Episode Transcript
Testing, testing one, two, three, four, testing, testing one, two, three, four, testing, testing. I have wanted to do that forever. Anyway, I'm sorry. My name is Skip Pogue and I'd like to welcome you to my very first podcast.
Let me tell you a little bit about the driving force behind this podcast. Since I first started working, I've always believed that the only way I could be successful in my personal, professional, or spiritual life was if I helped everyone around me be successful in their lives. And when I say everyone around me, I'm including you. So why did I decide to do a podcast? Well, I have three websites, commonsenseandcowboylogic.com, justsomethingtothinkabout.com, and skippogue.com. Each of them had some traffic, but not a lot of traffic. I posted articles and some stories and stuff on them, but I never could build up the traffic like I wanted. They weren't just, they weren't doing the job like I hoped they would.
So I started doing some research and reading on the internet about alternatives to doing a website. The more research I did, the more I liked the idea of doing a podcast. It seemed that everything I read and listened to pointed to the fact that podcasting was the way to go in today's world. So a bit over two years ago, I decided to start a podcast. By the way, I did say two years ago. Anyway, I started listening to various podcasts. I started reading books about podcasts. I even bought podcasting for dummies, which like most of the dummy books was good. It explained a lot of things I didn't know along with things I would need to know moving forward and how to go about doing all the stuff that's involved in doing podcasting. I found the book to be pretty good.
I also did a bunch of research about the things I'd need and all the ins and outs of podcasting. I got excited. I got really excited and I decided that was what I was going to do. I was going to start a podcast. I was going to become a podcaster. I talked to my wife and the rest of the family about my starting podcast and what I felt like I could accomplish with it along with everything that's involved. And they wholeheartedly supported what I wanted to do and encouraged me to do it. At that point, I was really pumped up about getting started.
In my excitement, I did something I later found was kind of stupid. I told my doctors that I was going to start a podcast and my dentist. I told friends that I was going to start a podcast. I told other family members I was going to start a podcast. I told people that I worked with before that I was going to start a podcast. In return, everybody encouraged me, which I thought was a good thing. So I needed some equipment. So I did one more run on the internet, making sure my list was complete. I then headed over to Amazon. I spent time looking at each item and determining which product was the best and would meet my needs. I put each one of them in the cart. Once I had everything in my cart, I clicked proceed to checkout. I marked the shipping address and payment information. Now, I was staring at the place your order button and I couldn't press that button.
You know how sometimes self-doubt catches you off guard? Well, that's what just happened to me. Well, you know, when you have self-doubt, you sometimes get a little guy sitting on your shoulders and talking to you. Well, I had two of them, one on each shoulder and they were laughing and telling me, "What do you think you're doing? You don't know anything about podcasting." And then one of them said, "I see you bought that book, Podcasting for Dummies. Well, at least you got the right book." Then I can't wait to hear what you have to say. Anyway, it went on and on and on. I quickly moved everything out of my cart into a wish list that I named podcasting. Shut everything down and went into what I would label as withdrawal for a bit.
So here I am after announcing to what seemed like the world and not clicking the place your order button on Amazon. I went through several months where I did nothing to move forward. Then one day I went back to Amazon, moved everything from my podcast list back into the cart and I hit place your order button. Over the next week or so, I practically wore out our postal person and a couple of UPS drivers. When I had everything that I thought I needed, I hooked it all up. I had the software I needed, so I started testing it. Everything worked great.
A couple more months went by and I found myself with a roaring case of self-doubt again. I tried to figure it out. I just, I don't know, it was strange. I wound up unhooking the hardware I had and put it all up. It was like I was giving up. It was like my get up and go got up and went. I don't know why. I don't know, but that's just what happened. I really needed to figure out what was going on, what the problem was. Shoot, I still felt like I could help people that I needed to help people and I wanted to help people. I felt like I still wanted to do a podcast. I don't know. Deep down, I couldn't figure out what was happening or why it was happening.
At this point, the problem by starting a podcast was not from the lack of knowledge or how to do a podcast. It wasn't for not having the right equipment. I had the right equipment and people around me offering encouragement every day. My wife, my daughter, the rest of the family, my grandchildren, some of my friends, everybody was encouraging me. God was there for me. I wanted to blame someone, anyone. However, I couldn't because deep down, I knew who was responsible for everything that had happened. There was only one person responsible for this mess and that one person was me. I realized I was the problem. I was full of self-doubt. I just couldn't get started back. I was lost in my own head.
