333 Amelia Hruby - Living Off the Grid: Inspiring Transition from Urban to Rural Life

0:00:00 - Harry Duran

So Amanda Hruby, founder of Softer Sound and host of Off the Grid, thank you so much for joining me on Podcast Junkies.

0:00:07 - Amelia Hruby

Thanks for having me, Harry. I'm really excited to be here.

0:00:10 - Harry Duran

So a special shout out to Lauren Pacelle, who made the intro we had a chat recently and her episodes do to come out as well and she does such good things, great things for podcasting and marketing and she's definitely knows her stuff when it comes to marketing and producing shows. But just getting the word out and so I definitely appreciate it of what she's doing for the industry and I'm wondering how you two got connected.

0:00:33 - Amelia Hruby

Yeah. So Lauren and I met through a listserv called Ladeo, which is for, like, women and non-binary folks in radio and podcasting and she was just starting Tink, which is her media company, and she was looking for women in podcasting to interview and I think I was her second interview for that blog series.

So this is like very early days. This is when Lauren was still even trying to figure out how she wanted to be involved in podcasting and I was running my first show, 50 Feminist States and we talked about that and kind of. From that point we've just stayed in touch, on and off over the past. I mean, that's got to be four or five years now.

0:01:13 - Harry Duran

Yeah, definitely have you made it out to the podcast conferences.

0:01:17 - Amelia Hruby

I've not done the conference circuit. I kind of feel like I occupy a slightly like one foot in both world space and podcasting, like I'm not really. I say I'm in the industry but not of the industry. I tend to do more of my networking in like small business spaces and creator spaces and I kind of pop into podcasting when I need a resource or I have a question or I'm not sure about something.

0:01:39 - Harry Duran

Where's home for you.

0:01:41 - Amelia Hruby

I live in Lincoln, Nebraska. What?

0:01:43 - Harry Duran

was life like? Did you born and raise there?

0:01:46 - Amelia Hruby

No, actually I just moved here during the pandemic. It was like a pandemic inspired move. I grew up in North Carolina, went to college there, I moved to Chicago for grad school and then my family is originally from here. My parents had moved back here. I think, in like 2019. And during the pandemic, I needed to get out of the city and I ended up here, and I'm still here.

0:02:08 - Harry Duran

We were on a road trip recently with my partner and we went out to Colorado and we live in Minneapolis and so that's a straight shot. It's a long day but we can do it if we leave early enough think 430 in the morning. There's something about getting on the road that early. That's nice, because by the time it gets to like noon it's your halfway done with your trip. But on the way back we decided to make it a two-parter, so we stopped not through Lincoln but through Omaha, nebraska, so yeah, which is a really a vibrant downtown scene.

I had never been, and we stayed in one of the older hotels. That's really nice. It's a really modern hotel. The name escapes me for a second, but it was, I think, just surprising for me because, as you can tell from my hat, I'm a bit of a city born and raised, actually born in El Salvador, so I came here when I was a year old, but I was raised in New York and so I've always had coastal living because I lived in LA as well. So home is Minneapolis and you said you were in Chicago, so you're a bit familiar with the Midwest and it's a bit of change in terms of pace.

0:03:04 - Amelia Hruby

Oh, yeah, so much so.

0:03:06 - Harry Duran

Yeah, what do you think it is that keeps you in Lincoln, given all the places you've lived previously?

0:03:12 - Amelia Hruby

Yeah, I think that I came to be closer to my family. I had actually went to boarding school when I was 16, a public boarding school in North Carolina, so I had not lived close to my parents for over a decade by the time I moved here and with everything happening with the pandemic, and I lost one of my uncles pretty early on, and so I really sort of had this realization that if I wanted to spend time with people who were getting older, I had to actually like go spend time with them.

And it wasn't just going to happen, and around that time I had an opportunity to move into a house here and so we moved and I have really enjoyed being closer to family, which is honestly not something I ever thought I would say, like I was not someone who was on the trajectory to like move close to their parents. And then it happened and I stay because of, like, low cost of living and affordability, and I launched my business in 2021. And it's really given me some breathing room in these early years to like get up and running and get the revenue growing and become really profitable without having to, you know, be paying like New York City or even Brooklyn or Queens rent at the same time which I have some friends doing that and it's really rough to start a business and need to like make that $2,500 a month rent.

That's really hard.

0:04:30 - Harry Duran

Yeah. So is it safe to say that when you were in college and figuring out and studying and on your major and getting your degrees that maybe podcasting wasn't in your future back then?

0:04:42 - Amelia Hruby

Yeah, not at all. I was an English major in college and then I went and got a PhD in philosophy. So I was like this humanities kid, I loved writing. But when I was in Chicago doing my grad degree, I started volunteering for a community radio station and I was an on air DJ once a week and I loved it and I loved music and I loved the Chicago music scene. And the station manager asked if I would be interested in running the local music interview podcast like I just interviewed local bands and I was like hell, yeah, that's great. And then she was like, great, you can do the interviews and you need to edit it and make the episodes and run the podcast. And I was like, okay, but they taught me and trained me in how to do everything. And so that was really the beginning of my like podcasting work and now career.

0:05:32 - Harry Duran

What was the name of the show?

0:05:34 - Amelia Hruby

The station was called Chirp Radio and my show was called Girl Power.

0:05:37 - Harry Duran

Hour.

0:05:38 - Amelia Hruby

I did a drive time. It's Tuesday morning, drive time. Show all music from like women and non binary artists.

