Updates and Resolutions

Shut up and sit down. Welcome to Being On Stage, the only podcast that gives you motivation, inspiration, and confidence to be better on stage. No matter how you entertain, sing, dance, band, comedian, public speaking, MC, drag, burlesque, performance artist, or street performer, this is the show for you. Hey, rock stars. Reggie Dawson here, your host of the Being On Stage podcast. Welcome back and welcome to the last episode of 2019, the last episode of this decade. Let me tell you, it has been an amazing ride. I've been doing this podcast now for about two years, focused entirely on performers, how to do better on stage, how to connect more with your audience, and more importantly, how to continue growing both within yourself and within your talent. And I've got to tell you, over the last two years, I've talked to some amazing, amazing performers. I've gotten a chance to work closer with a few of them. And one of the things I've learned and one of the things that I have to say I've taken advantage of over the last couple of weeks is, you know, it's important to take some time and be grateful for what you have in your life. And I know, you know, the holidays going around, maybe I'm just really in the holiday spirit, but I kind of took advantage of that lately, as you can see. As you can tell, it's been quite a while since I did some podcasts. I always take time off in December. Lots going on. You know, Thanksgiving just happened. I have a busy schedule. You know, this is not the only thing I do. I have a couple of other businesses I'm running. So with work and everything like that, things get a little crazy around the holidays. And then there's Christmas. And then my wife and I have an anniversary on January 1st. And then that's also New Year's and our daughter's birthday is right around the corner. And it's just it's a really, really crazy, crazy time. And this year especially has been crazy. So I took advantage of taking some time off and took a little more time away from the podcast than I intended. And part of that is organizational issues. And I'll get into that here in a second. But hey, listen, the title of this episode is, you know, updates and resolutions. So the update is, you know, it's been an amazing ride. I've worked with some amazing entertainers. I've learned from them and from myself that it's important to take time for family and for yourself. And that's that's a good. Focal point around the holidays is is to say and I'm going to keep this portion short and sweet because I really want to get into the resolutions part. But I really want to say, like, when when you take the time with the family, no matter where you are in your life, like no matter where you are in your life, no matter where you are in your career, there is no person on this planet that is too big, too famous, too busy, too swamped, too inundated with work and updating stuff. Social media and their own lives. There's no one that that that is that person enough or that enough of anything. There's no one that is. You got to make time for family. That's the bottom line. You got to make time for your family. You got to make time for your friends. You got to make time for yourself. And that's a little bit about my updates. What's been going on? You know, I homeschool my daughter. My wife just graduated with her bachelor's degree in graphic design. And on top of that, you know, businesses and everything like that on the holidays. So that's the updates part. So let's get into the resolutions part. One of the things I mentioned was organizational issues. And I got to tell you, I'm not I'm not exactly like Susie clean here. And I don't know who Susie clean is, but that's just what I'm using for the sake of this story. I'm not exactly the the most clean person. And by clean, I mean, like I bathe myself, things like that. Not that you need to know any of that. But by clean, I mean, like I'm a mess. I'm messy. I'm messy. I'm a little unorganized. There tends to be a lot of clutter in my life and in my home. And my wife does a very good job of helping me, you know, realize these things and and pushing me to do a little bit better. And I think that everyone gets a little cluttered in their life and in their organization. And one of the lessons that I have learned significantly learned, I want to say, in the past couple of weeks is organization is important. Not just in your life, not just in your life, but in your stuff. In your in your performing, in your career, everything or organization is essential. And one of the things I've been working on over the past few weeks is organizing my schedule. And this is especially difficult for performers is keeping an organized schedule, keeping a calendar, a planner, if you will. It is extremely difficult. I tried this in August. I'm trying it again. I'm trying it in different ways. I'm trying now. I'm trying something where I just I literally I plan it the night before and I print it the next day or as I upload. Well, not just. I don't just plan it the night. Like I look over it the night before and I print it so that I have it for the next day. So I'm just going day by day. The weekly thing got a little. I don't know. I'm just not. I'm not. I'm not an organized ish person, I guess. So I've been really working on that and keeping. I got to tell you, keeping your calendar organized and like actually having it in front of you every day. It is incredibly useful to make sure you don't miss anything. It's also useful for. Like thinking back and looking back on what you did, like at the end of the week when you're trying to figure out, like, what did I accomplish this week? Like, it's really good to look back and see that. And I think as you know, as we go through our careers as performers and everything, a lot of times we lose track. I see I see it all the time. I see like the day of event posts popping up on Facebook. I'm like, whoa, wait a minute. Like, my calendar is set for the day like you're you're telling me at 10:00 a.m. and about an event that's happening at 7:00 a.m. That's not organized. That's not. I'm going to say it. That's not professional. If you're going to post an