Danielle: It’s not. Like I said, I couldn’t understand anything else besides what I said but I do have four ones that I dug up from the archive. So, I’m excited about this cause it’s not, you know, it’s stuff from a few years ago that you’d have to dig, but you can search the stuff and find what I think are amazing podcast episodes. 

Jason: Cee Cee, how many do you have?

Cee Cee: I have three. I’m not going to lie. I had a really hard time with this. And so, I said yes yesterday thinking, well, what the hell am I going to do with that? And then thinking, well, this will be a really good challenge because then I’ll have to like, actually look. And I came up with three and one of them, I couldn’t even find the actual episode, but I can tell you what it actually is, because I feel like I listen to podcasts mostly as like a form of entertainment, not so much away that I’m going to make myself better.

Like I listened to a lot of comedy and stuff like that, whatever. So maybe I got funnier, LOL. but I mean, I’m excited to talk about it too, mostly because I’m excited to hear what y’all have to say. 

Jason: All right. So, if you’ve got three and Danielle has four, I’ve got five that are in my head, but we might not get to all of it. But let’s start with Danielle. 

Danielle: Sure, absolutely. The first thing that came to mind, I wanted to have kind of like a little like cheesy dream big, but like not when you’re actually going to roll your eyes when you listen to it. And so, I mean, a lot of people have heard of Tony Robbins. He kind of like spearheaded the personal development world in a lot of ways and him and, Peter Diamandis who started the X prize, which is like basically where they bring together a bunch of money to solve a world challenge.

Like, you know, like hunger or education issues. so him and Tony Robbins, they did this interview together called the psychology of success. So of course, like there’s a million podcasts labeled that, but I listened to this a few years back. I think it was from like 2017 or something, and it seriously made me think so differently about basically, instead of making these like 10% improvements in your life and in the world, like basically scrapping how things are done and like starting with a blank page of paper and like the amazing things that happen when you don’t just think like, how can I make this a little bit better? You know, or how can I improve my life just a teeny bit.

It’s sort of like, you know, if you start with that blank page, like, how can I like 10X, my happiness, how can I 10X my, you know, like my experience, like in my relationship or in my career and the way that they talk is not like this sort of like fake inspiration or anything. It’s like, they speak with conviction and, you know, when you hear their voice, they are so passionate about what they do and about making huge changes in the world.

And when someone tells them, I don’t think you’re going to make that happen, or that sounds impossible to me, they’re like, no. And they have this certainty that like, yeah, that sounds impossible right now, but how many times in the past have things been impossible? And then, you know, five years, 10 years later, it was a given and everybody knew that that was, you know, a new discovery in science or in education or anything like that.

And so, like listening to this episode and being like, you know, we’re kind of all living in this mental box of what’s possible, and if you break outside of that, either for changes that you want to see in the world, or even just in your daily life, it just kind of like breaks these boundaries of sort of that cheesy dream big thing and like actually seeing what that can look like in practice. 

Jason: I love it, but how is it life changing? 

Cee Cee: Yeah, I was about to say I’m done with it since you heard. 

Danielle: That’s a great question. You know, I feel like it’s just, it kind of gives you permission to like live differently a little bit, 

Cee Cee: Like a little perspective almost. 

Danielle: It’s kind of like, there’s certain things that you’re told that you have to do just in certain stages in your life, or just like, you know, get a secure job, you know, get married and just live on this certain timeline. And and you can, and that’s great, but it’s kind of like if you take a step back and you actually think like, what do, what do I really want to do?

And you know, what do I, what kind of timeline do I want to live by? It sort of just gives you permission to like break outside the box, or maybe you realize that timeline is exactly what you want, and you’ve actually just, you know, accepted for yourself like this is how I want to live. I’m not just doing it because everybody else is doing it.

So, I feel like it kind of gave me permission to explore a little bit more in my career. And so, like for me, I graduated from NC state and I’ve done a wide variety of things. So, like I went from corporate communication to working for along the founder of a startup to help high school students get into college, to doing five different jobs at once was, which was a little bit crazy.

And then moving into working full-time for Ali found in doing a couple of gigs on the side you know; it was a yoga teacher for a while. So, I kind of like had this feeling in me that I was multi-passionate and I had a lot of things I wanted to be doing, and I didn’t just have to have this one specific thing in my career, in my life, that sort of like fed my, you know, passions or bank account or anything like that.

I kind of could just like live outside that box by doing, you know, pursuing all these different things that I was interested in. 

Jason: You know, we all have those preconceived notions of what our path should be. And that could come from our parents, it could come from our siblings, it could come from media.

So, like the TV that we watch, the movies that we watch, whatever it is, right, but it doesn’t have to be that. And so, for you to break free from that and realize, well, I can do whatever, like I’ve got this one life to live here. I can make it who I want to be. you know, I don’t have to get married at a certain timeframe.

I don’t have to have the big corporate job if I don’t want to. Right. Yeah, exactly. Like you don’t have to do any of that. So yeah, that’s, that’s a great perspective there, Danielle. Yeah. What about you Cee Cee? What’s your, 

Cee Cee: Yeah, so I have one that kind of goes off of it, but the beginning of how we got to it is kind of silly.