0:05:43 - Harry Duran

Do you have some favorites that used to play a lot?

0:05:46 - Amelia Hruby

Oh gosh, who did I use to play a lot In terms of Chicago local bands, like I loved this band called Impulsive Hearts not local, but I was super into Mitski. I played a lot of Julian Baker. Now I'm like a big fan of like boy genius, or I'm really into Chapel Roan's new album. So those are all folks I would play then and now on Girl Power Hour.

0:06:09 - Harry Duran

Do you have a Spotify playlist?

I have too many Spotify playlists but I could certainly send you a little peek into, like the mind of our guests sometimes, and sometimes the best way to do that is just especially for the DJ, because DJ is near and dear to my heart. I grew up DJing, but more on the vinyl house music scene, and so I learned on turntables how to beat match and still have my turntables and dying to get them set up here and in our new place. And, similar to you, I think this may be a feeling that you had, but it's this idea of controlling the mood of and the tempo of, and I don't know how much feedback you were able to get on the radio station but as a DJ, in your live and your mix and you literally can see the results of the song you played and it continues the energy or drops the energy. You're like, okay, that one didn't work and you have to think on your feed, which I love.

0:07:04 - Amelia Hruby

Yeah, that is such a fun experience. I've lived DJed a few times, not on vinyl. I don't know how to beat match and all of that, but it is so fun to be in that like responsive place with a crowd Like. I think there are few opportunities to like really be creating or mixing in real time and see what the feedback is, and radio is definitely not like that, like I was in this sort of, you know, windowless studio at 5 30 in the morning by myself and getting you know playing things, but sometimes we get call ins or sometimes I'd hear from get emails from folks.

So that was always exciting but not quite that same responsibility which, honestly, like I think is something people really miss in a lot of like in podcasting, I hear from a lot of the hosts that I work with the sense of like I love making the show, but I never hear from anybody and I like I want to know what they think right Like there's not necessarily that like easy kind of feedback or social mechanism within the industry or like within podcasting right now.

0:08:06 - Harry Duran

I think, what was helpful for me, because on the meta version I have a podcast where I speak to podcasters. So I go to podcasts and conferences and I think early on I made a conscious choice to make sure it was video so I at least developed the rapport with my guests. Back then it was Skype with Call Recorder. But then you go to the conferences and they're like hey, harry, really enjoyed that conversation. Or hey, harry, I've been listening to the show. And it's happened with my second show as well and which I hosted, a show called the Vertical Farming Podcast. And now I go to indoor farming conferences. But people there have listened to the show and they're like oh, I've listened to all the episodes and I think, as a host, there's something humbling about the fact that people spend their time with you like dedicate an hour of their time to listen to your show, which I never want to take that for granted, because without our listener we wouldn't have a show.

0:08:51 - Amelia Hruby

Yeah, absolutely. I'm always have the sort of reaction of like when I put out an episode and then someone's like oh, I heard you say this, I'm like no one was supposed to hear that you know, like I made a whole podcast and I'm still just like in this sort of funny moment of being like, wow, people actually listen and I agree, like exactly the words you use. It's very humbling and I'm always so grateful for people's time and attention, especially in this era of like endless pings to our attention all the time.

0:09:18 - Harry Duran

So when you were assigned the duties for hosting the podcast for the radio station, was that your first foray into podcasting, or had you been listening to podcasts at that time, or how were of it were you?

0:09:30 - Amelia Hruby

At that point I had like heard cereal. I think I had listened to S-Town or Shut Town, but I had not. I was not like an avid podcast listener by any means. Like making a podcast was nowhere on radar.

0:09:44 - Harry Duran

And so what did you learn about the process that was different than what you were doing in the radio station.

0:09:50 - Amelia Hruby

So a lot of that process was field recording. So I was like going to clubs to talk to bands. I was going to festivals to talk to bands. Like we kind of worked the festival circuit. So I got to go to Raya Fest and do interviews and Pitchfork Music Festival and do interviews and so I was really learning how to like be out there with a field recorder and like have a conversation with a musician who's just come off stage or is going on, and like that was really nerve wracking for me and thrilling at the same time.

And then learning you know I think I took to editing pretty easily. It was. I think a lot of my skillset was just like how to have a really good conversation with someone you've never met and you only have 15 minutes with, and how to navigate that and not and get them hopefully to say something that they haven't just already said 20 times that day and I think that's made me like a much better podcaster.

Like most podcasters, you know, we're like in our home studios hanging out talking to somebody over the internet, but the fact that I had to do that a bunch of times live and similar to what you're talking about, dj, like get that responsive feedback, like oh, they didn't like that question or oh, they don't want to talk about that or like you know kind of navigate that with people. It just made me a much better interview when I did interviewer, when I did get back to this more like virtual podcasting space.

0:11:02 - Harry Duran

I've heard that before from folks that have had that experience with interviewing artists and you get such a short window and I can't imagine what it's like to be actually at the festival and they're thinking about their performance, not about giving you the best answers. And so what tips do you have or what did you learn? That's different Cause, obviously, in a long-form interview like we're having now, we've got the time to just kind of relax in terms of the conversation and let it open up. Naturally. But to your point there you, what's the nature of the questions you ask when you're in that tight window of like 10 to 15 minutes to ensure you're getting something valuable?

