Day 6: Turns Out...I'm Chasing Peace

Today's episode was supposed to be recorded much earlier, but my granddaughter had other plans...and let's just say Grandma's schedule became wonderfully negotiable. ❤️

I'm sharing Part 1 of a two-part Rebecca memory about the time I nearly scared the life out of her during a road trip to Fort Wayne, Indiana. Why? Because I was determined to get to Indiana "first." It made perfect sense in my head at the time...you'll have to decide if you agree after hearing the story. 😂

Then this episode takes an unexpected turn.

What started as a simple conversation about moving to the UK somehow transformed into a deep discussion about what I actually want my life to look like two years from now. It wasn't really about England at all. It was about discovering that what I'm truly chasing isn't a different country—it's a more peaceful life.

Sometimes the best conversations are the ones that end somewhere completely different than where they began.

Oh...and despite the name of the podcast, this one clocked in at about 20 unedited minutes. Apparently, I had a lot on my mind.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Good evening, everyone. Welcome. That sounded that seemed weird to say that. But anyway, welcome to another edition of 10 unedited minutes with Marlena. Yes, this is truly unedited. That's why I paused and did not go back to say that welcome again. But it is evening on Wednesday, June 24th. And the reason I am recording this podcast so late is because I had my granddaughter all day. And my granddaughter is in her Grammy era, meaning she is attached to my hip when she's here. And I say that with a smile because I love every second of it. And I tried to fight it a little bit today, tried to get grandpa to entertain her for a minute so I could uh record this podcast, but she wanted no part of it. And so I gave up and I decided to wait until she went home. So um, today, let's let's get this show on the road, I guess. It's time, right? Today's podcast is sponsored by my dear friend Rebecca Conklin Kleibomer. And if you're new here, uh we have the honor of being sponsored by Rebecca for two months. And to honor her, I am doing 60 days of remembering Rebecca. So I don't know what day it is today, but today's memory is um of a time when Rebecca uh was being an absolute true friend of me and agreed to go to Fort Wayne with me. And um, I don't know how many of you know uh Vera Bradley is a designer bag maker and uh one of my favorite purses. I love Vera Bradley purses, and every year, I don't think they do it anymore, but every year they would have an outlet sale in Fort Wayne, and it was always one time a year. And I don't think they at the time they were selling tickets to it. I don't know, but I just know we had to go and we had to wait in line. And and um I was telling her about it, and she goes, I like purses. I know I don't really like Vera Bradley purses, but I'll go with you. So Rebecca and I took a road trip. Um, at the time, Rebecca lived in Finley, so um it took it it took like a good hour and a half to two hours uh for her to pick me up and then get to Fort Wayne. And so in that time in the car was so much fun. Um Rebecca has a little bit of road rage. I really think it's gotten better, but um, as we were younger, it uh it was quite comical. And every time she would um yell at another driver, it was almost like she had Tourette's. Um, I would just die laughing. It was so funny. But um this was the first time that Rebecca and I had ever taken a long road trip together. So I didn't know like her car antics, she didn't know my car antics. And um we were crossing the Ohio-Indiana line. And Rebecca, I know you are uh you know what I'm gonna say, and you are cackling right now. But um there it whenever whenever my husband and I cross a state line, it's a competition as to who gets in the state first. So we have to put our hand out in front of us as fast as we can to see who gets there first. And I had no idea that Rebecca didn't know what this was, and I did it, and I am probably lucky to be alive because I think I scared the ever living shit out of Rebecca. She kind of screamed. I'm sorry, but she was like, what the fuck was that? So anyway, I showed Rebecca how to win at getting into the state first. So they there's actually two parts to this memory, and I'm saving the second part of it for tomorrow. So tune in tomorrow for part two. But part one was how I scared the ever-living shit out of Rebecca as we drove to Fort Wayne. And I also learned something else in that the first 30 minutes of that car ride was do not touch her uh thermostat because I was getting cold. I just automatically reach and turn it down. And she was like, What the fuck are you doing? So Rebecca's cockpit is her cockpit. The passenger side is mine. Don't touch anything in her cockpit. We'll be just fine. Oh my gosh, how much fun we had that day. Just in the in the trip there, the drive there was just hilarious and fun. So I love you, Rebecca. Thank you for sponsoring this podcast. Um, but let's get into it today. First of all, um, if you're watching this on YouTube, there's a bit of a different angle today. I thought I would try something a little bit different. I put the camera right in front of my face instead of off to the side like I have been. So, yes, you get to see a little bit of the um crafting treasures I have behind me, maybe a little more uh mess back here on my desk. But somebody once told me somebody with a bunch of piles on their desk is a very successful person. So yeah, look at my desk. I am very successful, I guess. But anyway, um, so that tells you this podcast is uh um out on YouTube. It's also streamed on Apple Podcast and Spotify and Prime Music, and that is all done