Remember me saying I did something stupid? Well, for the next seven or eight months, it seemed like that long anyway, my doing something stupid came back to haunt me. It seemed like every time I went someplace, I ran into a different family member or a friend or whatever, our friends would call or message me. The one part that was always consistent was that they asked me, where could I listen to your podcast? I would just tell them you can't right now. Of course, that led to a follow-up question, that question being, well, when can I listen to it? I guess my response was a bit snarky, but it was the same for everyone. It was just kind of noncommittal. I'm working on it. I'm working on it.
At this point, over a year and a half had passed. Suddenly, I got this urge to start working on my podcast. I was back and I was moving forward. Over the next couple months or so, I wrote some scripts. I had about a half a dozen written when I started recording them. Once they were recorded, I began editing the editing process, which took me a while because I wasn't used to using that software and the learning curve was kind of steep for me. Anyway, after I edited them, got them all where I wanted them, the way I thought I wanted them, I sat down and listened to each one of them. They didn't really sound like I hoped they would sound. The problem was the more I listened to them, the less I liked them. It didn't sound authentic. I didn't sound real. I don't know. It's just it was kind of flat, I guess. The whole thing just wasn't what I wanted.
Now, I did what I think most people do, and that's I went back in the studio and I re-recorded them. When I listened to them again, they still sounded the same way. Practically nothing had changed. My self-doubt was back. I felt like getting rid of my self-doubt was now impossible. I was stuck, and I mean stuck, and facing the fact that maybe, just maybe, I couldn't do a podcast. I don't know. My family still supported me and encouraged me, and my wife and daughter were my main cheerleaders, but they couldn't even get me to move off the dime, so to speak.
Then something happened. During all this time, I'd been watching a show on TV, and one of the actors had left the show and was going to start a podcast. The name of the show was Heartland, and the actor was Graham Wardle. Graham did just what he said he was going to do. He started a podcast. The name of it, Time Has Come. I listened to some of the podcast and even signed up later for The Mighty Network, who hosted his website and Graham's podcast at a basic level. I thought about the name, Time Has Come. Maybe it was a sign, a message, that the time had come for me to move on and get this podcast on the air.
However, I still didn't know exactly what I wanted to do and where I was going. It seemed that the main focus of Time Has Come was people wanting to challenge themselves. I soon discovered that all the members were very supportive of each other. They were all focused on helping each other no matter what the problem. It seemed that everybody that needed encouragement or something different, they got it. One person would help another person and so on, and it kind of just snowballed, and it kept going and going, and people just helping each other. I was kind of sitting on the side, but seeing all the people encouraging people and helping was really an encouragement to me.
At that point, I decided I needed more from The Time Has Come, so I changed my membership to become a founding member. Now, as a founding member, I got to participate in Zoom meetings with all the other people, plus Graham, and occasionally a guest or something, and that was encouraging me. I don't know, but for some reason, it felt like the time has come and the members gave me that little push I needed to move forward. I actually told several of the members that I was working on a special project. When they asked me what it was, I kind of hedged and said, "You know, I really don't want to tell you what I'm working on," because I still had that level of self-doubt that I hadn't truly got rid of. But they kept talking about it, and a couple of them encouraged me to set a date, and without really thinking about it, I told them I'd have this thing completed and ready by my birthday of this year, 2024. So, I had basically driven a stake in the ground. I also told them that the first place I was going to announce it would be on The Time Has Come Network, and as the whole saying goes, here we are.
I've talked about all this, and I haven't told you the name of this podcast or how it came about. Earlier, I was talking about the three domains I had, those being Common Sense at CowboyLogic.com, JustSomethingtoThinkabout.com, and SkipPogue.com. I thought one of them might work. I decided I did want to use SkipPogue.com, so that left me to choose between Common Sense at CowboyLogic.com and JustSomethingToThinkAbout. My daughter is developing my website, and over a period of 22 months, I'd go from one to the other and back again. Well, I did that when I was focused on working on it, but not all the time, obviously. I like, I kind of like them both, but neither of them kind of struck me as what I wanted to use, but I was kind of stuck with it.
Let's do a rewind real quick. I had been using a thing called Imagine the Possibilities, or ITP, on and off for close to 25 years, but I'd kind of forgot about it. At one point, I was doing a lot of training for everything from level one through management training for customer service employees. It was during that period of time that I came up with the whole idea of using Imagine the Possibilities as a motivator. I had wooden nickels, you know, wooden nickels printed up, and one of them, one side of them said Imagine the Possibilities, and then the center of that one said ITP as the abbreviation. The flip side of it had two little black lines around the edges of it, and then it said Round to it in the middle. My logic in having these things printed was that I could give them out to people, so the first class I held after getting them printed, I gave everybody one, but before I did, I told them, I said, "I'm going to give you this, and it's going to remove a roadblock we all have. We use it all the time," and everybody just kind of looked at me real blank, and then I started handing them out, handing them out with the ITP side up. They flipped them over, saw the Round to it, and I told them, I said, "That's the thing I fixed for you. You can no longer, as long as you have this, you can no longer use that as an excuse, because as long as it's in your pocket, you've always got a Round to it."
