#125: How to Make Content Creation a Habit

Hello and welcome to the resurgence of my podcast. My name is Alex Beden. You're listening to On Purpose with Alex Beden and I'm so excited because this is the very first time that I'm ever recording this podcast as both audio and video. I'm so excited to spend time with you guys today.

I've got a few things I want to chat to you about so let's go ahead and dive in. Cheers! I wanted to share with you guys why I stopped the podcast in the first place because if you listen to my most recent episode which was the last episode of season two you will have heard me be like, okay, guys, we're now going to switch to two episodes a week. And then I just disappeared off the face of the planet.

I don't know. I'm just the kind of person I'm like, sometimes those things happen. Like sometimes life gets in the way, business gets in the way. I know for us, we had just launched together.

We launched. So we were really busy onboarding our new clients and taking care of them. I had a lot of stuff going on in my personal life. And so I just took a step back and I want to highlight that I think that's okay.

But the important part is like jumping back in and continuing to build that relationship with your audience and with your ideal clients. Now, if I had to answer the question, why did it take me so long to come back? I think the real answer is that I felt so much pressure. And that's a really beautiful thing to admit, I think, because it's such a normal, natural feeling of being like, okay, I had this podcast.

It was something that people really loved and enjoyed. And, you know, I want to bring it back, but I don't know how I'd ever be able to bring it back in the way that it was once upon a time and really kind of putting my podcast on this pedestal like what it used to be. I have been thinking about what I want the podcast to be like, but I haven't been taking action. I've been stuck in that analysis paralysis, overthinking everything, and really just trying to make the right decisions before taking any action steps.

And I've gotten to a point now where I'm just like, I just want to take action. I want to take imperfect, messy action. I want to put myself back out there. I want to really let go of the idea that it has to be this perfect thing because it's never going to be perfect, right?

As you can see, we've had a change in formats because this is now audio and video. So that does mean that I will be uploading this onto YouTube as well as onto my podcast. So you will be able to find it in two places. The best place to be updated on when a new episode goes live is to be signed up for my VIP list.

That is a weekly newsletter that I send out that keeps you updated with the happenings of the Alex Beaton world. Just to be clear, However, my intention with this podcast is to create as and when I please. So I'm not promising you that I'm going to be showing up every week or every two weeks or every day or every month. I'm just showing up when I want to show up and that's what feels good and right for me in this moment.

So bear with me as we kind of go through this together. So today, something I really wanted to talk to you guys about is what it means to be a woman with ambition. I just turned 35 years old. Go me.

Cheers to that. One of the things I've realized is that I am a woman who is very ambitious, but my relationship to ambition has changed so much over the last few years. I really look back at myself in my early 20s and I see the way that I was so focused and so obsessed with my end goal of getting my business to a certain place. And I definitely feel like I'm in a much more evolved space, but it comes to my relationship with ambition and with my work ethic.

I think I'm just in a beautiful place in my life where I'm actually the happiest I've ever been. I'm the most fulfilled I've ever been. I feel like I'm living in my purpose. And whereas before, so much of my identity was wrapped up in my work and in my ambition and in proving that I could show up and work harder than anyone else.

And today, I don't feel that way at all. I'm really leaning into my soft girl era and wanting to embrace that side of myself that's like, you know what? I don't want to work 24 hours a day. Like I don't want to be stressing out in bed about something that I didn't get done that day Like I really just want to create a life for myself that is as easy as possible I don want it to be as easy as possible I do want to experience challenges and I do want to push myself and grow and I want to be able to lean into my creativity I want to work It just that I don want my work to take over my life And when I look back at my twenties, that's definitely what was happening.

Now that I'm in my thirties, I've gotten really clear on what I want and what I don't want. And I've become obsessed about creating that version of my life and not trying to overwork, overpush myself, hustle, hustle, hustle. I'm really focused on how do I create my life to be exactly what it is that I want through the use of boundaries, through the use of intention, through the use of being on purpose. When I first created On Purpose with Alex Bieden, the reason why I called it On Purpose is because it was like a double meaning, right?

The first meaning was you were doing something on purpose, something that's in alignment with you, something that makes you feel fulfilled, something where you're like, oh yes, this is in alignment with my purpose. And then the second reason was doing something on purpose, which means doing it intentionally, doing it strategically, being very clear about what it is that you're trying to create and working backwards from that. And that has continued to remain a very clear focus of mine as I continue down this journey, even more so now because I have a better understanding now in my 30s of what my capacity is.

