Note: This was cross-posted for me by the owner of Publetariat.com. Originally it was intended for my blog, so if it sounds a little too "self-promotey" it wasn’t an intentional "ZOMG publetariat guyz look at me!" Re-reading it in this context it may come off that way, so thought I would add a little explanation, since Publetariat wasn’t the original intended audience.
This rarely comes off online. I’m very passionate about publishing and my writing and about every other topic under the sun. I have an opinion about everything. I may not be right, but I have a viewpoint and I’m not shy about sharing it. Sometimes people read anger that isn’t there. And I get that. My grandfather once yelled at one of my best friends on Halloween when she came over there with me. Only he wasn’t really yelling AT her. He was just really irate about something and he was yelling “in general” but it seemed like he was yelling at her. She was an audience for his yelling but not it’s intended target.
He doesn’t realize he does it.
I’m kind of in that same boat. Only I realize (generally after the fact) that I do it. Though generally I come off much “harsher” in text. I wish I could let my silly side out and my freak flag fly (and sometimes I do a little bit on Twitter), but online I’m just always on a crusade, even when I’m not trying to be. I’m just intense. And there are days I want a vacation from myself and that intensity.
Though I’m still passionate and intense about things on my podcast, I feel like the more personal level of a podcast changes things. Like I listened to April Hamilton being interviewed by Joanna Penn on this podcast.
In many ways, April is a lot like me. We can both be very outspoken and brash and we can both get into very intense debates with people that somehow go sour when someone gets upset because they feel it’s gotten personal even when it hasn’t. But hearing her speak on the podcast, her voice softens those edges and she sounds about as friendly as a person can get. Then suddenly you’re able to re-frame nearly everything she’s ever said as it’s actually intended to be. I’ve always “gotten” April’s intentions in these sorts of exchanges, but hearing that friendly of a voice on a podcast, drove it home more sharply.
And so I think that’s what a podcast does for me. It gives me that extra dimension and softens some edges. (Well when I don’t sound like a chipmunk in a trailer park. Cause DUDE holy crap sometimes it gets crazy.) Hopefully while it still may be passionate and intense, it becomes clear that I’m *not* angry with everyone. I’m incredibly excited about the path I’m on and what I’m doing.
Then the fiction podcast, that’s all about the work, and it gives me another way to get the work out there and hopefully interacting with and engaging with an audience. Plus I know this sounds crazy-level vain but I really like my reading voice. It’s much better than my other podcast voice or my live interview voice because when I take the time to slow down and enunciate properly the twang is there, but it’s not like ZOMG insane.
Anyway… I also promised a link to the Breakthru Radio Book Talk episode I was on, so here it is. It should be noted that parts of the interview I’ve got that trailer park chipmunk thing going on. Though the reading at the end sounds a lot better (not perfect, but much better!)
Anywho… and then there are times during the interview (I don’t know why I torture myself by re-listening to it) where I remember even during the interview I’m thinking “Don’t say that. My GOD Zoe, shut UP!” But yeah, no. Never happens. No one should give me a microphone and just let me talk, that’s madness I tell you.
Click here to check out my very first podcast. It’s not "state of the art" podcasting but it’s a starting point. Sometimes the important thing is just getting started. And doing a basic podcast really isn’t rocket science. It can be done.
This is a cross-posting from Zoe Winters’ blog.