I’m not going to lie. so my friend is from South Korea and we were cooking. And she dropped something on the ground and I was like, oh, five, second rule. And she was like, oh, it’s three second rule. So, I was like, okay, I guess Korea has higher standards for like food safety than we do, because for us it’s five seconds.

So, I Googled the five second rule. And I actually found the podcast had nothing to do with the five second rule for food that I was just talking about, but it is called The Hall of Fame Podcast, the School of Greatness, and it’s an episode with Mel Robbins called the five second rule. 

So, what this five second rule is, and it has been very helpful for me, and I kind of had already started, we’re doing it before I found it, but it was very validating, is like, if you’re doing something or you need to be doing something right, and you’re doing something that you shouldn’t be doing, like for me, it’s like I’m sitting in bed drinking coffee and watching Tik Tok when I should like probably get up and go to the gym or like take a shower, one of those things. 

You stop for second and you count down from five and then you have to go do it. And for me that’s been great because I’m known to just like, be comfortable and like go with the flow and whatever. And so like, sometimes it’s hard, especially when you’re comfy in bed at like 7:00 AM.

Like I just want to stay here and watch Tik Tok, I don’t want to get up and do anything. Countdown from five and then you do it, and it all started because we dropped a tofu on the floor. 

Danielle: That’s great. Yeah, I think I’ve heard of this before. I think like she had a Ted talk about it or something. I love that. It’s like, you just, you don’t think you just do it. 

Jason: Yeah. So, what was that episode? It was Lewis Howes School of Greatness, and who was the guest?

Cee Cee: Mel Robbins, which I’ve never listened to any other episode of this podcast. It was just, it just happened to come up.

Jason: She wrote the book, The Five Second Rule. That’s right, yeah. I remember that. Yeah. Lewis Howes like that guy is on episode 1200 of his podcast.

Cee Cee: Yeah. When I was looking to make sure that I found the right one earlier and I saw it, I was like, yeah that’s it.

Jason: And that’s a very small life change, but so impactful. 

Cee Cee: Yeah. I can tell you now I’ve been thinking about that a lot over the last 24 hours. My house is spotless. 

Jason: Wow, awesome. All right, well, I’ll take a turn. the first podcast I want to mention, the first podcast episode that I want to mention is from How I Built This. And, you know, back in 2016, I was listening to some podcasts here and there. I mean, they were just starting out really?

And it would be some sports podcasts, or it would be maybe I was in a true crime then I don’t really know. I remember listening to a podcast on Shark Tank where they would interview the people that had been on Shark Tank in the past and kind of pull back the curtain on some people actually get deals.

And some people actually don’t, even when they shake hands on getting a deal. So, I was starting to get involved in podcasting, but then somehow, I found How I Built This, and the first interview that I listened to was Jim cook from Samuel Adams. So, Guy Raz from how I built this as interviewing Jim Cook.

And there’s a couple of reasons why this was so impactful to my life. The first one is I was listening to this and I was like, oh my gosh, this is absolutely amazing technically, so well-produced. Like the way that the producers at How I Built This, and Guy Raz are able to interweave the narration of it into the episode is genius.

And I just love that style and it started getting in my head on, oh, wait a minute. Is this something that I could do with podcasting? The storytelling of it was awesome, but then the other thing was, Jim Cook was saying that there are some things that are scary, and then there are some things that are dangerous.

And for him, his well-paying job at Boston consulting group was dangerous, but it wasn’t scary. It was dangerous because all of a sudden, he could be 65 years old and not have ever done something that he was proud to accomplish professionally. And he was like, okay, what am I going to do with my life?

Cee Cee: That’s a little bit scary 

Jason: But staying there was safe. Like, if you want to stay there, it was, it was safe for him. So, it wasn’t really scary, but he felt like for his life, it was dangerous. And so, he left that job ultimately to found Samuel Adams. And it got me thinking, so I was, it was 2016, 2017. That started to plant the seeds for me of, well, shoot, what am I going to do?

Like, what is my legacy? I was in a good job at that time. And I, I mean, I was fairly happy with it, but also unfulfilled. Was that something that I could be proud of? Right, so it planted the seeds for one day forming Earfluence.

I feel like, I feel like that was an impactful episode for me anyway. Yeah, all right, so let’s go back to Danielle. 

Danielle: Awesome. All right. Next on my list. I have a little bit more sort of like emotional and touchy podcast recommendation. So first off, just, just like with this podcast, it’s sort of like, if you click on any episode, you’re probably going to really benefit from it. Same with How I built this. I feel like, you know, if you’re scrolling through, you could listen to Sam Adams episode, like that would be great, but honestly, I feel like you could just scroll and click randomly and you will love it. You know, same with this one. 

So, this one is called Over It and on with it with Christine Hassler and she does these live coaching slash therapy episodes with just someone that’s basically anonymous with their first name. And so like, you get to see into this person’s world, like where else do you get to like listen to somebody’s therapy session? And so, I think what’s great about this is someone could be battling with something, either it’s like an emotional pattern or a crazy situation in their life.

And when you listen to it, you have your guard down. And so, if you’re sort of being, you know, coached or, you know, you’re working with a therapist or anything, you might still sort of have your defenses up in some ways, especially if you haven’t been working with someone that long. But when you’re listening to someone else’s life and their realizations, basically under the surface, it’s helping you.