through the platform BuzzSprout. And that's what my sponsorships pay for is just the monthly subscription to Buzz Sprout. So if you love my work, you love my podcast, and you want to show me some support, it's $25 a month. You can sponsor me, and I will give you a shout-out at the beginning and end of each podcast, and then um on any social media uh postings that I do for this podcast. So um let's get into it today. And today might be a little bit longer than 10 minutes, guys, because we're already over halfway, but something has got my mind just completely spinning right now, and it is uh Chat GPT. Listen, I have ran what I was gonna say in this podcast over in my head probably 20 times today, and I it it it it just is gonna take a long time to um explain it. So let me lay some groundwork for you first. Um in in in the last year, I feel like my life has been one of um focus, refocus, and rebuilding. So as you all know, um in December of last year, I closed my business of 12 years. And for those of you that have been following me my whole life, you probably don't remember this, but um, it's coming up on a year of when I made that decision to close the dough hook. And um it was it was a tough decision for me, but the decision was made based on me being extremely burnt out. Uh there's just no other way to put it. So when you are burnt out, um you I don't think you realize the level of burnout you are until after everything is worn off and things have kind of calmed down in your life. So um for the last year, I have been looking for a job. And I kind of started that search a year ago, April, just very casually, but then really ramped it up when I made the final decision to uh sell slash close the dough hook. And um, when I permanently closed in December, I really ramped up my search for a job. And never in a million years did I think it would be this hard or take this long to become employed. Um, I'm a pretty damn good catch. Uh I have owned a business for 12 years. Before that, I was in the newspaper industry. I was a journalist. I know how to write. I've I did everything in that, in the the company that I own from plunging the toilet all the way up to keeping the books. So everything in between. And I'm good, I'm good at it. I'm good at a little bit of everything and um very adaptable. But anyway, it's enough tooting my own horn. But um when you're burnt out, it's really hard to take on new projects like job hunting, but I did it, and I think I burnt myself out job hunting as well, because after December, starting in January, um, I would spend four hours a day searching job boards, um crafting a cover letter and resume to um to a specific job description and sending it off. So sometimes even eight hours a day. Like that was my full-time job was trying to find a job. And I mean, I when I say that I have spent a lot of time, I'm gonna tell you, I've probably sent out over 180 cover letters and resumes in the last year, and can count on one hand the number of interviews that I've gotten, and can probably count on two or three hands just the number of responses, period, that I got from those um uh resumes and cover letters. It's it's insane. The job, it's it's just insane. So um, yeah, so I took a break from it and I started, I decided to refocus my energy on starting my own um marketing and um small business consulting company, hook and rise creative. And I decided that because I'm like, hell, I'm spending eight hours a day applying for new jobs. What if I would take all that energy and just throw it into a new company, right? So I did that and um the economy um comes into play here. It's come into play since making the decision to close the dough hook. But um, the economy sucks. I'm just gonna say it. The economy sucks right now. And my mom and I have been having a lot of conversations about the economy. And before I get into that, I just want to say that whenever the economy sucks, small businesses are not doing well right now. And I've told this to my mom several times that if you are a small business and you say that you're doing well, you're lying. Because I can't imagine a small business that is not suffering in one way or the other. Your margins have gotten tighter, uh, your payroll has gone up. Like they're it's just not as easy as it used to be to be a small business owner. And so when things get tight, the first thing a small business will cut is their marketing, right? Unfortunately, I don't believe in that either, but that's that's the truth of it. That's the crux. So to start a marketing company when the economy sucks, it's slow going, right? I'm working at it, putting uh tons of energy into it, but it's hard. And that's that's the truth of starting any company. It's not easy, right? I know that, I get that. So um let's bring in Chat GPT here. Um, so I have I have used Chat GPT to help me write my cover letters and um hone in on my resumes, all of the above. And I also utilize Chat GPT to come up with some pricing guides and stuff for my Hook and Rise creative company. So, and I've taken on my daughter's uh massage business as a client for Hook and Rise, and so ChatGPT knows a lot about me, okay? It is scary how much Chat GPT knows about me. So last night, this is where this is gonna be a little hard for me to um to talk about here, but it's it's kind of comical, honestly. But last night I my mind wandered, and I'm sitting outside enjoying the birds and the cool evening breeze, and I just started thinking about I wonder what other um countries are dealing with right now. Like America, the c the economy sucks, are not to get too political, but our government is in some massive turmoil right now, and I think it's so far gone that it's not fixable, and Americans are just sick of it, right? Like they