0:11:37 - Amelia Hruby

Yeah, so I definitely was someone who did a lot of research. I was really listening to other interviews they'd done, reading written interviews, like really trying to find as much as I could of kind of what are things they've been asked about? What do they speak about a lot, is there anything that's kind of pinging my interest or attention that I can bring to this that might be a little different or take something a little deeper? So like the research phase was really helpful. Coming with questions ready, I would normally write a list of like at least 10 to 12 questions. I never had time to ask all of them, but that way I didn't have those moments where, like I'm just blanking out or where, if they answer things really fast, sometimes people will give you like a one sentence answer and I need more questions.

So I always wrote like an abundance of questions for my 15 minutes with them and then I think all of that said it's like you need to do all of that and then when you get in the conversation you need to forget that you've prepped and just like go, because it's also awkward if all you do is read your question and stare at them and ask them to answer.

So kind of having those like empathetic, like responsive skills where you can be like kind of leaning in and asking them about, or noticing when they seem interested in something and asking a follow up question about that before moving on, or noticing when they're not interested and like quickly moving on. I also always would ask a question like that was really about like where we were. So if we were at a festival I'd ask if they'd. I would know if they'd played the festival before, but I might ask about their last performance or if they're excited to be there for the first time, or something to kind of just open us up into the space we're actually in and then go deeper into their music or art practice or whatever it may be.

0:13:21 - Harry Duran

It feels like that skill is so important to learn because as a podcaster that happens a lot, especially in the early days when you're getting your feet wet with podcast interviews. You have to learn how to read the room or read the guests and their feedback and obviously I can't imagine what it's like. Occasionally I've had it happen, you know, if you ask a question and it just didn't land properly or you can clearly see that's probably not something they want to talk about. So you have to learn how to pivot very quickly and just keep the conversation sort of this idea of managing the flow of the conversation that I think is such an important skill to learn.

0:13:50 - Amelia Hruby

Yeah, and I think I agree completely. It's such an important skill and it takes time. It will be awkward in the beginning and part of becoming a podcaster is like embracing that and getting through that stage. And honestly, like you've done hundreds of interviews I've done hundreds of interviews Like the awkward moments still happen, like you just said, like it still happens sometimes it's not unavoidable, but knowing how to kind of reset or keep going or move in a different direction, flow somewhere else, together with your guest, is so important and I would also say like it's a lot of soft skills.

I've noticed more and more podcasters seem like they kind of try to outsource this, to like the pre-interview form and I love a pre-interview form. I encourage them. I tell all my podcasters I'm like get the emails, get the bios, get the photos, ask them if there's something they definitely want to talk about or don't want to talk about. But I've personally started getting pre-interview forms that ask me to write the questions they're going to ask or ask me to write the show notes that they're going to use, and I'm a little bit like that's your job.

Yeah, it takes so and it just takes away from. I'm like if I wanted to say all this, I would just say it on my own podcast, right? Like I want us to be in dialogue and like, if we're not really creating that shared space together, like if the guests are just doing all of that for you I don't know what your role as the host is anymore and it's really important to me as a host that my guests feel welcomed and invited and taken care of in the process of the conversation.

0:15:21 - Harry Duran

I think this is such an important reminder because it's almost at that point. They're just going through the motions. You know they're just churning the interviews out and they're not. I've been on those and you just feel like you're just a cog and just like, okay, they've got the basics now and they've got another episode in the can and they're just going. They're probably doing three or four a week and there's no connection with those. And I think we have such limited time nowadays and I think, to your point, I'd rather be spending it with people in genuine conversation, at least for the time that we spend together to like learn more about my guests and sharing those stories with my audience as well.

I always like to include everyone that's been in this conversation right now and your cat has also been making an appearance, so you want to introduce.

0:16:04 - Amelia Hruby

Yes, so that she just jumped off screen, but her name is Wilco. Like the Chicago band, I got her. She's a Chicago cat. I adopted her there in like my first three months of living in the city, and so I named her Wilco.

0:16:17 - Harry Duran

After, the band During the interviews? Did you get to meet any of your heroes?

0:16:22 - Amelia Hruby

I interviewed. I don't heroes is a great word, I'm not sure about that but I definitely interviewed some people where I was like oh my God, I never thought I'd get to talk to you and now I'm trying to remember like who are these people I talked? I have a really clear memory of interviewing Vagabond at Pitchfork and she's a musician I just really admire and I love her albums and honestly, the interview was totally awkward and I think I hugely fumbled it, but it was fine and I'm just grateful that I got to do that and that I got to talk to you. I'm trying to think of other now that you asked me that my mind is going blank, but I would say every interview I did felt like really special and exciting and that one just sticks out, I think, because I was a little bit starstruck at the time.

0:17:09 - Harry Duran

That's always fun. So, as you were doing the podcast there, talk a little bit about the transition into thinking or what that looks like for the timeline. Wise, getting started with your own shows.

0:17:21 - Amelia Hruby

Yeah, so I started working on the local music show at Chirp and then, once you know how to make a podcast and people know that you edit audio, they just start coming out of the woodwork and asking you to do things. I feel like every editor has this experience. Like, if you just wanna learn how to edit and only make your own show, just like, don't tell anyone, you know how to edit because they will come to you and they will ask you to do audio.

Thanks for them. And so that kind of started happening. Like, I made that show and then a friend asked if I'd be interested in working on a show she was running for her business and so I was doing a little more editing and then I got this idea, probably a year or so, maybe two year and a half into that process, that I really wanted to launch my own show that combined my love of travel and my kind of research and dissertation on feminism and I with this newfound skill of podcasting. So I launched a Kickstarter campaign for a show called 50 Feminist States and I raised I think six or $7,000 with that first campaign and I used that money to go on a road trip around the Midwest and Mountain West and I did.