So, I do have a specific episode. but it’s just the one I listened to most, most recently, but this one is called how to navigate confusing emotions. And it was this woman who was dating someone for 10 years. And then she found out that he had this whole other life, he had like this other woman or whatever.

And then, so, and then he went to go be with her and start a family with her, and they were like having a baby together. And then a year later he dies in a tragic car accident, and it’s like, what is this person supposed to feel, sure this person was a huge part of her life. Then she finds out that he betrayed her and then he dies in this tragic sudden accident.

And so, it was really interesting cause she was talking about how, she had this great support group around her, her friends and family, but they were all just saying like, Yeah, how, how terrible he was. And she was like, I still am still mourning his death.

Cee Cee: They’re saying its karma or something like that. Nobody deserves that much karma.

Danielle: Right. And I will, the other episodes are a little bit more like quote unquote normal situations, a little bit more relatable. Like you’re feeling stuck in some way in your life, but that one was just, you know, definitely with that one you’re not thinking, oh yeah, I remember that guy that time I dated some guy for 10 years and he betrayed me, you know, and then died, you know, like it’s, it’s that one’s a little bit more extreme, but still like, we’ve all sort of had these confusing emotions.

We don’t know how to feel. And so, you know, I love these different episodes and I think it’s every other episode she does like sort of the therapy session type of thing. And then for the other ones, she interviews people and whatnot, but I just really love them cause it sort of, she really get, is able to get deep with people and it’s so relatable, but you just have your guard down when you’re listening.

Cee Cee: Wow. It’s almost like free therapy. 

Danielle: Yeah, absolutely. 

Jason: So how does this work like these are, these are actually therapy sessions that they’ve gotten permission to record, I guess. 

Danielle: Yeah. It’s only the person’s first name. There are people from all around the world and she digs into it them. I’m pretty sure that she talks to them for maybe 20, 30 minutes and then she breaks it down at the end. And then it’s also good for people like who are therapists or coaches. Cause she’ll explain why she went a certain direction with people. which is interesting, even if you don’t want to be a therapist. 

Cee Cee: But now you can trick your own therapist. 

Danielle: But I just, I think it’s done so beautifully and she’s so intuitive. She just like knows right where to dig in and you know where to kind of loosen up. And it’s just, it’s an excellent podcast. 

Jason: Wow. Megan and I have had on our couple’s therapist onto her podcast, Weddings for Real. Which, because why not? It’s our podcasts, there’s no rules and podcasts. We can do whatever we want.

But yeah, it’s so interesting there. And he was talking about developing a podcast for himself and like, how would he do that exactly because it’s inside information obviously. 

Cee Cee: Just get them to sign the form.

Jason: Right, right. Yeah, and it may be something where he says, listen, I can do this for free. I can basically provide you therapy for free, if you’ll agree to do this, if you’ll agree to let us use it for the show, 

Cee Cee: I think I would do it no matter what, it just seems kind of fun. 

Danielle: Yeah. And when you’re anonymous, I mean maybe there’s someone who recognized her voice, but it’s kind of a crazy chance if that happens

Cee Cee: You can also change somebody’s voice.

Danielle: Or use a different name, whatever.

Jason: Yeah, that sounds like a great show, Over It and On with It. Yes. All right. Awesome. Cee Cee what’s next on your list?

Cee Cee: Okay. So, this one is one that I have, like never forgotten. I don’t know why, but it’s an episode of Planet Money, so NPR, and it is called What’s a Penny Worth. So, what they do is they kind of try, like trace what you can buy with a penny, why like pennies actually, or how pennies actually costs more to make than they’re actually worth, and it’s like totally out of my alley. Like I, I listen to Planet Money a lot because I was a public policy minor in college, so I wanted to, you know, learn more about how money and all that works, even though it only did so much. 

What I did learn from this though, like, I really love this episode because they perfectly interwove like the, the NPR style, like short kind of stories like they do on the radio with the nice, like place establishing background noise versus like a typical kind of podcast episode. And what it kind of told me when I listened to it when I was in college, is that I can, I wasn’t sure whether or not I wanted to go and work for NPR because like when you’re an audio journalist, it’s like, well, that’s kind of the only option I feel like I have.

But this kind of, it showed me cause it’s longer too. It’s like twenty-five minutes, that you can really make anything that you want. There aren’t really any rules to it, and I didn’t have to go and just work for NPR. Yeah, but it’s also a really cool episode. It sounds really good. Kind of like ASMR.

Jason: Yeah. And thankfully you did not work for NPR. 

Danielle: Here you are. And I love how you guys are taking two looks at the quality of this great podcast episode that you’re thinking of, and it’s both the content of it and how they did it. And you guys are like thinking about the behind the scenes and the production and everything. I love hearing that side from you guys. 

Jason: Yeah, thank you. Well, my next one is totally about the production of it and I’m going to get very braggy here. So, 

Cee Cee: Nice. 

Jason: All right. So, in 2018, Megan, Weddings for Real, my wife, was just starting her podcast. And this is episode seven, ultimately, of, of what it would be.

And she interviews Jenny Corbett, who is a photographer in the Raleigh area. Absolutely freaking hilarious. I mean, she’s moving to Charlotte so sad that she’s moving to Charlotte. But her Instastories, like she was the person to start Instastories, basically. She wasn’t, but you know, she was funny.