are just like fuck it, every man for themselves, and you know, that's how it is. So I was starting to wonder what it was like in other countries, right? Is this a is this a global problem or is this a national problem, you know? So I go to Chat GPT and I type in, hey Chatty, that's its name to me, Chatty. I said, um, what what would it look like or what would I have to do to move to relocate to the UK? And first of all, uh Chat GPT thinks it's my frickin' therapist, just so you all know. Like, it's like, what? I said, I'm just daydreaming here, I'm not really going to do this, I'm just daydreaming. So it said, well, and it spelled out all these facts, and it said, um, if you're looking to move to the UK to get out of a tumultuous economy in a country with um uh a government that is not doing well, a healthcare system that is on the verge of collapse, you're not going to have a better life over at the UK because they are experiencing a lot of the same problems. I said, okay. So so then I said, well, where would be a good place to move in this world? And ChatGPT is like Marlena, what are you really after here? I I'm not kidding you. That one question about moving to the UK turned into and finished with a um therapy session that said, Where what do you see yourself doing in two years? Like if if your world was good, you were employed, you were making a certain amount of money a year, and you everything was good, what would Marlena look like on a regular Tuesday afternoon? And that question rocked me to my core because I could not answer that. I Chat GPT and I signed off with each other and I sat there and I thought about that and I went to bed thinking about that question. And it like I had this like heavy rock in my gut because I'm like, why can't I answer that question? Like I'm starting to have like an identity crisis, like in a panic attack. Like, why can't I answer that question? What where would I be in two years? Why is that so hard to answer? So I wake up this morning and um I go back to Chat GPT and I said, Listen, you like scared the shit out of me last night. Like, why why can't I answer this question? And and it it I'm telling you what ChatGPT it is scary. We don't even need to finish what Chat GPT told me because it's just frightening how much uh that uh system uh knows me. And the thing that scares me the most about it is it's starting to put emotion behind it. Like listen, it says things like listen, Marlena, I know that you are thinking this, like this is what's going through your head, but what's the real problem here? If you were to ask yourself this question, so then you answer that question, and then it says, Okay, so this is what I'm discerning here, and like it's a freaking robot, it's a freaking computer. Why is there emotion behind that, guys? It scares me to death. However, it's cheaper than therapy. So what would I be doing on a regular Tuesday afternoon in two years? And my answer to that, just so you all know, Chat GPT helped me come up with the solution, and the answer to that would be my life would be peaceful. Think about that for a minute. My life would be peaceful. I would have a good job and all the bills would be paid and caught up, and there would be a lot less worry on my plate. And it's hard because I've spent the last 12 years like being the business owner and being the person that solves everything and being the person that puts out all the fires. And right now that's not something that I need to do. And it I'm a fish out of water, like I don't know how to feel, I don't know what to do. Like this morning I woke up and I didn't really have a major task on my plate today, and I was like panicking because I was like, what am I what am I supposed to do today? What w w where do I go? What do I do? Thankfully, my sweet granddaughter came over and distracted me. But I life is life is heavy right now, guys, and life and I I don't know if I would suggest utilizing Chat GPT, but she's she's some pretty damn good therapy if you really um utilize her a lot, I guess. But um it's scary. That that's terrifying to me how well that chat GPT can help you discern something, can walk you through the process of answering a question and help you come to a solution that you feel good about. It's it's just really freaky for me, but especially as someone who um did all the writing herself, you know, in the journalism world, we didn't have chat GPT back then. We had to sit down and actually think about it and write it ourselves. And I still do that, right? I still do that. I'm like, nope, I'm not gonna let Chat GPT help me with this. This has to be in my words, so that's what I do. Anyway, this went way over. This is a 20-minute freaking podcast today, guards. Sorry. We're gonna rename it today to 20 unedited minutes with Marlena. Um, hopefully we can uh shorten that up tomorrow again. But thanks for sticking with me today. I just had to get that off my chest. I have been thinking about that all day. And I also went to bed last night with um something very heavy on my mind about a podcast that I or not a podcast, a documentary that I watched um on Netflix last night too. And we might I think we're gonna talk about that tomorrow because that has my mind completely, pardon my French, but completely fucked up. Just so you know. But anyway, you guys have the best night. I love you. Thanks for sticking with me today. Thank you for re thank you, Rebecca, for being an amazing friend. I hope you had a great day yesterday. It was your birthday. Um, hopefully Dan sent you something from afar and it was beautiful and you loved it, and I love you. You loved it as much as I love you. So thanks again for sponsoring this podcast. You guys pray for me. I pray for you every day, and we'll see you tomorrow. Bye.