I interviewed feminist activists and artists in each state and then I did these state sort of portrait episodes where I'd like kind of put different conversations together to feature some type of feminist issue or artist or organizing effort in that state, and it was such a joy. I did three road trips, three seasons, and I loved that project. It was all crowdfunded but I think by the end I'd raised over $13,000 to travel and do the interviews and it still lives online. As I was telling you before we hit record, the pandemic kind of brought the project to a close. I actually was like on a flight March, I don't know 15th, 20th, 2020, to go on the next trip when travel got grounded in the US and I stopped and then the project never quite picked back up.

So that was my show and then from there in that process I like finished my PhD, I moved to Nebraska and when I got here I wanted to transition out of the job I was working in into my own business and so I kind of took all these podcasting skills and contacts that I had and I launched softer sound studio, which is my podcast studio, working with entrepreneurs and creatives to make their shows, and now we have a roster of a few dozen shows at any given time and we make episodes of people and write show notes and do all that good stuff. And it's a blast. I really love it.

0:20:07 - Harry Duran

And then you're hosting off the grid. Yes, so I also have my own podcast.

0:20:12 - Amelia Hruby

Who knows?

0:20:13 - Harry Duran

In your spare time.

0:20:14 - Amelia Hruby

I also have in my spare time. I have like three podcasts, but the main one is off the grid, which is a show about leaving social media as a business owner and it's basically for anyone who wants to like, share and sell their work online or offline without needing social media, relying on social media to do that. So on the show I share a lot of strategies and stories for about creative marketing practices and then I interview former influencers about their journeys like leaving social media or quitting influencing, and I talk to a lot of business leaders who share different marketing practices they use or business ideas that have been foundational for them, and I'm really just trying to help people realize that they do not have to be on social media for their business podcast, art, studio, whatever it may be, to be a success, like we have other ways we can market and sell our work if you don't want to be on social.

0:21:15 - Harry Duran

Lots of unpack there, so I'm gonna try to make sure I manage these threads that I'm dying to pull here. I'm curious where your love of travel came from when that started.

0:21:26 - Amelia Hruby

I think it started growing up in a pretty small town and feeling totally stifled there. I grew up in like a county of 30,000 people in North Carolina and I always was like buying magazines and watching movies and like dreaming of going other places, primarily like New York City, your hometown. And when I was in eighth grade, I like basically bullied my parents into taking me on a trip there by creating an itemized budget of how much money we would need.

We got train tickets so it'd be cheaper than flying. Like I found a hotel where we could all stay right by Central Park 13.

0:22:06 - Harry Duran

Geez, that's impressive.

0:22:08 - Amelia Hruby

I was very precocious. I was a very precocious child, but it worked because they took me on the trip. And I loved New York and I just knew that I wanted to be in a city and I wanted to, like, I wanted to travel, and so I just started traveling a lot more and throughout college I would go all over by myself. I've been a solo traveler for a long time. I've driven across the country by alone three times.

I think, and just really love it, Like I just love being in new and different places and exploring. But I think the root is just like my inner preteen trying to get out of that small town lifestyle.

0:22:43 - Harry Duran

That is precocious and that is tenacity and just the ability to organize and plan a trip. And to the point where you've got, you're probably I don't know if it's a spreadsheet or at least just a budget or something Just like it's crazy, that's fun.

0:22:56 - Amelia Hruby

Yeah, I need it. It was great. I remember that trip so fondly.

0:23:00 - Harry Duran

So I was thinking about that, like I'm always fascinated, because I felt like I was spoiled because New York City was my backyard, because I grew up in Yonkers. So if you're looking at a map, it's the Bronx, manhattan and then Yonkers is the first city outside of the five boroughs. But can you place yourself back in those shoes and just if you can remember what it was like when you got off the train in New York City?

0:23:21 - Amelia Hruby

Oh, I was in awe. I just remember feeling so energized by the city. It's how I still feel every time I go to the city.

It's like I didn't realize I was like an empty pit. Until I get there I'm like so full up on all the energy of the other people and I really love how everyone there just has like a thing that they like love doing and they're like working on and toward, and sometimes that can be exhausting. I do understand that, but I just felt like, especially because I was that precocious teenager, I was just like why doesn't everyone care more and want more and do more? And in New York City they are caring more and wanting more and doing more and I felt so excited by that.

But I think some of the highlights for me were just like getting into the city walking around. I remember riding bikes in Central Park. I remember going to Times Square and at 13 I loved it.

0:24:17 - Harry Duran

I thought it was the best place in the whole world.

0:24:19 - Amelia Hruby

Now I often go to New York and don't leave Brooklyn, but that's different.

0:24:23 - Harry Duran

It's a lot.

0:24:23 - Amelia Hruby

But yeah, it is a lot. But yeah, and I remember just being like. I feel the image that's coming to mind is like a Looney Tunes character with like the stars and like the Awuga eyes, like that was me the whole time I was there, that's what happens in Times Square.

0:24:37 - Harry Duran

I mean it's a century overload, you know it's like the whole strip of Las Vegas consolidated into like those corners, and I think for me it's interesting because it always feels like home to me. But I think recently and I don't know if something shifted after COVID but I noticed more of a frenetic energy, more as like everyone's just running around and doing their thing, and maybe it's because I'm in the Midwest now and I know the listener would get tired of hearing the deers that are my property or we see turkeys come to feed and our neighbors have chickens and so completely different lifestyle now and I'm kind of enjoying the peace and quiet and I'm sure you can relate being in Nebraska just having a sanctuary to return home to.