She was the first person that was worth a follow-on Instagram story anyway. So, Megan is interviewing Jenny and they cannot get it together. So, I am not, I’m not in the recording. I’ve got a full-time job at this time, but I’m listening to all this, and literally, oh, they have one mic in the center of the room. Jenny was trying to get through her backstory of how she formed our company 

Cee Cee: They couldn’t get past the beginning?

Jason: They, no, they couldn’t make it through the beginning. So, like, she’s trying for three times, they’re just laughing, hilariously, they’re drinking wine, all this stuff. And then eventually Jenny kicks Megan out of her own recording and says, you go stand by the door. So, I can go ahead and put myself together and say what I wanted to say on this episode.

Oh, my gosh. So, in the episode, there’s that there’s them pouring wine. There’s them like starting stories and stopping stories and all these things. And afterwards, both Megan and Jenny are like, I’m so sorry. You don’t have a chance on this one. you’re not going to be able to put this together, like, oh, great.

So, I’m listening to this, laughing the whole time, and I was like, I don’t know how to put this together, but what was great is, like you were saying, Cee Cee is that there are no rules in podcasting, like there’s no chronological order. It is not something that you absolutely have to do live or in that order, whatever.

And so, what I did was I took segments from the, at the end of it, put it in the beginning, just came up with some cohesive story to share and then had Megan do that narration, like with the, How I Built This thing, where anything that didn’t work, you know, Megan would just do the narration. And I tell you like that one is one that I’m most proud of for putting together, because it was absolutely ridiculous and funny at the same time, but ridiculous.

And it came together as, oh, this is a fun episode. And she got a lot of comments from that as like, wow, y’all are hilarious. And then that got me thinking, oh, okay, this is something that you know, Megan’s doing, I feel like I’m pretty good at this, maybe we can start selling more podcasts as well. So yeah, also definitely life-changing, if not a bit braggy. 

Cee Cee: I mean, I feel like you can always tell when somebody is having a good time and you want to hear somebody having a good time. So, I feel like when they’re having a great time, that’s even better. 

Danielle: It’s a lot more fun when you feel like you’re actually there hanging out with them. Like there’s something really sort of like intimate about just audio and when you’ve got your, you know, earbuds in and you’re doing your laundry or whatever, and you feel like you’re there hanging out with everybody, you’re laughing out loud to yourself. Like that’s the best time. And I feel like that works so much better than just like, okay, welcome to the podcast here’s A, B and C. And you know, like here’s the advice. 

Cee Cee: Here’s a question. There’s your answer. Let’s move on. 

Danielle: Yeah.

Jason: Right. So, how do you picture when you’re listening to a podcast, how do you picture them? Like if there’s a guest and the host, you picture them at a table, like, do you feel like they’re in the room with you? Like, do you have a vision for it? 

Danielle: I mean, it depends which podcast, but, I mean, some of them actually like have the video online, so like, you can see them right where they are or whatever, but I don’t know. I don’t think I visualize it. I just feel like there’s something about audio. 

Yeah. It’s just like, it feels like you’re like right there with them. Like they’re talking to you on the phone almost where it just feels really close, you know, you feel close to them and just hearing the audio and like you’re there, whether you visualize it or not. I think. 

Jason: Yeah. And I did the same thing, and I was wondering about that because of all the zoom calls that we’ve been on. And a lot of our, almost all of our recordings over the past year, and before we got the studio were streamyard or squadcast or zoom or whatever. And so, I’m wondering like when people are listening to this, are they thinking about the zoom? Are they, are they, are they in their head about that? Or are they just not caring? They just feel like they’re there in the room. So anyway, I’m just curious. 

Cee Cee: I will say, for my generation being on zoom, like of course I don’t like doing it all the time, but I don’t think it’s really affected me very much just because like I grew up getting on, like, I don’t know if you remember ooVoo when ooVoo was a thing, but me and my friends in middle school would get on there and video chat with each other.

Cause you can have like eight people on there and we would just get on there and talk and like hang out whenever. So, to me it doesn’t really feel that different. I mean, I am happy that I don’t have to do it as much as I did before. 

Jason: Yeah. Yep, that’s true. It’s so nice being here. I’m going to take one more, cause I’ve got a list of five. I don’t know what I’ll get through them, but I’ll make this one pretty quick and then we can get to yours, Danielle. So, this next one the, the reason is impactful on my life is because it started a professional friendship and a personal friendship. 

So, I was listening to some true crime podcasts, and everybody listened to Serial, and some of those, I don’t know how I found this particular one, but it was called the Pretend Podcast, and Javier Leyva was, he interviewed somebody that had been in the Word of Faith Fellowship Church slash cult. And this is in Western North Carolina. He’s interviewing this person and telling this amazing story about this cult, and so it’s very much true crime light. And the show in general is people pretending to be somebody else, but I was listening to this and I remember being on a run and thinking, oh my gosh, this is just masterful what this guy is doing, you know, I’m pretty sure I can tell, like, he’s doing this all on his own.

You know, he’s hosting it, he’s producing it and he’s doing all the editing. And I got back from my run and connected with him on Instagram, and then all of a sudden it turns out he’s in Raleigh. He actually worked for Red Hat and we started a friendship and he is on the board of advisors.

