Stuff I Learned Yesterday
About Stuff I Learned Yesterday
Stuff I Learned Yesterday is a podcast that aims to encourage, inspire, challenge, motivate, and improve the lives of those who listen to it. Stuff I Learned Yesterday is released each Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Each episode ranges from 5-15 minutes long and contain short stories based on real events and lessons learned by the hosts. Friday episodes are called the Friday Forum and are filled with inspirational and motivational thoughts submitted by Stuff I Learned Yesterday listeners. Submit your story for a Friday Forum episode by calling 304-837-2278, visiting our feedback page, or click on the Send a Voice Message button on the left hand side of this page.
16- People, Pizza, and Prioities
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I am exhausted. I am encouraged. I am inspired. I am feeling blessed. All of these things things are because of the same thing. I just returned home from spending the weekend in Chicago where I got to spend some great one on one time with my daughter, Addison, eat some of Chicago’s tastiest pizza, and meet and hangout with some wonderful members of the Golden Spiral Media Community.
When I started podcasting in 2008 I had no idea that it would lead me down such a life changing path. I thought it would be cool to podcast with some friends and that we might even get a few folks to listen to us. I never thought I would care so deeply about the listeners of our podcast, or that they would care so much about me.
The last 15 months have been the best and most rewarding that I’ve ever experienced as a podcaster. When we announced that we were doing a party for the finale of Fringe, I really wasn’t sure what to expect. Would we have a thousand people show up, or would we have 3 people show up? Would people actually come to Oklahoma City? Would it be something that people reflect on fondly, or would it be a train wreck that they look back on as a waste of time. Read More…
15- Friday Forum
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The Friday Forum is here! Thanks to everyone that has sent in a Friday Forum contribution. You can participate in Friday Forum by calling and leaving a message at 304-837-2278, emailing an audio file to feedback@goldenspiralmedia.com, or clicking on the Send Voicemail tab on my website, GoldenSpiralMedia.com. Friday Forum is your opportunity to Share what YOU’VE learned, so that other listeners and I can learn from YOU. It can be a message as short as 30 seconds or several minutes long. It really doesn’t matter just as long as it’s something that will benefit others.
This week’s Friday forum contributions come in from from Ben, Mike, and Mark. Ben shares a story of a recent trip to a pro-am golf event with the lesson of giving up, or moving forward. Mike shares the story of creating a video of memories of his grandma and the lesson of keeping it authentic when learning new skills. Mark shares a challenge to find someone and pay them a compliment this weekend. Read More…
14- You Do Not Have Because You Do Not Ask
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I could make today’s episode of Stuff I Learned Yesterday really short and sweet. If you don’t ask, you won’t receive. I mean, that’s not the way it works 100% of the time, but it’s a pretty solid statement. I would say that the vast majority of the time, if you don’t ask, you won’t get what you seek. Let me share an example that drastically impacted my life.
This story begins in the fall of 2012. During that time of my life I was very discontent with my job at the bookstore and focused on building a career in new media. Things were progressing, but not quickly enough for my satisfaction. I was really struggling. I it was either late October or early November. I had no desire to go through another Christmas season in retail, but at that point there was no way to avoid it. There was one morning in particular that I was getting ready for work and it was the last place I wanted to be. My heart wasn’t there. My passion for that career had gone.
The truth is, nearly every morning had been that way for a while, and as the Christmas season grew nearer, my discontent grew stronger. Each morning before going to work I would spend time in prayer. I would ask God to help me deal with the situation. That he would give me patience and wisdom. I wanted to ask him to give me an opportunity to follow my passion of new media, but I just couldn’t.
I couldn’t ask God for another opportunity because I felt like doing so would be selfish. The truth is, my job was great. It was a steady paycheck and a comfortable salary with a company that had values and a mission that I believed in. Yes, there were a few people there that I thought were bad apples, but the majority of the people there were great. The people in my department were awesome. Most people would want the type of job that I had. To ask for something else would be out of line. Read More…
13- Ray Ortega Bashed My Podcast…and He Was Right
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I recorded the first episode of The Fringe Podcast speaking directly into the digital recorder while standing in my closet. I thought the clothes in the closet would help absorb any echo from my voice, and also drown out the noise from my kids in the other room. Jason ended up not wanting to drive to my house each week, and never even used the equipment he’d help pay for. We would bring him in via Skype each week.
There is so much I didn’t know back then. I had no idea how to get rid of that chirping electrical sound from our computers. I didn’t know about shock mounts. I had never even heard of a compressor/limiter/gate. We landed an interview with actress Jasika Nicole about a month after the show premiered. From an audio quality standpoint, that interview was and is a disaster.
In fact, it is such a disaster that when I was at new media expo 2014 I sat in on a session that had Ray Ortega as one of the panelists. I was surprised when he mentioned this Fringe podcast that interviewed one of the actresses and how terrible the audio was. He went on to say a few other very critical things about the podcast. Keep in mind that Ray Ortega and I had never met.
Later that day I saw Ray out in the hall and I swooped in. I asked him if he remembered the exact name of the Fringe podcast. He said that he didn’t. I told him that I was quite sure that he was talking about my show. He stammered a bit and insisted that I was probably mistaken. I described the audio to him and the actress that was in the interview. We both agreed that it was indeed my show that he’d just trashed to the audience of New Media Expo. Read More…
12- Words + Action = Belief
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Today I have not one story to share with you, but two. On the surface, these two stories seem completely unrelated. Honestly, I suppose they are completely unrelated. The first story took place nearly 30 years ago. The second story took place 2 weeks ago. As I thought about what I learned from the recent story, it reminded me of the older story. I think they share a common thread, so I’m including both of them in today’s episode.