And also I think once you reach your 30s, you know, you're older, you're wiser, and the truth is that you have less capacity than you did in your 20s. So whereas in my 20s, I could push and push and push and work and work and work and hustle and hustle and hustle. I just like really don't have it in me these days. And as I gear up to have a family of my own, as I gear up to like create this next stage and phase of my life, I know that that version of myself, that's not sustainable anymore.

Right. And so I've been getting really clear on like, what is it that I want? And what is it that I don't want? We're kind of going through a little exercise here together in terms of like discovering what it is that you want and how to actually achieve creating content and bring content creation into your life in a way that's actually going to work for you.

And so as I'm going through this activity, I want you to just know that I am also going to be sharing this in my shared Notion. I'm going to have a Notion page specifically for my VIP list where I share like all of my notes and my tidbits and my resources. If you're not on my VIP list, go and sign up and you will get access. I'm going to make sure from now on that every single email that I send out has that link so that you can quickly go and find it.

I'm also, by the way, I forgot to mention this, switching away from season. So no longer will this be like season three, episode one. We're just going to go straight back to where we were. I believe this is like episode 126.

Hey guys, quick update for me here in the editing room. It's not episode 126. This is episode 125. And you'll be able to find the notion links there.

Let's jump in. What is it that I want to have? I want to have a multifaceted life. I don't want my life to solely revolve around my work.

Having said that, work is still super important to me. I'm still a very ambitious person. I do want to find a lot of purpose and fulfillment in my work, but I don't want it to be the only thing. So I want to have a very strong family and friends life.

I want to feel like an active part of my community. I want to feel like I have hobbies and things that I enjoy. And I want to be able to work on myself outside of work. I don't want my only personal development tool to be my work.

I want to have a multidimensional life. When I can focus on finding fulfillment outside of my work, I feel like that is what's going to allow me to really tap into my highest level of fulfillment, my highest level of passion and purpose. And I feel like in doing so, it's also acting as a model of what I want everyone else to be able to take from me. When you're creating content like this, when you're putting yourself out there, when you have a business, especially a business like mine, my business is Alex Beden, right?

So much of my life is shown in my business. And so I want to live a life that I like I can truly stand behind this and say this is something I proud of I don want everything to just be about work you know So that like a really big theme for me right now And so in knowing that I also have to get clear on what I don want And what I don want is to be a slave to my computer all day I don want to feel like I have to be here at this certain time I want maximum flexibility in my life.

And again, as I move into starting a family and entering that next chapter of my life, that's going to become even more important to me. So setting those boundaries from today and really making sure that I'm honoring that from today is going to be extremely important. I feel like up until this point, I've done a really good job of being consistent on Instagram, posting to stories, posting to reels, et cetera. But I want to take it to the next level by having what I like to call a meaty piece of content.

This isn't important for every single business owner in the world. For my business, because I have an online business, it is very, very important. And so I know that if I want my business to be where I want it to be in the next two years, five years, 10 years, I need to learn how to create meaty pieces of content, aka podcast, YouTube, etc. Something that's not just like scrollable social media.

I need to be implementing that into my daily life and finding a way to make it work for me. And that's what this episode is all about really is like, how can I make content creation work for me, right? So how do I get back into creating content without it being all consuming? The first thing I started with is asking myself the question, how can I make this fun?

I want this to be fun. Like every time I sit down to talk to you guys, I don't want it to feel like a drag or like a chore. I want it to feel like something I'm excited to do. And so today that meant pouring myself a margarita, right?

Giving myself a little drink. It meant filming outside. Like we have a new porch. This is one of my favorite spots, but the point is how do you make it fun for yourself?

The next question is how can I make this easier? Right? So one of the big things that I was struggling with is if you have a podcast, how do you market that podcast? And so me filming this on video is also a way for me to make this easier for myself because I can take these videos, create multiple TikToks and Reels out of them and post them on other platforms, right?

That is making my job easier. So that's one of the ways that I'm making it easier. Another way to make it easier that I've been trying to focus on and that I'll be focusing on a lot moving forward is having a weekly schedule where it's like every week at this time on this date, I know that I'm sitting down to record this no matter what. So really just focusing on making it a habit and non-negotiable habits.

Number three, how can I lower my expectations? Because I've noticed with myself that I have such high expectations sometimes. I'm like, oh my God, it has to be perfect. It has to be this.

It has to be that. That I was letting these little things get in my way. So for example, you know, it's kind of bugging me right now that it's getting darker, but this is my very first episode. I have to leave room for it to not be perfect and for me to learn lessons as I go, right?