Over that period of time when I was doing the training, I purchased over 2,000 of those wooden nickels. I hadn't seen one or thought about ITP or Imagine the Possibilities in a long time, but in about mid-April this year, 2024, I was looking for some papers and came across one of the boxes they came in. Inside that box, I found about a dozen wooden nickels. A few nights later, my daughter and I were talking again about the name of the podcast, and during that conversation, I mentioned finding a few of the ITP wooden nickels. Now, Suanne knew what I was talking about. We talked a bit more about it, and I told her, I said, "That's the name for my podcast. I want to call it Imagine the Possibilities." That was it. That was the title I wanted, but I told her, I said, "It's probably not available."
I needed the URL, not necessarily for the podcast, but for the website that goes along with this podcast, so I thought, "Well, can't happen," and so she told me, she said, "Go to GoDaddy right now and check and see," so I did. Well, I typed in Imagine the Possibilities. Imaginethepossibilities.com, unavailable.net, unavailable.this.that. Everything was unavailable. I couldn't find what I wanted, but I kept looking through the list, and finally, I saw it. Imaginethepossibilities.life was available. Just think about it. Imagine the possibilities for your life. Imagine the possibilities for my life. It's available. Imaginethepossibilities.life. So I bought it. I paid for it for five years. Anyway, that's the URL that we're going to use for the website, and the podcast is titled Imagine the Possibilities. Pretty cool. I think it is, and I'm not ever going to let this thing go again.
Now, I want to take a little bit of time and talk about some of the things we're going, we, you and I, are going to do together as we move forward on Imagine the Possibilities. Self-doubt. Self-doubt was a big issue for me. We talked about it, but I didn't really go into how you solve it, but think about self-doubt. Maybe you want to take up painting, oil painting, let's say, but you don't know how to oil paint, so you don't ever do it. Kind of like I procrastinated and didn't get to this podcast for over two years. Maybe you want to teach a skill, but you've never done that before, or you want to learn a new skill, but you think, "I can't do that." Self-doubt will wear you out. It will. But whatever you want to do, you can do it. I am 100% sure that anybody that listens to this podcast can accomplish remarkable things. You just have to do it. You have to get over doubting yourself and figure out how to do what you want to do, and that's what I wanted to help you with. I need the help, you need the help, we're going to help each other.
So anyway, now what I want to do is I want to talk about some of the other things that we're going to discuss, you and I, on this podcast moving forward. Now, obviously, self-doubt is one of them. We've already talked that one. We probably beat that one to death, but we just haven't talked about how you fix it or how you prevent it from happening in the first place. But we will. We're going to do that. We're going to talk about getting out of our comfort zone. That's a big deal too. And self-doubt is a piece of that, but it's really separate. In my case, it wasn't a comfort zone I was afraid of. It was self-doubt. But we're going to talk about that. We just tend to seem, it seems like we just tend to gravitate toward what we're comfortable with, and we don't want to rock the boat. So we're going to spend some time talking about that.
We're going to talk about planning, planning stuff for anything. Maybe it's a move. Maybe you're planning on a new job. Maybe you're planning on becoming a podcaster, painting, whatever it is. If it's important to you, if it's really important, then you need to sit down and make a plan. Now, I didn't do that when I first started thinking about this podcast. I just, I just went headlong into it, not having any idea what or where or what I should be doing first or second or anything else. I did eventually sit down and make a plan. And because I did that, I was able to finish the podcast, not in a reasonable amount of time, obviously, but I was able to finish it and get on the air. So that part's done, but planning is very important. And we'll talk about some of the tools you can use and stuff.
We'll talk about time management. Time management is important. Not only time management itself, but why time management is important. A quick example, I guess, would be what I was doing when I was doing my three websites. I wrote an article or story, which I generally did on Microsoft Word. I then used Word to edit the document. That helped me make sure my grammar and spelling and all that stuff was correct. And maybe for a three to five page document took me an hour to do. Not much over that. And it was done. I could post it on the I was finished with it. Now, looking at this podcasting stuff, I've quickly, I quickly understood. I didn't realize it first, but I've quickly understood that there's a lot more time, takes a lot more time in creating this stuff. Got to do an outline, then recording the material, bit of editing. I'm not planning on doing a lot of editing to it. Just take out some breaks that happened because I paused too long or something, but nothing real dramatic. But I just found that learning to manage time is important for us. And it's important in our personal lives. It's important in our professional lives. And it's important in our spiritual lives.
