmup episode of Practice. I know this is all still kind of a rough draft, but I’m already feeling more comfortable in, hopefully you find some benefit from it and come back for more. Make sure to check out the detailed show notes for this episode at ForcesOfEqual.com/Practice and feel free to hit me up on Twitter @cKdisco.

That’s all for now. So come back next time to see how I progress.

Too-da-loo! ✌️