And like, he’s a guy that I’ll go to for a lot of podcasts advice. You know, pre COVID our girls would hang out together and all this stuff. So, yeah, that’s just one that because of a podcast, it started both a professional and personal friendship. 

Cee Cee: That’s a really good one, like really good. And he’s so nice. And if you want to, you can go back and listen our episodes with him. 

Danielle: I feel like so many people don’t even, and it doesn’t cross their mind to just reach out directly to people like the feel so distant, and then just you finding out that he was in Raleigh. That’s amazing, and even if that person isn’t, I just, you know, I actually, this is so funny now that I work at Raleigh Founded.

So, one of our founders is actually Christopher Gergen and he’s like a big, you know, a visionary and he’s been involved with, with economic development and just, you know, helping people’s entrepreneurship and whatnot for a long time. And I actually listened to a podcast with him on it a long while back, and then reach out to him, did an informational interview with him.

And that’s actually part of the reason that I ended up working here now just through those connections and finding out about Raleigh Founded formerly HQ Raleigh. So, it’s just so funny if you, you know, have the guts to reach out to someone cold, what can happen. 

Cee Cee: Right. I mean, this goes back, I think there’s a Donald Thompson podcast, so shout out to that. This is an honorable mention, episode where I think that’s where I first heard your network is your net worth. And I feel like, I, I mean, I’m just like do my own thing. I tend to like, not think, oh, let me reach out to this person. Cause like, I’m like, they’re never going to answer me and there’s really no even point trying, but it, sometimes it really does work out. And I feel like that has pushed me to think like, maybe I should, you know, start adding people on LinkedIn or DMing them on Instagram or whatever. 

Jason: Oh yeah. And from a podcast or a perspective, if somebody were to just reach out and say, hey, I listen to your podcast, I love it. Are you interested in doing a, a zoom chat or a coffee or something like that?

Every podcaster that we work with would be like, yeah, thanks for listening. You know, that, that’s awesome. That, I’ve said this before, that fills their podcast or bucket right there. that feels so good to get that random connection on LinkedIn, on Instagram, on Facebook, wherever and just say, hey, I listened to the podcast and meant a lot.

Danielle: Yeah. That makes a ton of sense because you’re just putting out, putting out, putting out and it’s like, oh, there are people there. Hello! And to get that sort of personal connection from it, you know, it’s the feedback systems going the other way. 

Jason: For sure, and, you’re not as far away as, as you think you are. Like even with Brené Brown, like I tried to reach out to her and sure enough, her team to get did get back to me.

So, like, you know, even that’s like the apex of it. The podcasters that we’re working with, they are, I’m telling you, if you are reaching out to them and saying, hey, I love your show. That will go very far. 

Cee Cee: Compliments are great. People love them. 

Jason: Yes. All right, Danielle, what’s next on your list?

Danielle: All right. So, this is my favorite podcast and I have two episodes that I narrowed it down to from 500 or whatever amount that they have. So, my favorite podcast is the Tim Ferriss show. I’m pretty sure we’ve talked about this for at least Jason, that now I mention it to you, probably both of you guys.

And so, the first episode that comes to mind that I’ve recommended to multiple people and they specifically were like, thank you so much, I loved this episode, it was an interview with Terry Crews. And he is just such a representation of like, you can be multi-passionate, you know, I was talking about this earlier and just like that permission slip to be able to do all these different things. If that’s really, you know, what your heart is calling for. 

And he tells just like intimate details of his life and how. Sort of went down all these different paths. Honestly, I need to listen to this episode again, because it was so good. It’s been again years. But this, it was like emotionally impactful, it was, you know, super interesting to just hear how he built, you know, a capacity and all these different areas. He like painted for a while, which you wouldn’t expect, cause it’s like this big muscly, bulky guy you know, acting, he went down all these avenues and it was just so interesting to hear about his super interesting life and also, you know, how he got there.

So that’s a really good episode. And then this other episode, oh my gosh, like please listen to this episode. It’s an interview with Cat Hoke, Catherine Hoke. And she, I don’t think she did an interview before the one with the Tim Ferriss show or maybe no big podcasts like that.

So, she started bringing entrepreneurship into prisons, and basically like taught inmates how to build a business so that when they got out of prison, they would have this endeavor and they would be like feeling meaningful and helping the world and be able to like, you know, support themselves in everything.

And it was like, she went in with this one idea of like, I’m helping these people with their careers basically, because when they get out of prison, it’s hard to get a job, all that. But it sort of turned into this whole other thing where she realized that like, there was so much shame that they were carrying.

And so, for a long time in her career, she was talking about the importance of second chances. And then she came to realize that they in many ways had not even gotten a first chance. You know, a lot of these people had gotten in trouble starting at 13, 14, and there were reasons for that. And like they never really supported and they ended up in the prison system and all this stuff.

And so, she tells this just beautiful story of how she always wanted to make a difference, but kind of started as one thing and transformed into this like amazing, you know, helping people feel connected to one another and release shame and, you know, put themselves on track to really help people when they got out of the prison system and have sort of this new found meaning for life.

So, it’s just an amazing story and an amazing sort of look into that world and you know, how she, had an impact, but also learned from the people she was working with. 

Cee Cee: That sounds so powerful. I’m still processing what it is exactly that you just said. 