You've got to decide, you know, family, spend time with your wife and kids, go play golf, go fishing, or do something else in your professional life. Or are you giving up something in your spiritual life towards your work life? So we have to find a way to balance all those things out.
We're going to talk about it and how to manage your time better. Some of the tools you can use to do that. One of the podcasts is going to be about what you might have to give up to move forward in your life. Say your job, all of a sudden a promotional opportunity comes up. What do you have to give up? It could be a lot of things.
I had to move several times in my career to advance it. And each time I moved, I gave up a lot of stuff. I gave up friends that I'd had for years and years. I gave up some things that I was really comfortable with that I enjoyed doing and stuff. But just as important, my wife had to give up a lot. My kids had to give up a lot. They had to change schools. My wife had a lot of good friends and she had to give them up and make new friends.
So we're going to take a podcast and talk more in depth about this because I think it's important and it requires some forethought in doing it. So I'm looking forward to doing that one.
We're going to talk about self-improvement in one of the future podcasts. When it comes to self-improvement, here's something you can start doing right now. Read. I read all the time. I have the Kindle app on my laptop, my tablet, my phone. I have a library of about, I don't know, 225 books now. I also use Audible on all those devices. And the reason I use Kindle and Audible is I can carry them with me, number one. But number two, I learned a long time ago that I retain more information about a book or from a book if I not only read it, but I hear it at the same time. So that's one of my self-improvement tools.
Reading should be one of everybody's self-improvement tools, I think. And you'll probably hear what I'm going to say again. I'll probably say it again when we talk in this section about self-improvement. But when, I don't know, it was probably in the 80s, maybe early 80s or mid-80s, I met a guy named Charlie Tremendous Jones. And he was from Yazoo City, Mississippi. Same place that Jerry Clowers was from, if you know who either one of those people are. I just dated myself, I'm sure.
Anyway, Charlie said something that really struck me as the truth. What Charlie said to me was, "You are the same today as you will be five years from today, except for the people you meet and the books you read." I was already an avid reader, but hearing Charlie say that made it more real to me. It made me want to read more, and I have. I read probably a book a week or try to. Not always successful. Sometimes podcasting gets in the way.
But anyway, that's just a hint of one of the things we're going to talk about when we discuss self-improvement.
I think I want to talk about this, but I'm not sure. It kind of has to do with time management, and then it doesn't have to do with time management. But importance. What's the most important? Work time, your professional life, family time, your personal life, or faith time, your spiritual life. We've got 24 hours a day, and that's it. We obviously have to rest some, we have to do this, we have to go to work generally. But how do we move things around to make the things that are really truly most important to us, the first thing in our head, in our heart?
It's a tough nut to crack. You know, you have to, what do you say when I asked you the question, what's most important to you? You're going to tell me your job is, or your wife is, or if, or your husband is, or that your special someone is. Big question, right?
We're going to take some time and just talk through that, figure it out.
We're going to take a podcast, or maybe two podcasts, and talk about communication skills. It's important to understand how we listen to people versus how we should listen to people. We'll talk about that and what the end results of both listening and non-listening are.
We're going to talk about the fact that you and your spouse need to have great communication. This is also true for you and your children, you and your boss. If you're in a leadership position, you and your team need it. We all need to have great communication skills. How do we do that? How do we establish communications, and how do we make sure everybody's on the same level? That's what we're going to talk about.
Good communications isn't easy, and it's really important. So, I don't know, we may really spend two podcasts on that. Maybe not back-to-back, but maybe just one, and then do something else, and then do another one. But we're going to get into this communication thing where we both learn to do it better.
We have a session about finding motivation. Where do you find motivation? How do you find motivation? Seminars, friends, family, a mentor? There's a lot of different ways to get motivated. Time has come is a great example for me. It really helped me and kept me motivated, but not because I was directly participating in it all the time, because just watching people and listening to how they were motivating each other helped motivate me.
My wife keeps me motivated. She's probably one of my biggest motivators. She's encouraging me all the time. She's continuously encouraged me over the two-plus years to get to this day, to get this podcast on the air. And she wants me to do what I do or what I want to do because she knows it's important to me. It's a passion that I have, so she does that for me, and that's awesome.
There's a lot of other things we can do to both be motivated and to stay motivated, and some of it's kind of tricky and fun, and we'll cover all that.