And so embracing imperfections, knowing that it's going to be hard at first, knowing that it's not going to be perfect. So for example, this is my second time filming this video. I filmed this entire video yesterday and at the end of it, I realized that I never turned on my microphone and the audio was horrific. There were birds in the background.

It was super distracting. So I had to redo it. And here I am redoing it today. Right.

So embracing the fact that it's going to be difficult at first and just agreeing with myself like I'm not going to give up no matter how difficult it gets. I'm not going to give up. I'm going to make small changes to make it easier for myself. Another huge part of this for me is finding a way to remain on brand.

When you're creating content, you can ask yourself, how can I make it fun? How can I make it easy? How can I this? How can I that?

But really and truly, this is a business exercise and it needs to be good for the business. It needs to be on brand for the business. So my business is all about helping small business owners create content for their business, show up online, market themselves online. Now, from a branding perspective, the brand that I'm going for is your online biz bestie.

I want to be the person you're like, oh my gosh, that's my online biz bestie, right? That's what I'm going for. So everything that I just said about me making this fun pouring myself a margarita like that the behavior of your online biz bestie We here we drinking together we having a good time We hanging out We liming as we say here in Trinidad Here in Trinidad and Tobago we say lime and that means to hang out If you ever hear me talking about liming, that's what it's all about.

This is very on-brand. I'm not someone who's very corporate or picture-perfect. I really like things to be more casual, laid-back, fun type of vibe, and that's exactly what I'm going for. Therefore, all of this is very on-brand.

And then lastly, it would not be an Alex Beaton video if I didn't speak to you about mindset, because one of the things that differentiates me and my brand the most in my niche and in my industry is the fact that I focus on mindsets. Your internal environment makes such a difference on how you show up in the online space. I wrote here, how can I create an internal environment that will support me in this goal of showing up more consistently with my meaty piece of content? So again, my meaty piece of content is YouTube and podcast, right?

And I wrote down, number one, trust that I will find my voice. Oftentimes when we're leading into new content creation, it can feel so scary. We sit down in front of the camera and we judge ourselves. And we're like, how did that sound?

Did I say the right thing? What are they going to perceive me as? There's no space for that. There's no room for that.

You just need to create. And so I'm creating that internal environment of like, okay, I trust that I'm going to find my voice. I trust that it may be a little bit awkward at first. That's okay.

And actually, I think that's my next point here is like, leave space for it to be awkward at the beginning. it's okay if it's awkward at the beginning, right? Especially for me, like this is the first time I'm ever creating a podcast episode that's also a video. And so just getting used to the fact that I not only have to be minding my words and the power of what I'm saying, but I also need to be paying attention to how I'm coming across the lighting, the background, my makeup, my hair.

Like I'm so used to creating a podcast episode. I just put my headphones on. I've got the microphone like right here and I'm just like eyes closed, like focusing on every single word coming out of my mouth. I can't do that anymore, right?

I'm adapting. So as I am creating this new format, as I'm leading into this podcasting world, like I need to leave room for it to just be whatever it is and be cool with that. Like just release any expectations that you may have and let it be what it is. It's going to be cringe at first and that's okay.

Like you're going to find your voice as you go. So that's another thing that I've been telling myself. And then thirdly, know that it does not have to be perfect. Something that I tell my clients all the time is it doesn't have to be perfect in order to be profitable.

Another great quote is done is better than perfect. And I am embracing that in this video or audio, depending on if you're watching or listening to this 100%. Okay. So I hope that you can take all of the tips that I shared with you in this video and really embody them as you go throughout your own week and apply them to whatever it is that you're trying to do in your own business.

Again, I just want to remind you that I will have a specific space on Notion, I feel like I need to name it. Can you guys help me come up with a name? What can I name that Notion space? It's only going to be for my VIP list members, for people who have signed up for my VIP list.

So if you want access, VIP list is free. Just go to alexviplist.com and you can sign up there. I need to come up with a name.

I'm obsessed with Notion and I have a feeling that every episode I'm going to be wanting to share things with you. So that will be like the go-to place to find anything that I'm speaking about here on the podcast. And that's it. So if you enjoyed this episode, please let me know because it's my first episode back.

It means so much to me to hear from you guys and to hear your thoughts and your feedback and the ideas that you may have, whether you're watching this on YouTube or whether you're listening to this through your podcast app, I would love for you to take two minutes to open up Instagram, find me at Alex Fieden, A-L-E-X-B-E-A-D-O-N and let me know what was your biggest takeaway from today's first episode back. I'm so excited for the resurgence of the podcast. I hope you are too.

It's time for me to go before it gets super dark here, but I'm really looking forward to seeing you next time, whenever that may be. Cheers.