Life throws curveballs, and boy, have I caught a few this year. Buckle up as I pull back the curtain on the seismic shifts that have rocked my world, from nocturnal work patterns to daylight disruptions, and how these twists and turns have shaped the narrative of our show. I’ll spill the beans on my whirlwind stint with a railroad company, the emotional rollercoaster with my ex-girlfriend, and how a knee surgery steered me into the waters of the pool business. Plus, I'll share the realities of financing a shiny new Toyota Tacoma, and the magic of manifestation that scored me Taylor Swift tickets.
Ever curious about the nuts and bolts behind those silky-smooth podcast voices? I'm peeling back the layers on the tech wizardry of an AI voice changer that's taken our audio game to new heights. And for those who love a good behind-the-scenes, I'll take you through my journey with digital platforms like YouTube Premium and Audible, my leap into content creation, and the unexpected connections made while navigating the podcasting universe. If you're ready to pivot with passion and dive into a mix of personal sagas and digital craftsmanship, this episode is your ticket.
Life throws curveballs, and boy, have I caught a few this year. Buckle up as I pull back the curtain on the seismic shifts that have rocked my world, from nocturnal work patterns to daylight disruptions, and how these twists and turns have shaped the narrative of our show. I’ll spill the beans on my whirlwind stint with a railroad company, the emotional rollercoaster with my ex-girlfriend, and how a knee surgery steered me into the waters of the pool business. Plus, I'll share the realities of financing a shiny new Toyota Tacoma, and the magic of manifestation that scored me Taylor Swift tickets.
Ever curious about the nuts and bolts behind those silky-smooth podcast voices? I'm peeling back the layers on the tech wizardry of an AI voice changer that's taken our audio game to new heights. And for those who love a good behind-the-scenes, I'll take you through my journey with digital platforms like YouTube Premium and Audible, my leap into content creation, and the unexpected connections made while navigating the podcasting universe. If you're ready to pivot with passion and dive into a mix of personal sagas and digital craftsmanship, this episode is your ticket.
Well, hello, hello. It's been a time since I've done this. Yeah, it's interesting. So this is just going to be like a summary of 2023 for me, really quick, and kind of like what I went through and kind of like why I haven't been posting in a while, but also just like my plan for the show and the reasons why I'm going to start changing up a few things. It's not anything bad, it's just things have changed for me and I don't have the consistent scheduling like I used to when I was working night shift as a janitor, to have interviews in the morning or even afternoon lately. So it's, I'm going to switch up the show and see what I can do, where, where I can improve on things. So, first thing for 2023.
Speaker 1:
Beginning of the year, I got out of night shift. That was huge, honestly. I was doing night shift, doing like I still do it. I was in the night shift arena for like four years I think four and a half actually and essentially that was four years of no sleep. Near the tail end of night shift, I met my ex. Yeah, I met my ex and then we were talking and all that and all things, considering she was pretty considerate of my sleeping schedules and all that.
Speaker 1:
And then I got an opportunity with a railroad company. I'm not going to mention them because I did sign a NDA and something whatever a green financial agreement that I would owe money if they wanted for training me. But it's a. It's a decent, known railroad company. So I drove out to Texas in my little Pontiac, stay there for a month and was in the four star luxury suite. I was getting trade on how to do the railroad, the rules. I got all the certifications for the railroad. It was great.
Speaker 1:
Then I come back to California because that's where all the work was. And suddenly there was drama and eventually this company had a very, I thought, strong sleep policy where if you work so many days with so much, so many hours, you got guaranteed rest. All they did on her that and I was overworked and I slept through my wake up call and the one manager said the whole time we were training in Texas. If you fuck up, it's okay, this is your training period. You're supposed to fuck up, so you don't fuck up when you're actually live and doing it. Well, apparently I got fired for oversleeping, and which actually worked out for the better, as I talked to a couple of the railroad guys in the Academy group chat and someone accidentally sent a train through, and yeah, it was messy and I was actually supposed to go to that exact place. So I was like, okay, big plan, kind of thing, like God's got a mission for me.
Speaker 1:
So I come back, and me and my ex at the time she didn't like the fact I disappeared for a month and she couldn't really talk to me and we were slightly getting in arguments. But then, when I got back, she just like jumped, went full koala mode on me and wouldn't let go, and I was like, oh, that's cute, so I was been gone for a month, kind of thing. No, she didn't stop being full of both, though, and eventually there was there's series of three tries. I had about three month gap in between. The three month gap in between, I essentially kept saying I don't want to be with you, but I was scared. I didn't want her to kill herself over the distress of me, kind of thing. So she in high were arguing and we were going for the emotional jugular. We were just ripping each other's egos apart, and after a nasty one hour, like we would talk about three different topics and then come on to like the fifth one, she repeat herself and go back to the first topic. So it was the hour of that, just the endless cycle, and I'm like can't do this.
