Latest / Why We Do What We Do / Mini: This is the End-ish
Transcript
- 0:03Speaker 1: You're listening to Why We Do What We Do. Welcome
- 0:15Speaker 1: to Why We Do What We Do Mini.
- 0:18Speaker 2: I'm your host, Abraham.
- 0:20Speaker 3: And I'm your host, Shane.
- 0:21Speaker 1: We are a psychology podcast to talk about the things
- 0:24Speaker 1: that humans and non-human animals do. And these mini episodes
- 0:28Speaker 1: are very short format discussions. We get in there, get
- 0:31Speaker 1: out of there, let you go about your day. This
- 0:33Speaker 1: is probably going to be the shortest of all of
- 0:36Speaker 1: those would be my guess. But yeah, so we've been
- 0:39Speaker 1: doing these for a while.
- 0:41Speaker 2: They come out on Mondays. That's what we're doing. So
- 0:43Speaker 2: how are you doing, man? I'm doing good.
- 0:45Speaker 3: I'm doing good. How are you?
- 0:46Speaker 1: Okay.
- 0:47Speaker 2: I'm doing okay. All right.
- 0:49Speaker 1: We are coming to you with news today. The big
- 0:51Speaker 1: announcement is that we have decided to go ahead and
- 0:55Speaker 1: wind this podcast down.
- 0:58Speaker 2: I want to wrap this up.
- 0:59Speaker 1: We have been doing this for nine and a half years,
- 1:03Speaker 1: and we've been enjoying the experience of all of this.
- 1:08Speaker 1: But yeah, we have decided we're going to go ahead and,
- 1:10Speaker 1: and this is not the last episode. This is not
- 1:12Speaker 1: like we're releasing this and then we're done forever. We're
- 1:14Speaker 1: going to keep going for a little bit while, a
- 1:16Speaker 1: little while longer, but we're letting everyone know we've decided
- 1:20Speaker 1: that we are on our sort of home stretch here
- 1:22Speaker 1: and there's a finish line and then we'll, we'll go
- 1:25Speaker 1: ahead and stop doing what we're doing here. Yeah. Yeah.
- 1:28Speaker 2: That's the announcement.
- 1:28Speaker 3: Yeah, like you said, there's going to be a few
- 1:30Speaker 3: more episodes. By the time you hear this, there's going
- 1:32Speaker 3: to be another episode on happiness that's going to come out,
- 1:35Speaker 3: and then there's going to be our series on... We're
- 1:37Speaker 3: still going to do our Halloween shows.
- 1:39Speaker 2: Yep, doing all Halloween.
- 1:40Speaker 3: We know that's a fan favorite. we're going to do
- 1:43Speaker 3: one last suite as we wrap up the show and
- 1:46Speaker 3: then that'll be kind of it. Yeah. You know, we,
- 1:50Speaker 3: like you said, we've been doing this for a long time.
- 1:51Speaker 3: We have had a lot of folks involved in this
- 1:53Speaker 3: and we'll talk more about that towards as we kind
- 1:55Speaker 3: of finish up, but you know, it's one of those
- 1:58Speaker 3: things where as we were kind of evaluating it and
- 2:00Speaker 3: we were thinking about it, I think that we are
- 2:03Speaker 3: feeling pretty satisfied with the work that we've done here.
- 2:06Speaker 1: Yeah.
- 2:07Speaker 3: Cause I don't think it's fair to think that like,
- 2:09Speaker 3: You know, we're giving up on the show or anything
- 2:10Speaker 3: like that because it's certainly not what it is. There's
- 2:12Speaker 3: lots of reasons why we're coming, like, we're winding it down. But,
- 2:15Speaker 3: you know, part of it is, like, we feel like
- 2:16Speaker 3: we've done quite a bit of work. I mean, nine
- 2:19Speaker 3: and a half years of running a podcast is more than,
- 2:21Speaker 3: I think, what, one, like, 99% of the podcasts that
- 2:24Speaker 3: exist out there. I think we've done quite a bit
- 2:26Speaker 3: of work as far as that goes. But I think
- 2:29Speaker 3: that the thing that is important for people to know
- 2:32Speaker 3: is like there's a lot of work that goes into this,
- 2:33Speaker 3: a lot of labor that goes into this.