0:25:20 - Amelia Hruby

Yeah, I feel really at home in the Midwest, which is likely because that's where my family's from. But I do I mean, even living in Chicago for seven years like it's still very much a city, but the pace is so different from New York or LA. It's much more relaxed, People are much more kinder.

0:25:39 - Harry Duran

I don't know what I want to they're kind.

0:25:41 - Amelia Hruby

They're not in a hurry, less rude, they're just like living.

0:25:45 - Harry Duran

Yeah, yeah, that's all true, I had to get used to that being here. My partner when I first got here she's like you don't say hi to anybody. Like why are you just like? How come? You're just like very gruff. Like we go to a restaurant reservations I'm like Harry table two. She's like ask them how they're doing or something. And it took a while because New York is to say you'd get on a subway car, as 100 people in the car but no one's making eye contact.

You're not connecting with people on a one to one level, and it'd be weird if you did. And just like good morning, is someone in New York City every morning? Just like good morning, good morning, hello. Waving to everybody. You get used to that here. Now I'm like I go out, I'm in the car, I see somebody walking, I'm like I'm waving at them. I'm just like, yep, it's rubbing off on me now.

0:26:26 - Amelia Hruby

So yeah, it's fun.

0:26:28 - Harry Duran

It is fun, and so the Kickstarter. Did you have experience doing that and why did you decide to go that route and how hard was it to learn?

0:26:36 - Amelia Hruby

to put that together yeah, so I did not have any experience doing a Kickstarter crowdfunding. I read Amanda Palmer's book the Art of Asking, which when she wrote it she ran, I think, the first million dollar Kickstarter. So she, like, really did a lot of crowdfunding for herself and her band, the Dress and Dolls. I believe.

And it really inspired me to that, like I could do this road tripping podcast, even though I had no money to fund the project because I was in grad school. You know, grad students get paid. I was getting paid like $20,000 a year to live in Chicago. Like I didn't have extra funds to just like go off on the road, and I think that really what the reason it worked well for me is that I had been doing a lot of like community work in the city. I had donated a lot of time to the radio station.

I had also worked with this organization called Fourth Chicago that supported creative women business owners and, like, because I had been volunteering essentially so much like, when I created this campaign asking for support, people really showed up and they were really excited to support me and to support the idea at large. This was also happening in 2017. So you know the year that Trump goes into office and like I think there was a lot of hunger for like learning more about feminism around the country. You know it was like the year of the women, the first women's march or, at that time, that iteration of it, and so I think that, like the project I was bringing my community together and the project was like really needed in that moment, In a way that, honestly, I don't know if it would resonate now, but that's okay.

0:28:20 - Harry Duran

Yeah, I'm sure you learned a lot about that process and also on the responsibility you feel like when you have people that are contributing, and probably small dollar amounts, and how they all add up, you know, to those thousands you were able to collect and use as the basis for this trip. I imagine there's a special place in your heart for all these individual contributors who really like, believed in you and supported you.

0:28:42 - Amelia Hruby

Almost definitely. I'm like so grateful and have so much gratitude and I think that you know I carry that forward Like I feel that same gratitude for my listeners now, even though maybe they aren't donating dollars in the same way, although many of them are, because I have a lot of offering or I have offerings associated with my podcast and they buy those things and it's. I really appreciate that. But I think that it was so like crowdfunding was like a really great step toward running my own business. It taught me a lot about asking for support, asking for money, thinking about what I could offer that was like reasonable for me to produce in response or like as thanks. Yeah, it was like a little mini experiment and it went really well, fortunately.

0:29:28 - Harry Duran

Off the grid. This is a very interesting topic and I just happened to see someone who's been in like a business mastermind previously. He's got incredibly successful businesses, like multimillion dollar business, and he recently just posted he's going to stay on Facebook as his one channel but he completely signed off of everything else. He's got four daughters. He lives in Australia and I think he just had a realization that time with his daughters is a very small window of memories, because as they get older, then they start to. You know he already with his older daughter. She's already said hey, I think he would be reading her books at night, and she's the first one to say, hey, I'd actually want to read this book on my own now. So which is a bittersweet moment, right, as a parent, you're like, oh no, like you're losing that connection. So that's top of mind for me and it's so interesting that this came up and I'm wondering about the origin for this. You know how you came up with this idea?

0:30:20 - Amelia Hruby

Yeah, so the origin for the show really comes from my own experience leaving social media. So, like many people, joined social media in 20. Well, I joined Facebook in gosh 2009. No, 2007. And I joined Instagram in like 2012. And I had been on it for a really long time and I started growing a platform. I was, you know, I would say I was like a micro influencer by the time we hit 2019 or so, and I got a book deal and I really put a lot of work into growing my Instagram following to try to sell my book and have my book be successful, and the more work I put into social media, the more time I spent there, the more it felt like a scam.

0:31:08 - Harry Duran

Like.

0:31:08 - Amelia Hruby

I was like the more I give to this, the less I feel that I get from it.

And I started to realize that I was just had a really bad relationship with this app and I wasn't interested in working on that. Like I work on relationships with humans in my life, I don't want to work so hard on my relationship with an app in my life and I don't want to give so much time to it to feel like I'm even a small amount successful there. And so, in April 2021, I left social media entirely. I like archived most of my posts on Instagram and then logged out of my account for the last time. I didn't have a Twitter at that point, I didn't have a TikTok and I left Facebook long ago.