Speaker 1:
So, and at that time, during all this, I was trying to teach her about manifestation and all that and how you can manifest things in the literal world. And so I asked her, mmm, three weeks before it, yeah, I said hey, if you could ask the air quote universe for a price, what could you afford for a Taylor Swift concert ticket? And she said 450 max, that's about one week's worth of pay. I'll give up one week's worth of pay for a Taylor Swift concert, if I can even get it for that price. Three weeks later she finds it and exactly after taxes, $450. And so she was getting ready for the Taylor Swift concert and I fluently called her on the phone and we're stuck into her like babe, this is awesome, this is cool. And somehow, and to this day, me and her Chatted afterwards After the official done breakup. I said do you even remember what we were arguing about when you went to Taylor Swift? And she's like I Don't really remember. And she's like I actually feel like I kind of started the argument for some reason. So, yeah, so that was a good chunk of my time where I would have normally been podcasting but, me wanting, I would just always finish my work and head over to her.
Speaker 1:
I'm time back to the railroad. I got fired for that, and then my ex, but then my uncle was recovering from a knee surgery and from that knee surgery he essentially trained me from the couch yeah, he trained me from the couch how to Essentially do pools. So I've been doing pools with him. Because I bought a brand new 2020 Toyota Tacoma fresh off of the East kind of thing it's like. Because I got was making that river of money a thousand dollars a week for trading, training, my brains going way too fast and the. So the dealership just gave it to me essentially, and so I Was having almost a thousand dollar payments. It was like $870 a month plus 250 for insurance, and my gas went up because it's a truck. So I'm almost paying a thousand two hundred Just to maintain my truck and that's what I was earning. Minimum wage for railroad. That was one week's of pay, but yeah, so I it all worked out.
Speaker 1:
I am now I'm helping my uncle with his business and we're growing it and all this stuff I've learned from this show. Talking to people, I have been showing him and telling him and he's actually been utilizing it. He acts like he doesn't care but he totally does. And now for the part where it's hard for me to do Interviews because of the unpredictability of being a fool guy, it's Hard for me to commit to a set time, like this one guy. I really feel bad for him. I hate. He was stuck in LA traffic and I was out in the field Doing something with my uncle and I just told him like hey, is cool, we could skip the second time again.
Speaker 1:
I was helping my uncle or something, and I actually had a counsel on him because during all the railroad to now I bought this like $280 mic, usb mic, and it's really good. I just my laptop, for some reason, won't read it, no matter what I do. So I literally just went out and bought hyper x quad. Hyper x quad something. It's the one with the changeable color. So I have a set to blue for my microphone, because that was a big one. I couldn't. I have a AI software that I can dictate into so I can say what I think. So when I do it correctly, I can actually type like a thousand words in under 15 minutes, and I also have been using otter, but I lost my legacy package with that, so I might look into getting speech detects on App sumo with this seems to be the same effect. I'll tie all this ADHD run off it together in a second. Um yeah, so I haven't been able to consistently focus on podcasting Her work.
Speaker 1:
Reasons ex-girlfriend wanting all my time from arguments to just being tired here in California, when the heat comes oh boy, does it come, but it's like the same for Texas. I was there during a heatwave and tornadoes oh boy, but it was like a dry heat. I did not like that. It's supposed to be a huge humid heat and it was very dry. Yeah, this this year has been well.
Speaker 1:
This year, as in 2023, has been very interesting. I have recently actually Well. After I broke up with my ex, I got a call I'm going to like a college for student therapists and I'm going to get. I'm getting therapy. It's been ages since I've done that and I realized, wow, I got some emotional damage. So that I've been also working with my therapists on different things how to get better, how I am. I'm improving myself and self-worth and realizing this is very important to me, the podcasting and the video creation for YouTube, but also trading futures contracts extremely important to me. So I'm prioritizing all those.
Speaker 1:
The one thing of those who follow me consistently I have been and I'm looking to get back into it sitting in Marshall Arch for 16 years and just California getting so expensive the way it is. I had to well, quit because of the railroad stay quit because of the unpredictability of my job as a cool guy. But now that I'm starting to get more stable, I'm thinking of reapplying. I just miss the motivational kick in the ass my Marshall Arch instructor gives me. I also just miss actually punching a body and not getting in trouble for it too.
Speaker 1:
But it's also like the deeply more spiritual aspect of everything. I like it. It's not like the traditional God is person on the cloud. You realize, once you get to a certain point, a certain understanding of the art. That is not like a joke and whether like, oh, he can kill a man with his thumb. It's like no, literally I can't kill a man with my thumb if I really wanted to. And that kind of power gives you a strength, a confidence about yourself that you can't fake it. It's like Jordan Peterson's Be a Monster, but a book controlled anything. Yeah, I might have quoted that wrong. Sorry, mr Peterson, if you ever hear this, but it's true. Like if you know how to brutally hurt someone and you could do it at any moment. You choose not to because too many systems would get ruined if you do. There's a power to that. There's like a control and aura about you. You're like I can do this, I just choose not to. So I'm looking into getting back into Marshall Arch for that too. Now for the show I.