- 2:35Speaker 1: Yeah.
- 2:46Speaker 3: And the business side of things, like there's a lot
- 2:48Speaker 3: that goes into a podcast that is behind the scenes
- 2:52Speaker 3: for the hour, hour and a half that you hear
- 2:54Speaker 3: every week. So for every hour or hour and a
- 2:57Speaker 3: half that you hear every week, we're talking, I think
- 3:00Speaker 3: we could reasonably say anywhere between eight to 10 hours
- 3:02Speaker 3: of labor per additional labor easily every week just to
- 3:07Speaker 3: get that one hour of episode out to you.
- 3:09Speaker 2: Right.
- 3:09Speaker 3: So, you know, part of why the show is ending
- 3:12Speaker 3: is we're just kind of, we're both kind of tired. Yeah.
- 3:17Speaker 1: Yeah.
- 3:17Speaker 2: Yeah.
- 3:17Speaker 1: As, just as you said, I feel pretty, I feel
- 3:20Speaker 1: proud of what we've been able to produce and make
- 3:22Speaker 1: on this show, but yeah, it's, This endeavor of ours
- 3:26Speaker 1: has never been profitable.
- 3:28Speaker 2: This has never even broken even. Yeah.
- 3:30Speaker 1: It has only cost money. So we work full-time, more
- 3:35Speaker 1: than full-time, most of the time, actually, and full-time jobs.
- 3:38Speaker 1: And this we've been doing as like a side gig
- 3:41Speaker 1: hobby thing.
- 3:41Speaker 2: And it is.
- 3:43Speaker 1: adding that much more extra work every week has been
- 3:46Speaker 1: really challenging. And we feel like we hit a lot
- 3:50Speaker 1: of the things we wanted to hit. It's part of
- 3:51Speaker 1: the reason we did the whole functional analysis series this
- 3:55Speaker 1: year is that we knew that was something we wanted
- 3:57Speaker 1: to get to at some point and finally just made
- 3:59Speaker 1: it a point to get to it. So we've known
- 4:02Speaker 1: essentially the way we approached this originally when we started
- 4:05Speaker 1: talking about winding down was let's give ourselves a certain
- 4:10Speaker 1: amount of time knowing that there's a finish line and
- 4:13Speaker 1: see if our thoughts about this change. Maybe we'll decide
- 4:16Speaker 1: we'll miss this too much, or maybe it's not that
- 4:19Speaker 1: much work, or maybe we just want to change a
- 4:21Speaker 1: little bit how we're approaching it. But the more real
- 4:25Speaker 1: that finish line became, the more comfortable it felt and
- 4:31Speaker 1: optimistic it felt to have that finish line and be like, yeah.
- 4:35Speaker 1: We've enjoyed so much making the show. We've really enjoyed
- 4:38Speaker 1: hanging out with each other. We've enjoyed talking to you, everybody.
- 4:42Speaker 1: We've enjoyed the conversations we've had. We've appreciated our audience.
- 4:45Speaker 1: You guys have been wonderful. And it just feels like
- 4:47Speaker 1: we just are at a point where we've reached the
- 4:51Speaker 1: level of sustaining that can happen to allow this to
- 4:54Speaker 1: keep being a show. And we're ready to go ahead
- 4:57Speaker 1: and close that chapter and move on with new things
- 4:59Speaker 1: in our lives. And, you know, feeling pretty good about
- 5:02Speaker 1: what we've accomplished thus far. So that's the why of
- 5:06Speaker 1: why the show is ending.
- 5:07Speaker 3: Yeah, I think, you know, you brought up a good point,
- 5:10Speaker 3: and I'm so glad you said this. Like, you know,
- 5:12Speaker 3: we were kind of like, we did give ourselves space. Like,
- 5:15Speaker 3: we had this conversation, and again, we had this conversation
- 5:19Speaker 3: not out of a dislike or a... We were having
- 5:23Speaker 3: a conversation kind of like thinking about like, well, what
- 5:25Speaker 3: does this look like? Where is this going next? And
- 5:27Speaker 3: then we kind of landed on, it's probably time to
- 5:30Speaker 3: wind it down. And then you said, like you said,
- 5:32Speaker 3: we gave each other, like, we had space to To
- 5:36Speaker 3: kind of think about this as we were continuing to
- 5:38Speaker 3: do the show.