So for me it was a lot about leaving Instagram. But, yeah, I left and I launched my business and I was just like living my life and people kept asking me how did you leave social media? Like, is it okay? Did it work? Like, what's going on? Are you alone in the universe?

because you left social media yeah, and I'm like I'm great, I'm like live my life out here in Nebraska Hanging out, but because I got all those questions, I decided to start off the grid to start answering them, because everyone was getting like I got probably I would say like six to 12 emails from friends asking me about it and I was like that's enough people who want to know that I'm going to take a chance and just start this show, and I think the first five episodes are really me unpacking, like why I got on there, why I needed to leave, how I left and how I think other people can do that as well, and the response has just been now, at the end of season two, like pretty phenomenal.

Like people at this point, I think, really want to step back from these platforms, really want to immerse themselves in their own lives, but they don't want to sacrifice having a successful business or podcast or art practice by doing so, and so I'm trying to help, like we're all co-creating how to do that together, and it's been really exciting work.

0:33:02 - Harry Duran

So where are you now, current day we're recording this, october 2023. And what's your relationship with socials and, curiously, also how it relates to any promotional work you think about doing for the shows and the work that you do for clients as well.

0:33:18 - Amelia Hruby

Yeah, so I'm still off social media. You could go find my old account if you like. It's at Amelia Joe-Frube on Instagram. There is an Instagram page for softer sounds, but I don't log into it and some people have followed it, but there's nothing there for them.

I think that, in terms of how I promote my own work and help clients promote their work, I mean I certainly have plenty of clients who are on social media and we make social media graphics for them. I'm not in the business of forcing anyone off social. Just because it was the right decision for me doesn't mean it's the right decision for everyone. But in terms of how I promote my own work without social media, which is what people really want to know, I'm very active on email. I have different email lists for different aspects of my work.

I do a lot of podcast, guesting like this or collaborating. Luckily, in my work I meet a lot of podcasters so I get to be on their shows, have them on my shows and I also really do a lot of relationship marketing and networking. I'm really big on connection calls and meeting people and I've just launched a membership platform through Off the Grid to try to meet more listeners and connect with them virtually but face-to-face. That way, because I think that for me, actually building that network, that community, having those relationships, is what has helped the work go the farthest, because some of the people in my network have very large audiences and have been like, gracious enough to share the show and share the leaving social media toolkit and you know that can lead to like dozens, or in one case even like hundreds, of new people finding out about the show from them, sending like one email, and so I like really try to take care of relationships so that those opportunities arise organically, and that's been like a really powerful growth avenue.

0:35:06 - Harry Duran

So, in terms of maintaining that network, typically a lot of folks do that, and with something like LinkedIn, because of, like, the business nature of that platform. But I imagine you're not on there either, so is this all happening through email, these just maintaining and fostering these connections?

0:35:20 - Amelia Hruby

Yeah, pretty much. I guess I do have a LinkedIn. I don't really use it. Sometimes I see people tag me in things I just like to share, because sometimes people want to like gotcha me. They're like but I saw you and I'm like this doesn't matter, like I don't have my time here, it's not really relevant to me. But yeah, it's a lot of email, it's a lot of zoom calls.

I also really love this app called Voxer that allows you to send voice messages. I do that. All of my clients have Voxer access to me, and then a lot of my just like business friends as well, and so we'll just chat and catch up there, which I found really effective for staying in touch over time. And I also really love like for anyone who wants to do this themselves. I love this woman named Michelle Warner, her work. She has a sort of system for growing and maintaining your network and it's based off of kind of you sending a different type of email every day of the week and so I'll send you the link for that so we can include it in the show notes.

I've had her on off the grid. It's really fantastic for anyone who's like I don't really know how to grow my network and even when I do, I don't know how to keep in touch with people Like it's exactly what Michelle's networking that pays program is about. And it's relatively affordable. The free webinar she has will basically teach it to you. And then, if you take the course, you get all the templates and everything else. So I highly recommend that if you want to go down this path. It's been really helpful.

0:36:41 - Harry Duran

Yeah, that'll be interesting because I think people want the connection and I think what they're realizing with social that it's not the meaningful type of connection and obviously everyone just posting their best IG moments on these channels. And so I think I'm managing my relationship over the years as well, and I've actually returned to Facebook, but in a way where I'm just posting, like almost journaling, my story of like what's happening, the highs and the lows, and I've been sharing stuff that's very in the past would have been vulnerable for me. So I think it's interesting to see that there's some people getting that feedback. But I can totally understand how it can just be all consuming. Especially you're producing shows for clients. You know that's top of mind for me, so I'm conscious of like doing my best to get their shows promoted and you have to be in the social world to do that or no, or keep up with what's happening there. So you know it feels that sometimes like you're on the hamster treadmill a lot.

0:37:32 - Amelia Hruby

Yeah, and I think that's something that's really been a benefit to me that I understand not everyone can do, which is that I did leave social media. I talk about it a lot and so the clients that come to softer sounds tend to at least be like open to questioning the role of social media and their work. And I've had some people come who really like they want to have a podcast. What they really want is to have like 20 reels for each episode and all of that, and you know they're just not a good fit for us, but there are tons of other studios out there who will make that type of content with you and that's okay.

Honestly, I'm trying to help my clients make less content, but make more resonant content, more impactful content, more unique content, because, speaking to like our earlier part of the conversation, like I'm tired, I don't enjoy when I show up for an interview and I realize I'm in like a content mill and it's just like so impersonal and I don't want any of the shows I work on to ever feel that way, and sometimes that means we have to like slow our process down or take a step back.