Danielle: I like these to go back and listen to it again. Cause I seriously was like, oh my God, I need to text this to everybody I know as soon as I finished the first time, I listened to it. Again, that one might’ve been from like 2017 or 2018. I was trying to dig it out of the archives as I said, but this is another one that I really want to repeat listen to. 

Jason: I can see why you were so passionate about raising your hand and saying, yes, I want to come on this episode.

Uh, because I can see the conversations that you’re having with your friends now. And they’re like, ah, Danielle again, with the, with the text messages about the podcasts, like how do your friends, family react when you’re, when you’re sending them these, these episodes?

Danielle: I need to bribe them to listen. They don’t listen to, they’re not podcast listeners, most of them. And so, it’s more like I need to get them onto like whatever, Spotify or Apple podcasts, to listen to a podcast because they don’t normally do it. So, they need to like fit it into their schedule. All the ones I’ve recommended are like, at least an hour long. If not like two, I think one of them is like two and a half hours long. So, they’re like, Danielle, what is this? 

Jason: Yeah. You know, what’s interesting. I last weekend a friend came into town from Houston, actually. No, he’s based in Houston, originally. He’s been overseas for like the past four years. And you know, we’re talking about his job, my job, all these things.

And he’s like, you know, people keep telling me about podcasts. I don’t even know how to get a podcast. I’m like, come on. You’re not serious, are you? And he’s like, oh, I don’t, I don’t really know. And I was like, well, you have Spotify. He’s like, no, I used to. And I was like, okay, near your phone and you got an Android phone.

And so, he just, you know, had never figured out how to download Google podcast and start listening to podcasts. So, you know, you’re talking about your friends that are like, oh, Danielle, come on, I don’t know that I want to invest an hour or two hours. It Is so hard to change people’s habits of what they’re listening to, what they’re doing on their phones, what they’re listening to in general. Like you know, videos on music, on all these things, you know, to get them to, to change, to say, hey, here’s the podcast that you should be listening to. 

Danielle: Absolutely. And I have to share this. Two days ago, I taught my mom how to text a Gif. It was a big moment, you know, you just got to teach them how, and then they’re like right on track. So, my mom can now send a dancing banana GIF. 

Cee Cee: Oh, that’s awesome. 

Danielle: That’s a big step. Sometimes it takes that, just showing people how to download podcasts or they can honestly even like Google it and it’s on most people’s websites too. So yeah. It was just, you know, getting them in the door.

Jason: Yeah, and yeah. Do they want to. So, Tim Ferriss is an interesting guy. if I remember his story, right, he was a hundred hours a week working. 

Cee Cee: A nightmare.

Jason: I think selling just random things here and there. And, oh, he was, he was selling supplements. I think, 

Cee Cee: I feel like all the big podcasts dudes do sell like alpha brain, whatever it’s called.

Jason: Yeah. Something like that. Yeah, and he was very successful with it, but his relationships were, were struggling. I want to say he was married and about to start a family at that time. 

Danielle: I think he was dating somebody and she was like, you know, working hours are nine to five. 

Jason: That’s it, and so he came up with the story and he came up with the book four-hour workweek, and that was his how he became famous, like he was doing well already, but how he became famous is that the four-hour workweek? 

Danielle: Yeah. He talks about how so he was working in this business, selling the supplements and then he was so burnt out and decided to go on vacation. He left for a month and just assumed things were going to crash and burn. He came back and like he’d set everyone on his team up for success and was just waiting for things to just, you know, be demolished by the time he returned. And then everything was working pretty much fine.

And he was like, wow, I can delegate and step away. What is this? And then then, you know, the four-hour workweek was like sort of a spin on like 10X, like 40 hours down to four hours. And so, it’s really interesting where he started and just his whole journey since then. And I actually met him once, like total accident.

Yeah, I was, I was at a Tony Robbins seminar and they were showing him in the front of the room and there’s like a camera to blow up, you know, his picture up on the wall. And in the background, I was like, oh my God, is that Tim Ferris sitting up there? It’s Tim Ferris. I didn’t know he was here. That’s crazy. 

So, I had a little fan girl moment sitting in my chair, like 50 row rows back or whatever. And then like the next day we were doing like this intense exercise where your change, your internal dialogue or whatever. And I’m like, you know, we’re all in the hallways with our little notebooks scribbling stuff out.

And then I was like, you know, I’m like processing some stuff. I need to like walk up and down the hall. So, I’m like walking down the hall and I see like these two guys and one of them is like the short guy with his hood up and he walks past me. Like we’re walking opposite directions. I was like, oh, it’s Tim Ferris.

And then I just like, I don’t know what came over me. I was like, Tim? He turns around now. I was like, Hey. And I like went up and I was like, I don’t, it’s all a blur. So, I don’t even know what I said, but I’m pretty sure it was like, this line from your last book was really great. And I loved it. It’s made so much to me, blah, blah, blah, and then grabbed my hand. And he was like, I’m so glad to hear that. And like gave me a hug and I was like, see you Tim.

Cee Cee: That’s so lovely.

Danielle: You know, I walked away. And then like probably cried. I don’t know. But it was like a really like cool moment. And it’s interesting, cause he’s like shared sense that that was a big turning moment for him where he was like really focused on like all this internal success and kind of like shifted to more like internal and meditation and stuff, he would think he’d never really get into. 