- 5:38Speaker 1: And....
- 5:40Speaker 3: As we are getting closer to the end of this,
- 5:42Speaker 3: we were both like, nah, I think this is the
- 5:44Speaker 3: right decision. Like there, I think both of us didn't
- 5:47Speaker 3: really second guess it. Like we were kind of like, well,
- 5:49Speaker 3: you know, maybe, I don't know. Or maybe if we
- 5:51Speaker 3: did this, we both kind of went, no, this feels right.
- 5:54Speaker 3: Like this is the right thing to do. You know,
- 5:55Speaker 3: part of it's a quality of life decision. Part of
- 5:57Speaker 3: it is like you said, we both work full time.
- 6:00Speaker 3: You know, we both have people in our lives that
- 6:02Speaker 3: we want to spend more time with. Like there's lots
- 6:04Speaker 3: of things like that, that we really want to think about.
- 6:06Speaker 3: You know, and then we were looking at some of
- 6:08Speaker 3: the topics that we had left over and we were like, okay, well,
- 6:10Speaker 3: how are we going to do an episode on birds?
- 6:12Speaker 3: You know, and we were like, you know, as much
- 6:14Speaker 3: as cool as birds are like, that's, that's a different podcast,
- 6:18Speaker 3: you know, or at least, or at least like, you know,
- 6:20Speaker 3: thinking about those things. And so I think there's a
- 6:22Speaker 3: lot more to talk about. There's always a lot more
- 6:24Speaker 3: to talk about. There's always more to do.
- 6:26Speaker 1: Yeah.
- 6:27Speaker 3: We could. Yeah. But we feel like maybe, maybe it's not,
- 6:31Speaker 3: it doesn't need to be us. You know, maybe there's
- 6:33Speaker 3: somebody else that could take the mantle. Maybe there's somebody
- 6:35Speaker 3: else who could do that, but. I think it feels good.
- 6:37Speaker 3: Both of us are aging men. This is our midlife
- 6:40Speaker 3: crisis that we're going like. So instead of buying a Corvette,
- 6:45Speaker 3: we're just stopping a podcast, which seems healthier.
- 6:50Speaker 2: It certainly does. It certainly does.
- 6:53Speaker 1: I have a little bit more to say about that,
- 6:55Speaker 1: but here's a stupid ad first.
- 7:04Speaker 2: All right, we're back.
- 7:05Speaker 1: Maybe part of the reason we haven't been profitable is
- 7:07Speaker 1: how critical we've been of ads. You know, we kind
- 7:09Speaker 1: of put them in a little bit begrudgingly, but like
- 7:12Speaker 1: it was because I've always hated them.
- 7:14Speaker 2: I hate listening to them in podcasts.
- 7:16Speaker 1: I don't particularly like having them in here, but it
- 7:20Speaker 1: was kind of a necessary evil to try and help
- 7:22Speaker 1: keep things afloat as long as possible.
- 7:24Speaker 2: And it did.
- 7:24Speaker 1: Like the ad revenue we made was definitely helped ease
- 7:28Speaker 1: the strain, the financial strain of this. So I guess
- 7:34Speaker 1: we can show appreciation there. But I always wanted to
- 7:35Speaker 1: sort of criticize them because we didn't like the fact
- 7:38Speaker 1: that we had to do this. And so we'd make
- 7:40Speaker 1: space for them and also call them names.
- 7:42Speaker 2: Yeah. And I like that.
- 7:44Speaker 1: So when we do our final episode, we want to
- 7:47Speaker 1: do like a big reflection on sort of where we've
- 7:48Speaker 1: been and what we've accomplished and a little bit of
- 7:52Speaker 1: behind the scenes type stuff. But I also want to
- 7:55Speaker 1: invite people to write in and share with us. So...
- 8:00Speaker 1: This may be a little selfish, but I would love
- 8:02Speaker 1: to know for those who have enjoyed the show, if
- 8:04Speaker 1: you have some thoughts about what this meant to you
- 8:06Speaker 1: or what you got out of it or a thing
- 8:08Speaker 1: you liked in particular that we said or did. It'd
- 8:11Speaker 1: feel good to have some of that as we're going
- 8:14Speaker 1: into our final episode to just sort of share and
- 8:15Speaker 1: reflect and whatnot.