We're going to talk about failure. Failure happens. Many people don't deal with failure well. I didn't for a long time, and then I learned more about it and how my failing at something was a good thing. I discovered that failing to do something simply meant I had more room to grow, to learn, to get better at it. I could learn what it was that I didn't know how to do. Sometimes it took me a while to do that, but in the end it was all worth it because I felt the accomplishment, the success of not failing, and failing requires do-overs. My term for repeat, rinse and repeat.
We're going to have some fun with this topic, and hopefully I can help you understand what I figured out and how you can apply it when you fail at something.
I want us to spend some time talking about our limitations, what we can and can't do. Sometimes, and I know I'm guilty of this, I believe I can do anything. Other times I don't believe I can do anything. Does that make sense? Give you an example, kind of funny and maybe not the best example, but I was on a temporary assignment in Boca Tone, Florida.
At the time, we lived in Norton, Virginia. My wife, son, and daughter were at home. My wife called me about three o'clock in the morning and told me, said, "It looks like the small river in front of the house is going to get out of its banks again." I told her I'd get the first flight out this morning and head home. That way I'd be there to help you. She said, "I have a question to ask you." I told her to ask away. Her question was, "Can you stop the water?" Can I stop the water? What's up with that? My answer, of course, was no. I can't stop the water. Then she said, "Well, then since you can't stop the water, there's no reason for you to come home. You just stay in Boca, take care of business there, and me and the kids have got this. Don't worry about it. It's all going to be fine." That was when I found out I truly had limitations.
That's just an idea of a few of the things that we're going to be doing and discussing on Imagine the Possibilities as we move forward.
Another important piece of Imagine the Possibilities is the website that goes along with the podcast. On that website, you'll find transcripts of all the podcasts. I'm going to try to put the transcripts up at the same time I release the podcast. You'll also find some stories and stuff that I didn't do in a podcast. Some of it may be funny. Others just may be something I thought about at one time or another. Still, others may be something that makes you go, "Been there, done that." I'm going to put some things up that are motivational or inspirational, pictures and the like, that you can download along with some of the different stuff that you may find interesting.
Anyway, I believe you'll enjoy the website as a companion to the podcast. At least I hope you do. Oh, while you're at the website, you can also read, "I want to talk about me." That should provide you with a bit of information and insight into myself. You'll find out what I believe in, things that I like, things that I don't like, all that kind of stuff. It's just another thing that I believe is an extension of this podcast. I think you'll enjoy it. Just look around. I'd like to encourage you to visit the website as soon as you get a few minutes.
Just head on over to ImagineThePossibilities.life. If you see something there that you feel is missing, let me know. You can message me on ITP. You can make suggestions, comments about how I'm doing, things that I'm doing right or wrong. The only thing I ask is that if you want to tell me something I'm doing wrong or bad, that you just be respectful. It's also a place where you can let me know if there's a subject you'd like me to talk about in a future podcast. If there's something you'd like more information on, let me know. If I can do it, I'll send you the information. If I can't, I'll let you know.
No matter what, hopefully you'll find it fun and interesting place to visit. So just like I said, head over there as soon as you get the chance. Head over there as often as you can.
Well, that's it. I did it. I did my first podcast on Imagine The Possibilities. I also launched a new website called ImagineThePossibilities.life. Before I go any further, I want to thank you sincerely and from my heart. I want to thank you for listening to this. Hopefully you'll join on a regular basis and we can help each other. That's what it's all about to me. My whole passion is just helping people and that's all I want to do. If there's something I can do to help you, let me know.
Hopefully you have a bit more understanding about what we're going to cover in regards to some of the future podcasts and how I think I can help you and you can help me. Believe me when I say that doing this podcast helps me. Together we're going to move forward and both of us are going to become better one day at a time.
I have one other thing that I'm working on. It's something I think will add to both Imagine The Possibilities podcast and ImagineThePossibilities.life. I've got a lot of, I don't have a lot. I've got some details to work out, but once I get it worked out, I'm pretty sure I'm going to use it. I'm pretty sure we're going to have a good time with it. I'll let you know what it is and how we're going to use it as soon as I can.
Anyway, try to check back on the website every once in a while and see what you find. Let me know how I'm doing. If you have any questions or whatever, like I said, my motivation is to help you. So ask your question. I'll try to get you the answer. Whatever you need, I'm here.
Thanks again. Sincerely, thanks again for listening to this podcast. I appreciate your time so much. In closing, let me just say, be kind, stay humble, love deeply, and laugh often. I hope that you have a super day, and I pray that God blesses you in a super way.