0:38:30 - Harry Duran

But like I'm really invested in making more intentional content in podcast episodes, in newsletters, on blog posts, and I'm trying to help my clients do the same, so I'd love for you to share, maybe, if there's one or two kind of tips that come to mind in your conversations with your clients, or is there something that you see as a trend not a trend, but just something that you're always reminding them of, or a consistent pattern or something that they come to you and you're always like okay, I keep having to remind my clients of this, especially as new podcasters. I'm always curious for people that are in production business, like what's at like top of mind tip or guidance for new podcasters that they should be aware of as they're getting started with their show in terms of coming across as more genuine?

0:39:16 - Amelia Hruby

Yeah, so I think that something I'm always reminding my podcasters is that you have to take care of yourself in this process, and I mean that in a lot of different ways. So one way is like literal physical care, like if you're sick, your voice won't work well and then you can't make your show, and it really like we can get so disembodied in our work habits that we forget you know you're like well, even now I'm like, oh, I'm a little sick and I'm recording this.

But you're like, oh, I can sit on my computer and like write my newsletter while I'm sick who cares?

But then you go to record your podcast and you sound like a frog the whole time and you're like, oh yeah like actually we have to take care of ourselves and this process and I think I think, because right now we're kind of entering flu season, that's top of mind, because I'm getting it from a lot of people who are like I can't, we have to take a break because I'm sick which leads to like a second point which I think is, I'm always giving people permission to take breaks, which?

is really hard for people who run weekly shows Like it really feels like a failure point to have a week without an episode.

In terms of newer podcasters they're probably not at that point yet, but something I'm always saying to them is that the process of launching your first episode is a big, beautiful feat that I want to support you with. And then it's like a whole other thing to keep going in the ongoing way, and so I will often get people who like really want to like get that first episode out, and I'm always pulling us back. I'm like all right, I need us to have like at minimum four episodes done before we go live, because it's gonna take you time to shift gears from like here's my launch, it's the first time. Great, I finished my launch. Now it's done Into like oh, now I'm doing this thing. That's kind of never done. Like I'm always helping them.

I think to be a good podcaster, you have to be able to work ahead and stay present with your episodes that are going live, and that's really hard for some people like really hard, and I've noticed that and for those people, I encourage them to have a slower cadence. I'm like, if you can only work on the episode that's gonna go live and share it, then we gotta move to like bi-weekly or even monthly so you can be present.

Otherwise, you have to have the capacity to like see ahead and stay with what your audience is getting as they're getting it, and so I just really think for podcasters, it's a lot about pacing and like we really have to learn what our pace is, how we can pace and people don't anticipate that when they launch a show, and so I'm always helping them navigate that as we enter the process, and some of that is the permission to take breaks, the permission to slow down, and some of that is also like speeding up together and like realizing oh wait, I do have the capacity for this. I'm so excited, I wanna like sprint through it and we can do that, but then also we get tired and we need to take a break, because you can't sprint forever if you have a human body like mine or anyone's human body, it will eventually stop sprinting.

So, yeah, I guess that's what's coming to mind in terms of, like, taking care of yourself so you can make a more genuine podcast, especially as you're getting started. I guess I'm kind of just telling you what's ahead in your journey.

0:42:24 - Harry Duran

Podfading is a real thing.

0:42:27 - Amelia Hruby

It is. Yeah, I'm trying to work on a sort of like manifesto about sustainable shows, like making them sustainably, not like eco sustainability.

But, like I've really just been noticing with a lot of my clients, like we're all burnt out, like they're burning me out by trying to make more content. I'm burning, like their show is burning them out in the process, and I think we need like a reframe on podcasting and what expectations we have for ourselves and our show and what expectations our audience have for us, so that, like we can keep making these shows, because I've lost a couple of really great shows over the past year because they just couldn't make them anymore and it makes me sad for like, not for me, like my business is fine. It makes me sad because they were really good shows and like I wish they still existed and had the energy to keep going and I respect that it wasn't the case. But I want to see less of that in the industry, not more of it.

0:43:23 - Harry Duran

It's such a helpful reminder just to take care of ourselves, because without our voice and without our health, we don't have a show right.

We are the point person for this show and we're the transmission that's happening. If we're not taking care of ourselves with our health and our mind, and we can't be present for our guests, and then we're not gonna be producing the best that we're capable of. And I think that's such an incredible, helpful reminder for people and just to also just to understand what their pace is and to go at the pace that's comfortable for them. I think it's such a great reminder. I'm curious, amelia, because of you study of philosophy, do you find that you return to that a lot? Or how is that colored, like sort of like the lens through which you see and live your life?

0:44:08 - Amelia Hruby

I don't think of maybe like philosophy or philosophers or philosophies, very often like specific things, but what I have, what I'm learning it's taught me, is that I'm an incredibly critical thinker and I'm really able to kind of assess trends or things that are happening and have like unique insights and see ways and then also have those, take those insights and kind of convert them into like frameworks that non-philosophers can understand. So in the context of off the grid, I'm able to do like a 20 minute episode, like my very first episode of the show was like three myths about social media for small business owners, or three myths and one truth. I think.

And in that I was really able to point very quickly to like here are three points of dissonance that you've probably felt with what you've been told about social media and what you've experienced about social media and I can really kind of look at it, I can point those out and I can give this like snappy content framework for it.

