STOPPAGE TIME

Transcript

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It’s the Ticked Season 3 Finale, Roll Intro!

 

What’s up everybody? Welcome to a brand new episode of the Ticked Podcast, this is your host, Ben. And it’s the Season 3 Finale of 2019! I love the end of a year, and how it gives us the chance to look back and examine all those areas where we fell short in our lives. …I’m just kidding…But, don’t you feel like that sometimes? The end of the year is always an interesting, kind of introspective time where you can look back on the year and decide, “Did I hit the goals that I wanted to, and what can I do this next year to improve on that?” So as I was thinking about the format for this episode I thought it’d be hilarious to do a Ticked, 2019, End of Year Letter. 

 

Now in my personal life I get end of year letters all the time from family and friends – especially in the month of December it seems like every time I go to my mailbox there’s another letter from a family member or a friend and able to catch up on what they’re doing. 

 

Also in my professional life, a lot of you know that I work for a financial consulting firm…and at the end of every year my company has a meeting with all employees where we talk about where we’ve been for the past year and talk about some of the goals that we have going forward. And also as we analyze client performance data we have to dive into Annual Reports where the Chief Executive Team shares successes of the past year and also outlooks for the future. 

 

So today I wanted to do something similar, in a shorter episode on the Ticked Podcast. So this is officially, The Ticked End of Year Letter, or The Ticked Season 3 Report:

 

Season 3 finished up with 29 total episodes, down a little from past years, where season 2 had 53 and season 1 had 48 episodes. The 29 episodes this season were split between 7 stoppage times, where the hosts talk about a central theme and related ticks and tick offs, and 22 guest interviews. We didn’t have any Ticked On The Road episodes this year, and I’m hoping to bring those back in season 4. The longest episode from this year was episode 108, Curtis Anderson, All In - running 90 minutes. Of course, listening to that episode you’ll remember that was also a transition episode between hosts and ran a little longer than normal. The shortest episode, on the other hand, was actually the season 3 premiere, episode 102, The Road Ahead, running 43 minutes. In all, the average episode run time this season was 58 minutes.

 

What episodes from this year were listened to the most? 

Episode 105, Kate Hansen, Seek Identity

Episode 116: Tennille Boseman, Meant for This

Episode 118: Colin Jones, Blackjack Apprentice

 

A few highlights about these episodes: 

Episode 105: Kate Hansen, a former olympian at Sochi, was recruited at the ripe ole age of 10 to compete in the Luge Winter olympic event. Remember, Luge is a single person sled, racing down the track lying on your back, feet first. Throughout her episode, Kate describes finding the balance between the life we all think Olympic hopefuls lead, and the life she actually led. She didn’t come from a luge-family. She didn’t have the older siblings or parents that coached her. She lived apart from family during high school, visiting only for Christmas. She lets you in on the entire career that exists outside of a two-week broadcast on NBC, one which she retired from before event attending college. How many of us say we did that?

 

Episode 116: Tennille Boseman, was a personal favorite of mine, cause Tennille and I go way back, all the way to grade school when we won Mr and Mrs Conscientious. It’s a title we both love and hate to this day. But Curtis came to the rescue with the aid of Google, and informed us mid-interview that to be “Conscientious” was: Of a person, wishing to do what is right, especially to do one’s work or duty well and thoroughly. Tennille is a head trainer with Orange Theory Fitness and at her core, you’ll find people and relationships, helping others through the hard times – whether that’s through grief or through a workout. Sometimes at the same time. Her Life Motto: “Move with Purpose, Live with Purpose.” 

 

Episode 118: Collin Jones, was a Skype interview which came down to the wire. Curtis and I were scrambling last minute to get all of our technology inputs working. In one moment, we had microphone input levels but no headphone output levels. Then in the next moment, they switched…I still don’t know if we have it all the way figured out…audio problems, am I right? Colin is a professional blackjack card counter, an occupation he landed on after combining his math degree with a book he received at Bible Camp. He provides training, resources, and a community for card counters through his online program, Blackjack Apprenticeship – teaching others to think like an investor, not a gambler, and that blackjack, unlike every other casino game, is a strategy where past events actually impact future outcomes. In this episode, we talked about living your life through transformations, not through transactions…it really helped put the human back into human interaction. Interestingly enough, I left that interview feeling like I had really connected with Colin - even when he was one of 3 guests this year calling in via Skype. 

 

What was my “Most Ticked” episode? Or said another way, a guest I found highly motivating? 