Speaker 1:
Because of the ability, the inability to schedule consistent times for interviews, what I'm thinking of doing is not I wouldn't say fully daily, but like at least one mindful, maybe business oriented, like a Monday and then Wednesdays, maybe like books and like because I've read a lot of books, so just different reviews of those and maybe talking about the creative process, as me trying to write a story too, but also kind of like mental health, and I'm an instigator by nature, I'll admit it. But there's a lot of people who don't realize like certain habits of certain people are bad kind of thing, even if the internet says they're good, it's like no, it's extremely detrimental and damaging. And I want to even if I help one person, I just want to help someone get the courage. I kind of use Mr Peterson as an example. A lot of his videos, especially when I was in high school and college, gave me a strength like wow, I'm not suffering alone, like he sees this in other men and he's speaking out for it, and that I gave me like a rope to hold. So I'm, I want to be that, that rope for women and if women learn from it too, and whoever else, like great. But my, my main target is like my little self, my high school self that was cyber bully, picked on, kicked, attacked, always forgot about in different sports, until after they see the talent and then they're like we want Josh, and I think it's just telling them like hey, it's okay and that's so. Recap that real quick.
Speaker 1:
Monday would be kind of like business and mindset. Wednesday would be kind of like books I've read summaries of them, if it's worth getting or not, and then maybe a little bit of my creative process. And like Friday would be like the, the, I guess, mental health of everything, and but other than that, I'm also wanting to edit more videos. I'm looking into some AI software where I can just upload Something like this and it'll actually just do a little cuts of like stock videos and then do like text overlay See if that can work. If not, I'll just figure out a way, maybe like download steam or something and play a video game and then run that with this, this audio in the background, with text overlay. What I would have to be subscribed to Adobe Premiere, but If it works, then I'll do it and just figure out ways to optimize attention, how to make sure people are Are engaged in learning.
Speaker 1:
Sounds cliche, but it's like those reddit videos where they're like playing Subway surfer or whatever trendy indie game and the text overlay is kind of where I took the inspiration from, because, like, there are many times I've turned those Reddit stories on and just listen to, like women. What have you done to tell a man you really wanted to do it but he never got the signal kind of thing. I'll just turn it on and then I use brave browser For those who don't know, by the way, and I even paid by them. It's great if you don't want to pay for YouTube premium and you're on iOS, for the Apple, you can download videos and it'll just play in the background and Make sure you have a lot of memory, by the way, because if you hit a big, big song or like I listen to manifestations as I sleep, it will take like a gig, but if it's like a 10 minute one, I think it's like maybe 300 megs at max. But so that's what I do. I play, play it through brave browser and the great thing is there's no ads, because there's a really aggressive ad blocker you can activate, and this is both iOS and Android. So, like YouTube does not give you any ads. Actually, the comment section can be blocked. They're sharing, for social media is blocked like literally, it's just you in the video is sweet, divine.
Speaker 1:
I'm recently paying for YouTube premium because I want their YouTube music. As I work in the field on the Pools, I like listening to lo-fi and then With brave. The only thing is, if you pause it and then close the actual app, but not like kill it through swiping up on iOS because I was using it before I moved back to my Android it loses its spot. So if you were like an hour 20 minutes, anyone to pick up when you were gone from it for too long, it'll actually reset back to zero. First, that doesn't seem like anything bad. If you do it like seven times a day, it gets really annoying. So I paid for YouTube premium just so my music stays on track. And when I'm not listening to music, I listen to my audible books. I am, yeah, I have the two credits a month for like 23 bucks a month. I've been listening a lot of their free Well, eric will free catalog with their paid subscription stuff. It's actually really good.
Speaker 1:
But yeah so, oh, so the back to the redder thing the um. Yeah, so I would watch it with the Brave browser and all that active. And that's what gave me the idea oh, this would be really good to incorporate and use, because then I I don't want to play video games unless I have a justifiable excuse. So if I'm saying, oh, I'm using this for content for later on, my brain won't beat me up and be like you, lazy piece of shit, what are you doing? Yeah, so sorry about that. I was coughing pretty hard. Uh, the um, it's just to trick my brain like no, this is productive, we're playing video games, so people will watch our content, kind of thing. Um, I own Valhelm somewhere and I have like two Steam accounts. One of them I got locked out of, but then I kind of got back in, and then another one. It's the same thing. Steam is really unpredictable for me. Um, but yeah, I just it's just different ideas.