And nobody goes to get a PhD in philosophy to be able to do that. Most people just become content marketers. But I got a PhD in philosophy to be able to do that and I think that really I don't underestimate like the power of being a really smart critical thinker in this sort of era of so much AI generated content, so much like SEO, watered down content. You know, so much content is just written for like algorithms and computers and without other people in mind, and I think that I'm really grateful that I spent seven years just like reading really smart people, thinking about what they have to say and then taking apart what they said and critiquing it, and that's really kind of allowed me to do that with things I care a little bit more about than maybe you know, like 17th century German thought.

0:45:58 - Harry Duran

Which makes great for conversational talks when you're with someone or you're at the bar or something it's. I'm sure it makes for very interesting sidebar conversations when you find someone.

0:46:06 - Amelia Hruby

It certainly can when they want to talk about it, but normally nobody brings up like content at the bar but they can't. I could talk about it.

0:46:13 - Harry Duran

Let me tell you about Nietzsche. So, as we wrap this fantastic conversation to a close, I have a couple of questions that I always ask my guests. What is something you've changed your mind about recently?

0:46:27 - Amelia Hruby

Okay, I'm gonna say this and I'm not sure if I've changed my mind. What immediately comes to mind is I think I have sort of changed my mind about Substack. I'm pretty critical of the platform or not of the platform itself. I think it's a great free tool for creators, but I think that their app is basically a social media app, and when Substack builds itself as not social media, I don't think that's true. But I'm about to launch a Substack newsletter with a friend of mine, and so I think I've changed my mind about Substack.

0:46:58 - Harry Duran

Have you looked at Beehive?

0:47:00 - Amelia Hruby

Not from like the signup end, but I just someone just sent me their newsletter and it was on Beehive and I was like, oh, this looks just like Substack.

0:47:07 - Harry Duran

It's. I waffle between both when I have it now personal newsletter at HarryDurandcom, which is sort of just like my free form, kind of maybe a little bit what you're alluding to, just top of mind. It used to be like a marketing newsletter, but now it goes out every Saturday Just like hey, I went to this men's gathering. Hey, I just had a session with my therapist. Hey, I just had a podcast interview. So it's a nice the fact that it's not a lot of pressure to market anything and just talk about my life as like reduce a lot of the overwhelm about what to write about, cause I just think about, oh, how is my week? And sometimes it's a paragraph or sometimes it's a book I read and I just want to deep dive in. So it's got a lot of features that I think are helpful and I've now upgraded to the paid version, so it might be interesting just to experiment with both and to see that they make it a lot of tools that are helpful for creators just getting started, I think as well. Oh, cool.

0:47:57 - Amelia Hruby

Yeah, I get the sense that Beehive has a more marketing oriented like Substack is trying to be like four writers and I think Beehive brings in more traditional email marketing tools, which is. I did a whole episode of Off the Grid on, called to Substack or not to Substack, and my main critique was like Substack's not great for business owners. It doesn't do the things you need your emails to do when you run a business, but like that, not everyone runs a business.

And I think Beehive might be an alternative that is also good for business owners.

0:48:26 - Harry Duran

What is the most misunderstood thing about you?

0:48:30 - Amelia Hruby

Well, people think that because I'm not on social media, maybe I have no social life, which is extremely not true. I have so many friends, I talk to them all the time, I have a very fulfilling social life. It's just not on social media.

0:48:44 - Harry Duran

Let's not get it twisted, as they say. Digital social is very different from like IRL social.

0:48:50 - Amelia Hruby

Yes, exactly.

0:48:52 - Harry Duran

Well, thank you so much for taking the time to come on the show.

Thanks again to Lauren for introducing us. It's always fascinating to hear about all the different things that are happening and, as much as I'd love to stay on top of all the cool podcasts and listen to all the podcasts as you can relate to, there's not enough time in the day, right and so I really treasure these opportunities to slow down and spend an hour with someone and just go deep on just learning about them, their shows, and get them and get my listener inspired to explore new shows and also just learn about things that are happening, like people having conversations about getting off the grid. And it's been fascinating to see the arc of your journey in terms of what you studied and how radio led to the podcast and how you've begun to piece all the things that you've learned, your love for travel, and it feels like everything now has come to bear here in the stuff that you're working on now with the podcast and with your guests, and I just love the opportunity for you to share your story with my listeners today.

0:49:50 - Amelia Hruby

Yeah Well, thank you so much for having me, harry, and for anyone who listens to this and thinks wow, amelia really had it all figured out and has it all figured out, please know, this story only makes sense in hindsight. When I was living that stuff, I was like what am I doing?

0:50:05 - Harry Duran

This is all so random.

0:50:07 - Amelia Hruby

So I'm grateful that you have been here and have had this conversation with you, and I'm just really glad that Podcast Chucky's exists and that you're out there having these conversations with podcasters all over. So, thanks for having me, Thank you.

0:50:19 - Harry Duran

So I'm curious, as someone who is off the grid where would you like to send folks to connect with you?

0:50:24 - Amelia Hruby

Oh yeah, Well, I have lots of websites so you can find. If you're interested in stepping back from social media yourself, you can find my podcast and our free Leaving Social Media Toolkit at OffTheGridfun. And if you want to learn more about softer sounds, you can go to softersoundsstudio. And if you're interested in my work, you can find me at amilyafrubecom.

0:50:46 - Harry Duran

OK, we'll make sure all those links are in the show notes as well. Thanks again for your time, amelia. We appreciate it.

0:50:51 - Amelia Hruby

Thanks, harry, thank you.