There are two that come to front of mind for me, Tennille Boseman as just mentioned a few minutes ago, episode 116 titled, “Meant for This.” And EJ Michels, episode 114 titled, Foreign Figures Part 4. Both of these guests have had life experiences that have completely defined the person they are today: incredibly good, compassionate, grateful and gracious people, and you just feel better after hanging out with them. It’s funny - when I started this podcast, I didn’t want to feel like I had gotten into an “interview rhythm” because I felt like that would be a disservice to the guest. I want every guest to feel like their interview is unique and tailored to them, not pre-programmed to fit into a template. And because of that, I get nervous before every interview. You’d think that I’d leave every interview feeling entirely drained, but I don’t. And it’s because of guests like these two. 

 

I wanna bring up two episodes that I’d call, my “Most Ticked Off” episode, or perhaps, the episode where the guest and I really got into a great bashing cadence. 

Episode 105, Kate Hansen, Seek identity, we have a great time talking about the prank she played in cahoots with Jimmy Kimmel. And then, this probably doesn’t come as a surprise, but episode 126: Bethany Anderson, First Date – awkward pauses and all, honestly one of the most memorable interviews I’ve ever been a part of. Never before had I examined my own behavior so thoroughly or so..in the moment rushed than in that interview when she’d bring up a tick off, and I’d have to re-run every moment of the interview through my brain to see if I was contributing to that tick off. That was a fun one. 

 

And, for the future, considering I have this practice now, if you’d like for me to moderate a first date that you’re on, send me an email. Ticked in 2020 presents: Ticked on the road, Dates. I’ll narrate the whole thing and help you interpret body language. It’ll be a thing. 

 

2019 was a great year for tracking our content. It’s the first full year that we’ve been a published podcast on Spotify and Google Play. Our biggest month for the 2019 year was October, which was personally very rewarding to me since under a month prior we’d returned from our summer break. So, as we started publishing episodes again, you guys responded very favorably. Thank you. Now that it’s the end of the year, I’m getting all these emails about “see your year in review” or “2019 Wrapped on Spotify.” - So I went down that rabbit hole...And truly, thank you. In the podcast description box - did you know there’s a podcast description box? It asks “What sparks your creativity, your passion, your drive to tell your story?” 

 

This is a passion project for me, sometimes I’ve been too passionate about producing on a regular basis and I’ve stressed myself and my partners out. “Ben, it’s just a podcast.” Has been on the lips of several supportive friends. My creativity, my passion, is sparked by you. Knowing that there’s an episode I have the create and produce and interview and edit before next Tuesday has honestly given me the drive I need to fulfill other things in my life. It’s been contagious for me. And when I’ve felt stressed out, frustrated, defeated, burnt out…the tiny step forward has been the thought of…I need to head over to the studio and interview THIS person, and that’s a small thing I can do today to feel accomplished and motivated.” Although tough a lot of the time, the constant production of this endeavor has become my passion and that’s because of you. All of you, coming from nearly 40 countries. Keep doing what you’re doing, and I’ll keep doing what I’m doing. 

 

Finally, what are some of the things I’ll remember from season 3?

 

We opened the season in true dramatic comedy fashion, answering a cliffhanger from the season 2 finale. Lib decided to leave the podcast and take Dalton with him. And I’m not mad about it. 

Their final episode was supposed to be episode number 100, but because Apple Podcast Display options started forcing you to show episode numbers, we had to re-configure our count…and including out-ticks from past episodes (which, side note, I promise will come back) was actually episode number 108. That same episode, with guest Curtis Anderson, was when we introduced Curtis would be working behind the scenes with Ticked after Lib and Dalton made their exit. 

 

We went on to produce a handful of episodes up until the summer, at which time we took a break from producing episodes to work on a lot of behind the scene stuff. Specifically, we re-thought our website design, updated our branding to be more consistent, and started implementing better tracking analytics which, have really made this recap episode possible. Then we resumed in September to finish out the season. 

 

The guests we’ve welcomed into the studio include: The 3rd and 4th members of the band, Foreign Figures, a former Olympian, a first-time author, 3 C-suite executives, 7 Entrepreneurs, an historian (yes, I used the article “an” for historian), a doctor and a nurse, 3 mental health coaches, and a first-time, first-date interview. Season 3’s been awesome to produce. 

 

So thanks for listening, thanks for contributing to conversations and sharing episodes and posts. Especially, thank you for leaving a star rating or review inside apple podcasts, or whatever app you use to listen. Your ratings and reviews help us appear as relevant podcasts in a search, and we’re able to reach more people and share more stories through that effort. 

 

And that’s the end of season 3! We’ll be back sometime mid-January, and in the meantime - tell all your friends.