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A podcast that explores what it means to work with purpose by interviewing people who are working for more than just a paycheck.
Are you in corporate America grinding away the weeks as you watch the years fly by? Do you have that voice in your head that’s asking for something more? But you shouldn’t complain, right? You’ve got a good job, good pay, good benefits. There’s people out there that would kill for a job like that. But that little voice just won’t go away.
I’m your host Gino. And as an ex 9-5er I know that feeling all too well. I worked in corporate for 6 years before I finally decided to walk away, choosing to live my life a little differently. And since then, I’ve met some pretty amazing people who do work that positively impacts the people around them, their communities, and the world. This podcast exists to share their stories, and to help inspire you to do the same. Leave that job that you hate and to start working towards your purpose.
Welcome to Working Towards Our Purpose, a podcast that
offers a different perspective on what a job can be. For everyone
out there that's heard that voice in the back of their head asking for
something more, it's time to listen to it. I'm your host,
Gino, and join me as I interview people who have decided to
work in their own purpose. Together, we will learn, become
inspired, and hopefully find our own path towards working in our
purpose. Welcome
back to working towards our purpose. And today I have
another solo episode and, something I'm
still getting used to and, kinda forcing myself to do
it. But, I had a little idea that I kinda wanted to talk about
in this episode. And, yeah. We'll just, we'll get right into
it. So over the past few weeks, I've had,
2 people kinda, like, reach out to me about what I'm doing,
and one of them found me through my podcast. It was kind of an old
friend that we got reconnected with. And then, one of them
was just kind of like a DM on Instagram from somebody I met, you know,
once or twice before. And it kinda got me thinking about
this idea that, like, you kinda get to choose or
decide, like, what you'll be known for or what you are known for.
And I think that that's kind of a cool and
empowering thing to, like, think about. I think for, at
least for me, for a long time, like I was just an engineer
because that was my job and I didn't
really feel proud of that or I didn't feel
like that really meant much to me. Mostly because it wasn't something that I
chose and it was just kind of something that I did. But going to
the idea of like getting to decide what you will be
known for. As I mentioned before in in my last solo
episode, when I first quit my corporate job, I tried to put that
behind me and I tried to not really talk about it or think about
it. And, you know, when I first started networking and meeting
people, I didn't really use that as like
a definition of who I was or like an opener. It was more so
like I'm doing this new thing now. This is my business. I do
podcasting. And I never really talked about my past engineering life
until I met, one person specifically who
found out, like, much after I met her that that I had a
past life of doing engineering and, you know, went to college for it and
everything and she was, like, kinda surprised and was, like, oh, you didn't like, you
never said that. And I was honest with her and I was, like, yeah. It's
kinda something that, like, I don't really like to talk about because I
wasn't proud, I guess, of of that thing that I did. And she was
like, regardless of how you feel about it, when I hear that you have a
college education, I put you in a different category.
And when you think of somebody who went to college, you think of
somebody who was able to complete set amount of tasks in order
to get the piece of paper. And although I kind of didn't really like to
hear that because I didn't wanna be judged for the fact that I went to
college even in a good way. I kinda heard what she was saying and I
was like, okay. Yeah. She's right in the fact that, like, I will probably
get judged in a different way because people know that I did
that. But for me, it was more about like explaining my
story of how I got to where I am. And I think that
in doing that and in being transparent and vulnerable
and authentic with my story, I think that
really what that does for me is it helps me connect with people who
are in similar places. And I think that that's really kind of who I'm trying
to reach with this podcast is people who do feel like they're stuck
or people who are in jobs that they don't care about
and think that maybe there's not another option or maybe they have to be doing
the thing that they're doing. And I don't know. I I think
you always have a choice. And I know that
I'm in a fortunate position to be able to say that. But at the end
of the day, I think you get to decide where you put your energy into
and wherever you put your energy into expands. So that
being said, getting back to the idea of you get to decide what you're known
for is like I get to decide what people know me for based off
of what I do and how I talk about what I do. So
in this podcast, I talk a lot about me leaving corporate and me
feeling like I was stuck, me choosing to pick something different and
to try to figure something else out. And that
has connected with people and it's resonating with people and it makes people
know me for the person that left corporate. And and I think that that's a
good thing because then it helps me connect with the people that I'm actually trying
to connect to. Going back to the specific people that reached out to me, one
of them was a friend from a really long time ago. We we were both
engineers. We interned at the same company together before
I even got into, like, the real world. We were still in college
and I really haven't talked to this person in a very long time. And
somehow he found out about my podcast and he listened to a few
episodes and specifically the first one. And he was like, man, I
completely feel the same way that you did when you were here. And,
you know, he feels stuck and he wants something more. And
for me, it was really cool to get a message from him and be like,
hey, man. I resonated with this. You know, thanks for putting it out there.