Speaker 1:
I'm definitely going to be posting more on YouTube and going with that and then also like with like, maybe like the, the Friday ones, with the motivational, the health stuff. Maybe I'll bust out my GoPro and get a better mic, like if they have the media mod for it, and set that up. Maybe I'll go somewhere in my local Hills and set up and talk and a thing. Then, uh, yeah, I can just rip out the audio from that and put it here or just record a separate audio. Who knows? Um, yeah, I'm just, I'm excited about this process, so I'm going to do that.
Speaker 1:
Uh, for the Josh Bolton show on YouTube, we have a separate one. I was 2023. I was supposed to do it, never got around to it. Uh, for what I just explained earlier Um, so I think it's a new one is called J A, y, e, e, e or JB. Uh, you know, josh Bolton, it's played on words. Um, yeah, I, uh, I think also JB will be important. I'm not sure what it will be yet, but I want to do something with it. Um, yeah, other than that, that's kind of where I'm going with the show.
Speaker 1:
Uh, buzz sprout has also introduced more of a AI transcription title description, chapters and all that. So that'll be helpful for other content. And, by the way, if you're ever thinking of doing a podcast and you're not sure what to do, the first host I highly recommend is buzz sprout. Um, because once you do all the integration and set up, it's a cake walk. I've tried helping other people with coaching on um podcasting.
Speaker 1:
A few people have hired me for podcast coaching and they want to do the free setup and I'm like, is this such bullshit? Like what are you doing? No, no, no, no, no, no, don't do that here. Just pay the 18 bucks a month. I will set up everything on the background. Just don't even bother with that. Um and a few of them.
Speaker 1:
One of them, well, he was trying to use a podcast to put it on the background. He built a mastermind like where you pay him like a hundred K a year and he's thought by posting like five podcasts he just has the hundreds of thousands. Um, the irony, he also was named Josh too, um, but uh, no, I told him. I said this is a long game, this is a very long game. You have to do this as like pure passion and understand like a hobby. You're not going to make your money back anytime soon, if at all.
Speaker 1:
But that's the that's the beauty of it is cause I I never started the show for a profit. I never started the show to make millions of dollars. I just started it because I got COVID. I was sick and dying and I actually thought it was going to die from COVID because it was back in 2020, in December, and I said you know what? Fuck it, if, if I'm going to get in trouble online, at least I'm doing what I want.
Speaker 1:
And so I started it and it was easy for me to talk to business people. I'm like, hey, mister, can you come on my show and tell me about your business kind of thing. And I just kind of like I just kind of rolled into business um niche so trying to get out, uh and explore more. Um, if I can schedule interviews, it probably would be Saturdays. It's the one day I could probably tell my boss like, hey, like I got it's my profile, the guy coming on a set. I can't do whatever side gig kind of thing. So the.
Speaker 1:
All that to say is I just wanted to hold something and say it's mine and that's also why I taught myself how to do futures contracts and trainings and how my trading, my trading method, has evolved, but it's Pretty accurate. I'm not necessarily gonna explain what it is at least for free but it hits like 95% of the time, yeah, but it's just the. The frequency of it is smaller, but the moves are just gorgeous. Those who don't know about trading Don't don't ignore that, never mind kind of thing. But yeah, so the the show, as scattered as this as this has been is, it's coming back. I'm going to, I'm gonna get at this again. I'm gonna make sure I don't lose my target of helping people and Stuff like that.
Speaker 1:
So the best way to, if you do want to reach out to me, is Josh Bolton show at gmailcom or my website. Josh Bolton show calm, there's a message me tab, another thing I've been thinking about. Another thing I've been thinking about is using audio Messages. I don't really see that many podcasts using it at least successfully, and there's a couple platforms I could do, like pot inbox or speak pipe or a couple other ones where you can send a message in, and I Think that would be great because then I can incorporate people Into the show and we're like, hey, this is from so-and-so and I think, well, okay, successfully. I'm just thinking back on something Ralph Garment show. He does that where you but you call his actual line and he plays it kind of thing. It goes through his voicemail. That's kind that he's the only one I see successfully doing it, but he's prior radio show host so he knows how to incorporate people like that.
Speaker 1:
Other than that, yeah, I want, I Just want to help, I want to serve in the best way possible and I believe getting back on the show, back into YouTube, I'm focusing on building the highest quality possible content and a reasonable amount of time is Going to be the best effort, plus my writing process. I like my stories, oh, fun facts, and if you made it to the 26 minute, 40 something. Second point I've been using a AI voice changer, but it's a. I have it set to perfect pitch so it Cuts out most of my breathing, it evens my plosives and a couple other things I really have, as I've been watching this there's a few times I've actually like raised my voice and I don't really notice it on the the recording. So it's I like it. What are your thoughts on it, by the way? So, other than that, have a good one everyone, and Until next time you.