event and you're going to put yourself out there, you got to be organized about it. You know, you're you're trying to build a fan base. You're trying to gain fans here. You you got to put your calendar out there ahead of time, you know. And that's when I mean, for me, I'm going day by day. Yeah. But I have I have I have meetings and podcasts and website updates and sales. You know, and that's when I mean, for me, I'm going day by day. Yeah. But I have I have I have meetings and podcasts and website updates and sales and things like that. You know, you're trying to gain fans here. on stage has an email list. Do I pay for it? No. I use MailChimp. do i have more than 2 000 subscribers no so i don't have to pay for it it's free up to 2 000 subscribers go for it um these are things that need to stay organized though and these are things and a website especially if your website that for example has a calendar that people are supposed to sign up for a free session make sure it doesn't take them to paypal like mine does right now for some stupid reason um but these are things that we got to get fixed in our lives and in our and yes i'm talking about myself but you you got to be able to relate to this you got to have something going on where it's just completely out of control and needs some fixing and usually it's technologically related for me i hope it's the same for you otherwise what am i talking about i guess that's the price i pay for doing a grip it and rip it podcast for issues and resolutions i'll be honest part of this organization has bled into my desk my area of work um through christmas and everything i've had to hide and stash presents and it's kind of taken over my desk with just presents and i'll be honest like some mail that probably needs to be tossed out and so i'm i'm cleaning it off i'm going through it this week i'm reorganizing my desk but when you don't have a clean desk you don't really want to sit there and podcast so i'm actually and this is the funny part as i round out this podcast and as i'm talking about you know updates and resolutions um i'm actually podcasting in my car a gentleman's podcast that i listen to um he actually podcasts every single episode from his car he does it in like the kroger but he says he's in the kroger park and all this stuff and i've seen it uh that's the fancy thing about having an iphone he has this great microphone that plugs in the end of an iphone and pretty much has studio quality um i don't have iphone of course because you know i don't like apple but that's a whole nother podcast and a whole nother conversation don't hate me um but yeah so he he podcasts from his car so i figured you know what my desk is unorganized i've done the podcast from the car thing before um when i was running around a lot with my wife when she was in school and everything and it works it's really great acoustic so honestly i mean if you need to practice your singing or even if you need to record some singing or some um some vocals or even i guess an instrument if you can figure out a way to play it um the vehicle has really great acoustics so um consider that and i'll see you in the next video as you move on move along in your career with whatever you do that a vehicle has great acoustics that's where i'm at right now and ironically enough there is about three um three of my neighbors are having their lawn work done right now and you can barely barely hear any of those um machines machines machines going on so there's that and that's i guess that's the last resolution for for me to you and i'll see you in the next video honestly the goal the the goal i want you to set for yourself is no matter what's gotten in the way no matter the organization issues that you're having no matter what happens in your life and what's gotten in the way and this is something i've gotten away from you got to find a way to do the things that are important to you and to do the things that are going to further your career and no matter what that is whether it is setting five minutes aside to rehearse on the back porch whether it is setting 20 minutes aside to record something while sitting in your car whether it is setting five minutes aside to rehearse on the back porch whether it is setting 10 minutes to just take a walk and think about what you're going to do uh you got to take the time to do it and you got to just make it happen and i think that's going to be my my big resolution for for 2020 and i think that that should be all of our resolutions for 2020 is to just make it happen make it happen for ourselves take the steps that we need to take and do the things that we need to do to make it happen whatever it is to you start thinking about that today start thinking about that right now what can you do in 2020 i don't care if it's january 1st right now when you're listening to this i don't care if it's december 31st when you're listening to this 2020 i don't care if it's 2027 when you're listening to this okay what can you do right now tomorrow next year the day after tomorrow next week whenever what can you do this year to make it happen it that thing that you want for yourself what can you do to make it happen my commitment to you my resolution to you as is every single year actually no it's not this is the first year i'm making this big of a resolution because i've tried not to make resolutions so um i'm gonna do in 2020 what i need to do to make it happen on this podcast and i'm gonna do it in 2020 what i can do to make it happen for you too if you want to hop on my calendar in 2020 and let's make this happen together you can do so go to being on stage dot com slash calendar uh after january 1st because i have to fix it first or you can just go through the paypal thing and it's not going to take anything out of your account because it's a free session um but if you go through that process you can still get on the calendar it's gonna take you through this paypal bowl um but yeah jump on the calendar and um let's make it happen let's get you taking the steps that you need to take for to that thing that you want to happen for yourself and get it moving baby and always always always keep on shining 2020