- 8:17Speaker 2: We're going to talk in our.
- 8:18Speaker 1: Final discussion a lot more about sort of the show
- 8:21Speaker 1: itself and more of the decision to end it and
- 8:27Speaker 1: some of the decisions we made along the way. But yeah,
- 8:31Speaker 1: we're actually coming up on 500 episodes, pretty close. And
- 8:34Speaker 1: that was actually kind of the goal, was to get
- 8:35Speaker 1: to 500. When we started talking about when we'd wrap
- 8:39Speaker 1: this up, I guess I'll share now that this was
- 8:42Speaker 1: like end of April, beginning of May of 2026, that
- 8:45Speaker 1: we were sort of saying like, what should be our
- 8:47Speaker 1: timeline here? Or I said like, let's give ourselves some
- 8:51Speaker 1: amount of time to keep doing this and see if
- 8:54Speaker 1: we want to keep doing this. And we landed on
- 8:55Speaker 1: a couple ideas, but ultimately we decided 500 episodes. 500
- 8:59Speaker 1: full-length episodes, by the way. We're not even counting the
- 9:01Speaker 1: minis as part of that count.
- 9:02Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah.
- 9:04Speaker 1: Because they otherwise have done well over 600 at this point.
- 9:08Speaker 1: So that's where we're going with this. Yeah, I think
- 9:12Speaker 1: write in. Email us info at WWD, WWDpodcast.com. We're also
- 9:17Speaker 1: on social media. I mostly only check Blue Sky. I
- 9:20Speaker 1: do have Facebook, so you can try and reach us
- 9:21Speaker 1: out there. I'll try and make it a point to
- 9:23Speaker 1: go Look on Facebook. I think we have an Instagram
- 9:26Speaker 1: that I've never looked at, but Blue Sky is where
- 9:28Speaker 1: I'm the most active. So if you have an account there,
- 9:30Speaker 1: but yeah, email us is great. Happy to hear from
- 9:33Speaker 1: you there. Facebook's fine.
- 9:34Speaker 2: I'll just need to make sure I remember to go
- 9:35Speaker 2: check it. Yeah, I think that's... Yeah.
- 9:38Speaker 3: I mean, like, let us let us know. I mean,
- 9:41Speaker 3: if you have a favorite episode, if you have a
- 9:43Speaker 3: favorite moment, if you I mean, anything that you think
- 9:48Speaker 3: would be something that we that you would want us
- 9:50Speaker 3: to know. I mean, we're going to do a final
- 9:53Speaker 3: episode regardless of whether or not you send stuff in.
- 9:56Speaker 3: We're going to have plenty to talk about and we
- 9:57Speaker 3: will talk about it. But like, I think that there
- 9:59Speaker 3: is something. really special about being able to celebrate because
- 10:02Speaker 3: 500 episodes is nothing to sneeze at.
- 10:04Speaker 1: Yeah.
- 10:04Speaker 2: That's a lot. A lot of time.
- 10:06Speaker 3: That's not like us patting ourselves on the back. That's
- 10:08Speaker 3: like genuinely go– that's a lot of work. Yeah. Whether
- 10:12Speaker 3: you could argue that there's varying quality in there, that's
- 10:14Speaker 3: a different conversation. But like 500 episodes plus another couple
- 10:20Speaker 3: hundred minis is a feat.
- 10:23Speaker 1: Yeah.
- 10:23Speaker 3: And I think ultimately– Our goal is not to get
- 10:27Speaker 3: praise and pat ourselves on the back for that work.
- 10:30Speaker 3: I think that you and I have the same value
- 10:33Speaker 3: that we've had from the beginning, which is to get
- 10:35Speaker 3: information out to people and have an impact. And so
- 10:39Speaker 3: it's nice to know because you and I spend all
- 10:41Speaker 3: this time talking to each other and we don't get
- 10:43Speaker 3: to spend a lot of time talking to the people
- 10:44Speaker 3: who listen to the show. We find out later, we
- 10:47Speaker 3: show up at a conference and somebody will say like, oh,
- 10:48Speaker 3: I love the show. And I'm like, oh, cool. We're
- 10:50Speaker 3: in Australia. I didn't know that you listened to us here.
