Welcome to the Freedom Fridays Project Podcast. I'm Pete Clark, your host, the Whispers Guy, it appears that work expands to the time that we give it and I started to explore how I was investing my time and effort, particularly on Fridays. It's evolved to an exploration and experiment with time, energy, attention and identity and a mindset shift from I have to, to I choose to. So if you're interested in exploring some changes to the way that you invest your time and energy, if you'd like some tips on the way as you make some changes, perhaps to your identity, if you would like the freedom of I choose to, away from I have to, then this is the podcast for you. So welcome to the Freedom Fridays Project Podcast.
This is going to be my last recording of the year and I've gone back to a solo version just to reflect on some of the things that have happened over the course of the year and the most amazing, astounding, and pretty proud thing for me is that I got to 46. As you know, if you've been listening, I started this on a bit of a whim, bit of a dare, a starting ugly scenario way back in January 2021. I didn't know where it was going, I didn't know really what I was doing, I was just kind of dared to record some musings. And that started, and I began interviewing guests and here we are episode number 46. One of the things I'm most proud about is I committed to doing it for a year and I've done that. I've turned up every week and well, not necessarily recorded specifically every week as those of you who podcast will know. But we have managed to produce a podcast and publish it every Friday for a year. Which, given how busy people's lives are, mine and guests and the people that are helping behind the scenes, that's a pretty I think that's a pretty impressive commitment to turn up and share something, hopefully something of value for those that I do speak to who say they do listen to it. And I'm pretty proud that I was able to turn up for a full year, week on week on week on week, not really knowing the impact, I don't follow the numbers I have no idea who's listening. Again, I'm not doing it to compete with the likes of Tim Ferriss or Gary Vee. But turning up week on week, it taught me one, I could do it because that was always one of my concerns about committing to doing it, could I really turn up, week on week and produce something every week given how busy my weeks can be. And secondly, it's not necessarily easy, but how easier than I thought doing something over a long period of time committing to it consistently, can be once you get into a bit of a rhythm. It's actually a little bit easier than perhaps you imagine it to be. And so here I am recording, episode number 46. I've got a few notes that I'd like to share. But I don't really know what I'm going to say. And ironically, that's kind of how I started, didn't really knew what I was going to say I just got into it. And one of my reflections is as I got into it, five down, 10 down, started to interview some guests, I noticed my mindset was becoming much more judgmental on me and the impact, and would people like it and was that good enough. And it's interesting how I started with no interest in that and my ego came in to protect me and the impact on my reputation, if indeed having a small group of listeners has any impact at all. But it's interesting how that's shifted and partly because I think I've interviewed people as opposed to done solo. And that's what I'm going to pick up on next. I interviewed quite a number of people. I won't mention anyone in particular, but I want to mention that absolutely everyone I spoke to has a story. The premise of Freedom Fridays evolved into ordinary people with extraordinary stories and everyone I spoke to had a story. Now for some it was more obvious and they told it and they expressed it. For others it was buried a little bit deeper, one layer two layer three layers beneath the surface. But everyone, every person that I spoke to, had a story. And interestingly, despite I would say at least 50% of them not even recognising or admitting, acknowledging that they had a story, whilst deep down, I think we do a number of my guests would listen to previous podcasts and make the comment, Well I don't, I've got nothing to tell, there's no story to tell. And yet, through the course of the conversation, through the course of the dialogue, it was revealed. And there are some incredible stories, ways of being, paths that people have taken over the course of the people I've spoken to some less so. And maybe, maybe that's because that's okay. And it's okay to have a normal-ish kind of path. And yet, when I dug a little bit deeper, it reinforced for me that how I've become me is completely unique compared to how you've become you. And I knew that intellectually, no one has the same experience as anyone else, even in the same family. But the way that we become who we become right now is very unique. An event happens, and we completely interpret it differently. We see some news and it reaffirms or denies certain beliefs we have. We have experiences that are totally unique, and our way of processing it, I don't know the mechanics or the neuroscience behind how we process it necessarily, but it seems that we process it completely uniquely, which sounds obvious, because we're unique. But in asking some similar questions, I found people's interpretation of their history was completely unique. As I observed their history, even in the short time that I spoke to them, I had a different interpretation of their history. And so when I was speaking to people, there were so many different strands of what they'd picked up and put this eclectic version of themselves together, which, I guess is what everyone does, we're an eclectic version of our best and worst self. And it fascinated me that my structure for the conversation, and maybe this helped, was I would ask the same question at the start, what's the big change you're going through, etc, etc, and I would ask some silly little questions at the end kind of binary questions and in the middle it became a conversation. It was always my intent, a little bit selfishly and indulgently, to be able to have a conversation that perhaps we wouldn't have had a conversation about and that's one of the lovely things. That's one of the things I loved about it and selfishly, I really, really enjoyed and thrived. And I would continue doing it purely for that reason, that with some special people that spoke to, most of whom I knew to one degree or the other, we had a conversation about stuff that we'd never had a conversation about before, purely in the guise of, Hey, I'm doing a little podcast, would