And that for me was kinda like I don't know. It showed me that,
like, I guess what I'm doing is maybe helping some
people in in some way, and I I feel so uncomfortable even saying that,
which I think comes from, like, me not wanting to ever talk about
myself. But I think that's if I'm looking at the
facts kind of, like, what happened. I don't know. It it felt
nice to to have somebody be like, hey, I can empathize with,
you know, what you did and and maybe I wanna be doing something similar
or, you know, something like that. And then
what really gave me this idea was when the second person reached out to me
and it was somebody that I met, like, a handful of times before. It was
kind of a friend of a friend And, you know, when I first met him,
I I I don't really remember what I told this person, but I
must have been saying something, like, you know, how I started my business and I
left corporate. And I must have been honest with my story
and, you know, leaving corporate and starting my own business and all that stuff.
Because when he reached out to me, he was like, hey man, I'm leaving my
job next week. We should, you know, we should grab beer and get together.
And for me, that was kinda like, it it's what gave me the idea for
this episode because it was like, oh, this guy who I don't really know that
well knows me as the guy that left his corporate job to
try to start a business and figure it out. So it was kinda
like, again, almost like a cool thing for me to be like, oh, wow. This
is what this guy knows me for. And that was because, like, I made the
decision to talk about that and to be honest with,
like, where I've been and what I'm doing and why I was unhappy.
And yeah. I don't know. It just felt good
to have him reach out to me in that way and also kind of just,
you know, gives me confidence in like what I am doing and the way that
I present myself now a day makes me more confident and more comfortable with how
I'm presenting myself to purpose. And, you know, not that you need
reassurance from other people that you're doing the right thing, but it's nice to
be able to, like, connect, I guess. And even if it's not everybody, you
know, like I'm just giving an example of 2 purpose, but, like,
make it it feels to me that, like, I'm making a difference at
least with those 2 people. And, again, this
is probably my self conscious small mind thinking, but, like, I'm thinking,
like, oh, man. Even if I just was able to help 2
people in one way, like, that to me feels purposeful.
And that to me is, like, almost validation of, like, hey, you're
on the right course. You know, you're on the right path. You're doing something
that resonated with at least 2 purpose. And
that to me is, like, really fulfilling, and I like this path that
I'm going down. So, you know, in in that being said, I
think these solo episodes are gonna be important to push that
further even though they're uncomfortable for me and I and I don't
really like preaching to people.