- 10:52Speaker 3: Stuff like that. And, you know, it's always cool to
- 10:56Speaker 3: connect with folks and we love that. But, you know,
- 10:58Speaker 3: the two of us are sitting in our offices most
- 11:01Speaker 3: of the time recording into a microphone via Zoom. And
- 11:05Speaker 3: so we don't get to talk to you and we
- 11:06Speaker 3: don't know what the impact is and we don't know
- 11:08Speaker 3: what this looks like for you. So we would love
- 11:09Speaker 3: to know just to see, you know, like not to
- 11:12Speaker 3: say that it wasn't worth it because it was it
- 11:14Speaker 3: was it was worth it to do what we did.
- 11:16Speaker 3: And we feel good with that. But it is nice
- 11:17Speaker 3: to know if it did have a greater reach than
- 11:20Speaker 3: we think it did, you know?
- 11:21Speaker 1: Yeah.
- 11:21Speaker 2: Yeah.
- 11:22Speaker 1: And great to have that feeling and thought and notes
- 11:25Speaker 1: going into our final discussion when it happens. And I
- 11:27Speaker 1: do want to say on sort of the effort note,
- 11:29Speaker 1: because I know there are already podcasts in a similar
- 11:33Speaker 1: vein of what we do who get to continue on
- 11:35Speaker 1: and A lot of them, I think there's something that
- 11:38Speaker 1: they have that we didn't have. Either this is mostly
- 11:41Speaker 1: what they do, is do podcasts. And so their job
- 11:45Speaker 1: or most of their time gets to be spent doing
- 11:47Speaker 1: this thing and supporting it and all of that. And
- 11:50Speaker 1: that's fine because they don't have another full-time job that
- 11:53Speaker 1: they're doing. Yeah.
- 11:54Speaker 3: Or.
- 11:55Speaker 2: The way that they orient.
- 11:56Speaker 1: To the podcast is they have other people come on
- 11:58Speaker 1: and sort of– like they don't have to do a
- 11:59Speaker 1: lot of prep for that podcast to happen.
- 12:01Speaker 3: Yeah.
- 12:02Speaker 2: So like– and actually one of the– we've had guests on.
- 12:04Speaker 2: Those are the easiest episodes for us because we don't
- 12:07Speaker 2: have to do a lot of prep. The amount of– Right.
- 12:09Speaker 1: Like when we would put together these topics, we wanted
- 12:12Speaker 1: to research them fairly well. So we're reading articles and
- 12:15Speaker 1: books and like we do so– I have– and I've
- 12:18Speaker 1: loved this.
- 12:19Speaker 2: I've loved the learning. I've read so, so, so much.
- 12:22Speaker 1: I've read on so many topics I was unfamiliar with
- 12:25Speaker 1: or only peripherally familiar with. I've gotten to learn about
- 12:28Speaker 1: a lot of things that I've really enjoyed. I've loved
- 12:30Speaker 1: learning about history and, and all of that. And so,
- 12:34Speaker 1: but it requires a ton, like there's so much time
- 12:37Speaker 1: spent just doing the like research part. And then we
- 12:40Speaker 1: have to write it and put it into an episode format.
- 12:42Speaker 1: And that takes so much time. And so the amount
- 12:45Speaker 1: of time to like become a sort of, mini expert
- 12:50Speaker 1: in a topic long enough to have a podcast discussion
- 12:52Speaker 1: about it is just a commitment that was pretty large
- 12:56Speaker 1: and why I think a lot of other episodes that like,
- 12:59Speaker 1: they don't need that amount of prep to be able
- 13:01Speaker 1: to do their thing.
- 13:02Speaker 2: But that's great for them.
- 13:03Speaker 1: But it's just a different format than what we were doing,
- 13:05Speaker 1: which was trying to do like, here's a different philosophical
- 13:09Speaker 1: orientation to a thing, which means we had to understand
- 13:11Speaker 1: that thing and the philosophy behind it, which means reading
- 13:14Speaker 1: a lot of what other people have said, which.
- 13:16Speaker 2: Is great, but takes a long time.