And you could just sort of like, see it, you know, like you can tell when someone’s sort of like, yeah, whatever, nice to meet you, whatever. But he, you know, he just seemed like a really grounded, really good guy. And like, I was just like, this is crazy. 

Cee Cee: It’s nice when you meet somebody who you admire and they’re like, not mean. 

Danielle: Yeah, you should never meet your hero. It’s like, you should never meet your heroes unless they’re actually great people, right? 

Jason: Yeah. One other interesting thing about Tim Ferris is he uses hallucinogens for depression, and we don’t have to get into, you know, the pros and cons of it on this show by any means. But yeah, it’s just interesting, like he is open about using LSD, to help him with depression and it encourages others to do it as well. Like, and obviously, you know, not for. I don’t know, I, I w I, I’m not, I’m not an expert on it at all. 

Danielle: It just shows that, you know, once you reach a certain level of success, the things that you really care about in the areas you want to make a difference in, like, you might more have like the funds or the exposure to an audience to be able to share that, whether it is, I think it’s, psylocibin, I don’t know, I’ve, you know me, I’ve scrolled through all his episodes before or whatever, but you know, that, or even sort of like with the example, the podcast episode at the beginning with Peter Diamandis and, you know, he and Tony Robbins are huge on like reducing food waste and making sure that like people who don’t, you know, have access to fresh food are able to get that.

And it’s like, you know, it’s when you’re further along in your journey. And you’ve, like I said, got the audience and got that level of success, money, whatever it is. Like, you can support these things in a bigger way, whether it’s depression or whatever.

Jason: Wow. All right, Tim Ferriss, big fan. Yeah. 

Danielle: That’s all of mine. I just like, I was holding out for the best one, cause I’m obsessed with the Tim Ferriss show. 

Jason: I’ve got two more. You’ve got one more, I think. All right. So, I’m going to start with one. this episode is one of ours as well. It is the very first episode of Beyond the Obituary, and, uh the concept is telling stories of those who have passed on way more than a one-page obituary ever could. 

So, I had proposed this concept to Renaissance Funeral Home. They loved it, and the first recording was the person that I was talking to at Renaissance Funeral Home and talking to her. Her husband had passed away. So, we go into Renaissance and it is Heather, it is their three kids, his mom, and then a family friend.

So, I was interviewing, is that six people, I think it’s six people about John, about John’s life and everything that he was to the kids and all that stuff. And it was just so moving and I was floored by how strong Heather was, especially, and how their kids and the kids were, I think, 8 through 13 at the time, how they were able to talk about it. And just so many tears going through that. 

And for, for me on my personal journey, like, you know, I grew up in a, you know, a religious American household, you know, we don’t talk about death really. It’s really not something we bring up, but for these people that have gone through it, I started to realize that a lot of people want to talk about it.

And, you know, they want to talk about those, those people that have passed on and share these stories. and that, that series arc, that podcasts arc for me and I, I talked to maybe 8, 10 people in similar situations was just so memorable, and it has helped me a lot in being able to talk to myself my children about death. So anyway, that was, that was life altering for sure. 

Danielle: Wow. That sounds incredible. And it’s just, that’s something we all have in common is we’re going to lose people in our lives. And so, to talk about it helps us feel like we’re not so alone in that.

Cee Cee: Yeah. It’s super, super healthy to do.

Jason: Yeah. Yeah. And I, you know, growing up, I would not have thought that but yeah, you need to talk about it.

Cee Cee: Yeah. I feel like I’m completely desensitized to it. And my granny used to always say next Christmas, if I make it to Christmas, cause she was always falling apart. She finally passed away in December, but after Christmas, so it was pretty freaking powerful. 

But I took this class in college called death and dying, and that was also very interesting. You learned how other cultures kind of deal with it. Americans, like, you know, like you said, we don’t really talk about it, but a lot of other cultures do a lot of other very interesting things. And I’m not going to go into detail about that because it’s kind of gross.

It was interesting. It was like psychology, sociology and some, well, another anthropology, another ology. 

Jason: Wow. All right. We’ve covered a lot on this, this episode. So far, you know, death and dying. we’ve got LSD or psylocibin, emotions. Yeah, I think we’re going to make it through without crying, but we’ll see. There’s still time. Cee Cee, what’s your, what’s your last? 

Cee Cee: Yeah. So, my last one is the one that I can find the actual episode for. But I have watched the show they’ve been on YouTube for like 10 years. They’re called Rhett and link. They make the show called Good Mythical Morning, right. I love them. I’ve always loved watching them, and I’ve had a particular place in my heart about them the entire time, because they’re from Buies Creek. So, where Campbell is, but from the town over at Lillington is where a lot of my family is from.

So, I always thought, oh my God, that’s so cool. Like these two guys who are just like, you know, they went to NC State, you have that in common. But like, you know, grew up with people that I knew who are like now these big like celebrities and they live in LA and they have this company where they do all these really cool things.

Like that’s awesome. and so, I listened to their podcast a lot. And there was one episode where they were talking about North Carolina. They talked about North Carolina a lot, which I like, and they mentioned something about Lillington. They were talking about a hardware store and they said Womble and Sons, and that’s my family’s hardware store.

And so, I remember thinking, wow, like I really feel connected to these people. Like I feel so seen. And its kind of, it encouraged me to think like, well, if they can do that, like I could definitely do that too. Like, there really are no limits cause you think, oh, I’m in North Carolina, I’m never going to be able to, you know, create this big thing, whatever.