The first story took place when I was probably 8 to 10 years old. My brother and I always spent a lot of time with my grandparents, that is, my dad’s mom and stepdad. My mom’s parents lived in California, and I only remember meeting them one time. There were a couple of other times I met them, but just like my Disneyland experience, I was too young to remember. My step grandpa was the only grandpa I ever knew, and never considered him anything other than my real blood related grandpa. Because they lived here in Oklahoma, they’ve always been a close and important part of my life. Read More…
11- A Look Into the Eyes of Regret
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If you’ve listened to all the episodes of Stuff I Learned Yesterday, then by now you know that I spent a good chunk of my life working for a bookstore. I started out as a part-time cashier, worked my way up to store manager, worked as a buyer for a short time, and then worked as the e-commerce director. Many of you also know that after nearly 19 years with the company, I left there almost one year ago. In fact, this Saturday, April 5th, will mark the one year anniversary of the day I turned in my resignation.
My decision to leave the bookstore was not easy nor was it made quickly. A few years ago I started a business that I hoped would help transition me from the bookstore to being full-time self employed. That business is a website design company called Dramatic Traffic. I still own it and have local clients that I serve under that name. Most of my new clients are served under the more widely known company I own, Golden Spiral Media.
To help grow Dramatic Traffic locally, I joined a Wednesday morning group of other small business owners and entrepreneurs. I knew that I had a lot to learn about being in business for myself and I wanted to learn from others who had blazed that trail before. They didn’t have a website designer in their group and eagerly accepted me as a member. Several members of the group spent time with me one on one and shared their wisdom and life stories with me. One of those members was a man in his late 60’s named Mr. K. Read More…
10- Friday Forum
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Thanks to everyone that has sent in a Friday Forum contribution. If you submitted a Friday Forum and don’t hear it on the show today, don’t worry. I still have it and will very likely use it on next week’s Friday Forum episode. You can participate in Friday Forum by calling and leaving a message at 304-837-2278, emailing an audio file to feedback@goldenspiralmedia.com, or clicking on the Send Voicemail tab on my website, GoldenSpiralMedia.com. Friday Forum is your opportunity to Share what YOU’VE learned, so that other listeners and I can learn from YOU. It can be a message as short as 30 seconds or several minutes long. It really doesn’t matter just as long as it’s something that will benefit others.
This week’s Friday forum come to us from Mark. Mark sent in a story that’s long enough to take up the entire duration of today’s show. While it’s perfectly okay that Mark’s story is this long, please don’t think that your Friday Forum story has to be this long. In fact, for most Friday Forum episodes, I envision 2 or 3 stories from various callers. Read More…
09- The Fire Sauce, The Hot Tub, and the Prank War
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There was one particular stretch of time though that was challenging. It started when we set up a new store in Denton, TX. Denton was close, only about 2.5 hours away from home. The setup took a month, and that included staying a week or so after the store opened so that we could be there to assist the new employees as customers started arriving. We would travel down to Denton on Sunday and come home either Friday night or Saturday afternoon. This gave us a day to spend with our families before we headed back to Denton.
Now, not all of the setup crew was from Oklahoma City. The company pulled in top employees from all over the company to come help set up new stores. Two of us from the Oklahoma City market were part of the team so we would ride down together and room together once we arrived. My traveling partner for that four week stretch was a good friend of mine named Ben.
Ben and I had a lot in common and being around him really made the drive time pass more quickly. We were both competitive, so when one of us decided to pull a simple prank on the other, it was on like Donkey Kong! Read More…
08- Teaching With Action
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We have tried very hard to teach our kids to think of others before themselves, don’t do things to other people that you wouldn’t want done to you, be responsible for their own behavior, treat everyone with respect, and to never, ever be afraid to wear a Doctor Who shirt in public. We all know that as parents, our kids are observing us and learning from us. Sometimes they’re picking up our bad habits, but hopefully, if we do our job right, we’re teaching them those things that are good and noble and honorable.
Of course, none of us as humans or as parents are perfect, so sometimes I screw up as a parent. But the story I want to share today is about one of those times where I got it right.
Dallas Comic-Con 2013 took place right around Mother’s Day and my wife thought that a good present for her would be to give her a weekend of relaxing at home…alone. In fact, when I asked her what she thought about me taking the kids down to Dallas for Dallas Comic-con, her first words were, “Sounds like a great Mother’s Day present!” This would be a win for everyone involved. Kari would get to enjoy some peace and quiet, read her books, work on some cross-stitching, and relax. The kids would get to take an adventure out of state, and I would get to get my geek on. Read More…
07- When Relationships Hurt
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Today’s story is one that I thought I’d get around to sharing eventually, but really didn’t think I’d be sharing it this early. My mind was changed after I received this email (I’m withholding the name of the sender out of respect for her privacy):
My name is [withheld] and I’m from Mexico. I follow several of your podcasts and find them really amusing and enjoyable. … I have almost five years in a deep depression and started seeing a psychologist this past friday. One of my many issues is my relationship with my sister, which is almost inexistent, we might as well be strangers. Yesterday I asked my sister about this and for her I’m quite dramatic, boring, ridiculous and she have no interest in sharing her life with me. She doesn’t understand why this affects me, I was shocked. Well, I think that’s everything.
Thank you for sharing your passion for so many wonderful series, thank you for make my life less miserable.
First, I want to thank this listener for her courage to write in about such a difficult issue. I am not at all qualified to address this situation in any kind of clinical or professional way, but I can tell you that her story is not uncommon and hits really close to me. I want to share a story with you today in hopes that it might give you strength and a brighter outlook. Read More…