you like to come on and be interviewed? And that first question, What's the big change you've gone through? revealed so many little bits and pieces and things I picked up on and ways to navigate what's going on for someone? And what struck me is, I don't know if I ask that question anyway? I've done it under the guise of a podcast, What's the big change you're going through? But in my normal interactions with that individual do I just get too focused on task, do I just get too focused on the purpose, the initial purpose of the conversation, whether it be a client conversation, or a content conversation. I don't stop to ask the question, What are you going through, what's the big change you're going through? And interesting, I don't think others then respond in a deeper way because they assume everything's good, got this going on. This guise of a podcast to help perhaps illuminate the things that people do that get them to where they're at revealed some phenomenal things and there were some beautiful jaw dropping insights. Again, I won't name any there are too many to name, if you're interested, trawl through some of the history. There's some jaw dropping, for me, moments in terms of when I spoke to people the things that they revealed, the trauma that they were relatively composed in talking about, the insights that they had in making and still immersed in the change that they were talking about, it really was from a selfish point of view as the interviewer, but I was listening as well, because that was my structure, I would listen to the answers to the first question and then just pick up a conversation. And interesting when I spoke to most of the probably latter day guests, so June onwards, not everyone but some didn't know, hadn't followed the podcast, hadn't listened to any, had listened to then some of them and went Oh, mine isn't as good as... So I'm sure many of us listening, and certainly we recognise that imposter kicking in, we compare ourselves to other examples and Mine isn't as good as... And yet, whether it was a deeply revealing narrative of a traumatic experience or something quite simple, someone was going through a very simple thing, I think there's gold, there's nuggets of experience that can really help shape our own and inform our own ways forward if you're willing to listen to the Whisper.
Which brings me back to the whole premise, around Freedom Fridays that if you know my story, I believe that life whispers to us. It whispers to us in many forms and usually it needs to be a shout before we'll do something. It might be whispering for a number of times, and my business, I called it 21 Whispers. It's an arbitrary number it is not necessarily 21, it could be six or 27, or 362. The number is very subjective but this metaphorical 21st Whisper, is when the whisper turns into a shout. And I'm hoping that maybe this might pique some interest, you trawl through some other of the historical podcasts with a question in mind, what's the question that you'd most like to have an insight to, what's the part of your life you'd most like to have, and hear your 21st Whisper, and then listen again to other people's stories, and see what pops up.
The final thing I'll share is, I felt really privileged, really quite honoured to be let in, let into someone's life. And I know over the course of the last 18 months on Zoom, and Teams in our 2D digital world, we've been let into people's homes inadvertently, we've had strangers in our homes because of what's behind us. And so a big thank you to all of my guests, and perhaps even guests to come. The privilege I felt in you sharing your story, sharing your vulnerability, and be willing to go into an unstructured conversation. I didn't provide any other questions we just had a conversation. And I'm really privileged that people were willing to go there, on my terms, it's just going to be random, they were willing to do that. And so I feel really grateful, humbled that you were willing to do that. And my final reflection is, I felt that I was able to meet you where you're at. I think my interpretation of the feedback you gave me as I interviewed you, some of the feedback I'm getting from some of the listeners is that you feel met, you feel met, you feel heard, you feel held, and you feel seen. And I think that's a beautiful privilege to be part of it, it's a humbling thing to be part of and it's a special it's a very unique thing to to happen particularly as things currently are pretty noisy. There's lots of noise out there in the media. We're coming towards the holiday season, the Christmas season for many of us who celebrate that time of the year, it's a time to reflect and a time to remember and also a time to refresh and renew and perhaps take some space to re-energise and reimagine what could be for 2022 and that's the final insight for me, and it's about me. What I've learned about me over the course of doing these podcasts is that sometimes I don't feel met, I don't feel heard, I don't feel seen, sometimes I just don't feel held. And because of the work that I do because of my immersion in some of these personal growth topics, I'm a bit of a geek in that sense. Those that know me, I've read a few books in my time and I love it and sometimes in the course of the busyness of our lives, the busyness of the work I do, my solid and pure (as far as I can tell) intention to meet people where they're at, there's a little gap sometimes, I sometimes don't feel Met. So over the Christmas and New Year period, I'm going to work on meeting myself, giving myself enough space to be met, to be held, to be heard and to be seen by myself. And I'm going to share that with my family so they can understand perhaps something that they can do for me. It sounds as I'm saying this it sounds really selfish and self indulgent, and yet, it's a need. I think it's a human, it's a basic human need to be heard, held and seen. And there's a gap for me right now, as I come towards the end of a really busy year. I'm going to get better at expressing the need that I have.
So that's it for 2021, that's my final podcast recording of the year. Thank you so much for listening, if you have thank you so much for taking some of the whispers to heart, and I look forward to seeing you in 22. Although at this point, I haven't decided what I'm going to do. I'm definitely going to take a break, I need a break, I need to just have some downtime before I consider what I might do with this in 2022. So wishing you all the very best for the holiday season. Wishing you the capacity and the opportunity for any of your dreams and wishes ambitions to come through next year. All the best, cheers.