But like, then they mentioned my family store on it. I need to find it because that would be really cool to share. 

Danielle: Wow. What did you do when you heard that? Where you’re like, oh! 

Cee Cee: I called my mom! I was like, mom, you’ll never believe what these people were just talking about. And of course, he didn’t really get it. It was super, super exciting. It was super exciting. 

Jason: Wow. Rhett and Link are hilarious. 

Cee Cee: I still watch them like every day. I was watching them this morning 

Danielle: When you had a countdown from five to get out of bed. 

Jason: They’ve rebranded. Right? So, like Mythical or something, 

Cee Cee: The company’s called Mythical. So, their overarching company, they have Good Mythical Morning, which is their like daily show.

They have good myth or The Mythical Kitchen where they have like a cooking channel, which they’re not on, but they like have all of this different creative conglomerate. Working for that company is one of my dreams. 

Jason: Oh, there you go. So, one of my favorite Rhett and Link skits, do you know retina link by the way, Danielle?

Cee Cee: I have to look them up. 

Jason: So, they, they pull through a taco bell. Are you familiar with this? They’re going into a taco bell drive through and they decided to sing the order. So, one of them has got a guitar and one of them is singing as loudly as he can about their taco bell order. And they order like 20 different things. And it, it was just funny. You’ll have to check it out. 

Cee Cee: Yeah, and they come back and perform at the state fair every couple of years. 

Jason: Rhett and Link. They are great. All right. Last one, is my first podcast episode that I did with Donald Thompson and the reason that this was impactful on my life is for a couple of reasons.

One, I had reached out to him about, hey, you’ve got a podcast. I want to talk to you about making it better. And he’s like, sure, come on, come on in. We talk about different reasons he has a podcast, and all these things, and then he’s like well we’ll come on, and you can interview me for a podcast. It’s going to be about this eBook that I wrote. 

Cee Cee: That’s very Don though, you just come on my podcast right now. it’s like, we need this person on there. 

Jason: Right. It does sound like Don. But it was a, an eBook that he had written called Diversity and Inclusion at Work, and so this is back in early 2019, I believe. And so, I’m reading this book and it’s like a 60-page book and like all these different insights into things I was not thinking about, about DEI.

You know, so like how, because, you know, for me growing up, like everybody was everybody’s equal. Like everybody, you don’t, you don’t think of different people as better or worse than others. Everybody is equal, and that is just so shortsighted and I started to realize, and I hadn’t realized, I mean, shoot, I was 39 years old and I hadn’t really why’s that in until then about, okay.

That’s fine that you think about that, but what about unconscious bias? You know, what about making an effort to have a variety of people in the room? So, you have different types of ideas, so you’re not in that same one box of homogeny. So, like thinking about that, I was like, oh, okay. I didn’t realize a lot of these things before.

And that really started my own personal DEI journey of having an understanding. And then of course working with Don, you know, that started a podcast and a relationship where we’re on episode 80 something now. But since that episode, the DEI types of podcasts that we’ve done together and working with The Diversity movement, and like I was the host of the Ask A series where we did ask a Black guy, I ask a white guy, we did ask a straight guy, asked two queer women of color. we did ask a boomer, ask a millennial. 

We did all these different things and it just opened my mind to celebrating our differences and appreciating what DEI meant in the workplace. So that was life changing. 

Cee Cee: Yeah. Working with them is always super rewarding because you feel like you get to learn a lot while doing it, but it also feels really good to know that you’re producing something that other people can listen to and maybe even have that kind of same sort of reaction to it.

Danielle: Yeah. That makes a lot of sense. And that’s honestly how I see the point of a podcast is to just see into somebody’s world. 

Cee Cee: I’m trying to laugh most of the time. 

Danielle: or be entertained and the humor. 

Jason: Yeah, that’s true. And that’s ultimately what I ended up going to is like sports podcasts or entertainment podcasts, right, because we are just being flooded with, with our jobs right now on all this information and all the learning stuff. Sometimes you just want to take a break.

Cee Cee: Sometimes I don’t want to learn anything. I just want to be done. Is that too much to ask 

Danielle: you just want to laugh. 

Jason: Yeah, oh, perfect. Well, this has been awesome. No others on your list? 

Danielle: Oh, well, listen. I could come up with 20. I came up with this list in about 10 seconds. I was like, boom, I got it. But you asked me again in a week and I’ll have a whole new list. 

Jason: Right. All right. Well, this has been awesome. Thank you so much, Danielle. how can, how can our listeners connect with you? 

Danielle: Come visit me at Raleigh Founded. 

Cee Cee: That’s a great answer. 

Danielle: Stop in and say hi to us. All of us, 

Jason: We are at the warehouse Raleigh Founded. Upstairs, right by the NC state entrepreneurship center.

Come say hi, come visit Danielle at Raleigh Founded too connect with her on LinkedIn. Do all those things. Connect with us on LinkedIn. If you’re looking for a podcast, you can check out earfluence.com or go to, or email us info@earfluence.com. 

All right, everybody. Thank you so much for listening and thank you, Cee Cee. Thank you as always. Danielle, thank you for being here. I’m Jason Gillikin and we’ll see you next time on the Earfluence Podcast.