- 13:18Speaker 3: So And I don't think that people know this. Every
- 13:21Speaker 3: week when we record the minis and the full-length episodes,
- 13:27Speaker 3: we are following... I wouldn't call it a script. I mean,
- 13:30Speaker 3: I would say it's semi-scripted because we do go off
- 13:33Speaker 3: on tangents and we do all that. But the notes
- 13:36Speaker 3: that we have... for every episode, for our full length
- 13:38Speaker 3: episodes or anywhere between six and eight full pages. It's
- 13:42Speaker 3: like writing a paper every week. It's writing an assignment
- 13:45Speaker 3: every week because you want to make sure it's well-researched.
- 13:47Speaker 3: You want to make sure it's accurate. We want to
- 13:48Speaker 3: make sure that we're capturing the nuances of that particular topic,
- 13:52Speaker 3: that we are as thorough as possible, which is why
- 13:55Speaker 3: we end up with some episodes that are two to
- 13:57Speaker 3: three episodes because we get into the topics and we're like, oh,
- 14:00Speaker 3: this is more involved than we thought it would be.
- 14:03Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah.
- 14:04Speaker 3: I mean, when we're talking about these, these episodes, like
- 14:06Speaker 3: it's not, it's not us talking off the cusp. I mean,
- 14:08Speaker 3: we sound, we sound super intelligent and we sound beautiful.
- 14:11Speaker 3: Thanks to Justin, of course. Like, you know, but like
- 14:15Speaker 3: it is one of those things where it's like the
- 14:17Speaker 3: amount of research that goes into every one of these
- 14:20Speaker 3: episodes is more than you, than many people even realize.
- 14:24Speaker 2: Yeah.
- 14:25Speaker 1: I think that's great for this mini. We've already gone
- 14:27Speaker 1: way further than I thought we would go as far
- 14:29Speaker 1: as time. So let's go ahead and wrap this one
- 14:31Speaker 1: up here. But what I would like to leave you
- 14:33Speaker 1: with in this right now is mostly that please write
- 14:35Speaker 1: into us. We'd love to hear from you. Email us
- 14:38Speaker 1: at info at WWD WWD podcast.com. Thank you to our
- 14:42Speaker 1: patron supporters. Thank you to our listeners and audience. Thank
- 14:45Speaker 1: you for listening. Thank you, Shane, for recording with me.
- 14:48Speaker 3: Hey, anytime.
- 14:49Speaker 1: And for sticking with me on this project for so long. No,
- 14:53Speaker 1: I'm not even going to give the normal wrap-up spiel
- 14:55Speaker 1: that I give, but I think we'll wrap it up there.
- 14:58Speaker 1: Is there anything that you'd like to add or that
- 14:59Speaker 1: I'm missing before I say goodbyes?
- 15:00Speaker 3: I think the most important thing I want everybody to
- 15:02Speaker 3: know is first of all, thank you for giving us
- 15:04Speaker 3: your time and attention and your ear space. And second
- 15:07Speaker 3: of all, it's not you. It's us. Like, I think
- 15:09Speaker 3: that's so important to know. Like you couldn't have done
- 15:13Speaker 3: anything different right now. Like you, your support was invaluable
- 15:17Speaker 3: and it's just, it's, it's our time to do what
- 15:19Speaker 3: we need to do.
- 15:20Speaker 2: So yes, exactly right. Um, yes. Deep heartfelt. Thank you.
- 15:23Speaker 1: As I said, this is not the last episode. We're
- 15:25Speaker 1: going to be putting out shows for a while for
- 15:28Speaker 1: a couple of months after this, at least, um, we
- 15:30Speaker 1: have a pretty good clear idea of our timeline and
- 15:32Speaker 1: what that's going to look like.
- 15:32Speaker 2: But, um, we just wanted to let everyone know that.
- 15:35Speaker 1: That's where we're headed and that, uh, that's what's going on.
- 15:38Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely.
- 15:39Speaker 2: Okay. All right. Thank you all. This is Abraham.
- 15:42Speaker 3: This is Shane.
- 15:43Speaker 2: Why we do what we do. Minnie is out.
- 15:44Speaker 3: Bye. You've been listening to why we do what we do.
- 15:49Speaker 3: You can learn more about this and other episodes by
- 15:51Speaker 3: going to WWD, WWD podcast.com. Thanks for listening. And we
- 15:57Speaker 3: hope you have an awesome day. Bye.