Hopefully, I'm not coming off as speaking to people and,
I'm more so just trying to share my own experiences in the
hopes that they will resonate or positively affect
others. And I think with the more practice that I do with
these whole episodes, the better I'll get at that. So yeah, just just trying to
push through the uncomfortableness of it and get it out
there. So a few other things that I just wanted to mention too on this
topic, because I noticed another, sort
of correlation in regards to this topic. I I'm not sure if I've
said it much on this podcast yet, but originally, I got into podcasting,
into audio engineering from music because music was, like, kind of
my first passion. And I always just, like, I remember when
I first learned how to play the guitar, I locked myself in my room and
just played it until I figured out, like, how to play songs and,
like, I would just, you know, try to learn from tablature songs that I
liked, and it was something that was, like, very consuming in a good
way. And I've always just, like, told myself,
like, if it's if it's anything music, I could figure out how to do it,
and I've always kinda had that confidence in it. Music was, you know, my
original passion and the reason why I got into podcasting. And I remember telling
myself, like, when I first started my podcast company that once that made enough
money, then I would get into music production and I would work with bands and
kind of, you know, mixing and recording engineering and all that kind
of stuff. So as I was like kind of looking towards 2024
at the end of 2023, I was telling myself, like, you know, why are you
waiting to do that? You should just kinda do that now. And at the
same time, there was a music project that came to me, and there
was a friend who I used to be in a band with, and he wants
me to mix his album. So he sent me a song and I I mixed
the first song and I sent it back to him and,
you know, like, a week after I did that, I got a message from
a friend of his who I met once and I
guess he heard the song that I mixed and he was like, hey, man. I'm
working on this project. Do you think, you know, you can master this for me
when I'm done recording and mixing it? And that for me again was like a
huge thing. It was like, woah. You know, I do I did one thing in
music, and now this other person has seen what I've done, and
now they know me as, like, this guy that does this music. So it's like,
again, just one of those, like, crazy things, like, I I'm not an expert
in music production, but, you know, I guess I have to give myself
credit for being involved with it for the past 10 years at least
and Yeah. It was kind of a validation of like, oh, this guy sees me
as the guy that does music. So I guess really, you know, as I'm thinking
about it now, it's interesting the different
perceptions that, like, you have of yourself versus
the perceptions that people have of you. Because I guess if I were to look
at myself, I wouldn't say, like, I'm a music producer
or a mixing engineer or a recording engineer.
I wouldn't say any of that because I don't think that I'm good enough yet
to be able to say that, but there's other people out there that
look at me as being able to do it better than them
maybe. And whether that's true or not, it's
it's a different perception. So it's interesting to flat out
see that. Like, when somebody messages me and they're like, hey, can you do this
for me? It's like, woah. This guy sees me differently than I see myself. That's
kinda cool and it kinda gives you more confidence in yourself and your own
abilities. So, yeah. Hopefully, this wasn't all over the place,
but the point being, like, now that I'm,
again, deciding what to be known for now that I'm choosing to do more work
in music and I just started and I'm not, like, saying that I'm this
expert or anything, but I'm just doing what I can and helping people out where
I can. Then now because I'm doing it more and I'm investing
more energy into it, more people are going to see that I'm doing this thing
and eventually they're going to start coming towards me and being like, oh, you're the
guy that does this. You did this other project. You know, can you do this
for me? And I think that's just really cool. And again, so
like freeing and motivating that, like, you can
choose to do that thing. Like, you know, you
can go learn how to play the ukulele and a week ago, you didn't
even know what the instrument was, but in 2 weeks, you're telling people you're
playing the ukulele. You're you're learning how to use it. And now all of a
sudden, you're the person that plays ukulele. It's like, I don't know
the the free will of it or the the endless
opportunities. Like you can, you can choose anything and you
can really do anything that you want.
And it doesn't mean, like, you have to quit your job and it doesn't mean
you have to, you know, not be a parent or or any of that stuff,
but, like, you can just choose to also do this new thing.
And I think that that's just really a really cool thing to be able to
do. And, yeah. Hopefully hopefully this
episode made sense. Still getting used to this new solo kind
of format. And, yeah, I don't know. I just wanted to share that thought with
you all and hopefully it resonated with somebody. And if it didn't,
next week I will have another interview podcast for you and we'll
get back to learning from other people and thank you all for listening.
I
If you liked today's episode and are interested in more, you can sign up for
my Substack newsletter with the link in the show notes, where I share
thoughts, tips, and ideas that I'm learning along my journey to help
inspire you. The show was produced by Pleasant Podcast at
pleasantpodcast.com.