Erin: Welcome to Hotter Than Ever, where we uncover the unconscious rules we've been following. We break those rules, and we find a new path to being freer, happier, sexier, and more satisfied in the second half of our lives. I'm your host, Erin Keating.
Today I want to talk about work and money and getting real about the practical stuff of life. I have been doing and funding this podcast since I conceived of it in the fall of 2022 and launched it in April of 2023. So we're coming up very soon on a hundred episodes, and that feels like such an epic milestone. So I'm thinking a lot about the value of this podcast and the value of the endeavor of hotter than ever overall, and the various incarnations it has taken, the role that it plays in my life and hopefully in your lives, and how I want the idea of hotter than ever to grow, and then realistically what I have to do to get it there. These are not new thoughts, but I am thinking about them in a new, more practical, realistic way.
This podcast has been labor of love, and I am not signing off. I am not quitting. This is not me quitting the podcast or saying anything like that. I am definitely not going anywhere. But how do. There never has been a labor of love. It's been an act of love for myself, a place to rediscover and share my voice with other women and some men who listen and who are struggling with the same things I'm struggling with in midlife, and who are wanting more and more pleasure and more joy and more fun and more self determination and agency. And it makes me feel like I'm a part of the world and part of our collective journey to make and share this podcast with you.
And I am beyond proud of the conversations I've had with these extraordinary women. And to add my voice to this conversation that helps us work through this incredibly weird and shaky time in our own personal histories and also in the culture. It is a weird time to be alive as women over 40 in the United States of America in the year 2024. And for the past almost two years, I have been running and funding this podcast, the Substack, you know, my live shows, all of it out of my own savings. And I don't know what I thought was going to happen when I launched the podcast. Like some kind of magical success that was just going to have me sail smoothly from my super financially abundant corporate life. Really an unprecedented moment in my financial life after having been part of a company that I po'd and blah blah blah, that bought me a house that bought me access to a sort of stable, I don't know, identity, world, life, something. And I thought I would just sort of smoothly sail from that into this role of successful entrepreneur, creator, professional, creative cultural commentator.
As now, I've sort of evolved the vision even further. Now I always think about what Lena Dunham said on girls, where she said, you know, I want to be, if not the voice of my generation, a voice of a generation. She has always been a bit of a muse for me, anyway. I don't know what I thought was going to happen in terms of growing as a business, but I had, and I have a crystal clear vision for a media company that serves us, that tells stories by us, to us and about us, this amazing generation of extraordinary women with extraordinary lives and successes and futures ahead of us that I am so fucking fortunate to be a part of. Looking back, it is amazing to me how kind of cock-sure I was about getting this whole thing going. And the pussy-sure, I don't think that's a real word. It doesn't have quite the arrogance. Vagina-sure, it's not even a thing.
Cock-sure is really, really, when I am critical of myself for my blind optimism, I think, how could you be so cocksure? I don't know what I thought would happen. I am learning about myself that I tend to leap before I look. Once I get a clear vision for something, I tend to run after things. And there's so many people out there who analyze every possible permutation and variation before they pursue something new. But I think things just incubate under the surface for me for a long time. And then when they burst forth, I just kind of chase after them. So apparently I am not the kind of person who thinks in a cautious way about the next steps in my life. I just know intuitively when change needs to happen.
And I know how scared I was, and I know how free I felt when I was first in this new chapter of my life. And I was so determined to make something beautiful out of it. And I have, and I am, and I'm so proud of that. And I felt called to do it, and I still feel called to do it. What a miraculous thing to feel called to something. I feel so grateful for that. I'm even more grateful that I have started this conversation as more and more people around me claim their own freedom in a thousand different ways. And whether that's this conversation about changing how we do relationships, how we do relationship status, how we do love, how we do sex, how we figure out and commit to the lives we want and get what we deserve by taking the time and deep consideration to figure out what we actually want our lives to look like, how we actually want the next 30 years of our lives to feel.
It's all muddy and murky and confusing and hard. But so many of us have spent 20 years investing in a particular way of doing life and particular set of values and aspirations and careers. And in reality, we have been in this moment where everything all around us, underneath us, has been changed irrevocably by technology. And it's changed every aspect of how we live and how we work and how we date. And so many things have changed, and we have been changing, too. The economy has changed, the nature of work has changed, and we are changing and adapting. We are wildly adaptive, this generation of women over 40, we are wildly adaptive, and we are changing in response to it. So my first change was to say, I don't want to be inside of a corporate structure anymore.
I don't want to be harnessing my talents to somebody else's bottom line. Because the structures and the things that we once depended on, every corner of the culture that felt secure and consistent, where if you had a job, you could keep it for a long time and you could have benefits and you could save for retirement. It's not just my industry of entertainment and tech. I know that's not the only place that's changing. Everything is changing, changing, changing. And I preach the gospel of change, right? I believe in getting cool with change and rolling with change. But I also have to face the reality that my finances are changing. And in reality, I am not made of money.
And I've been living on savings and funding this business with savings and some family help. And I still have all the expensive trappings of the life that I procured when I was a corporate girly and I was getting direct deposit paychecks and stocks and all the spoils of participating in this corporate structures. And it was wildly powerful for me to have that kind of success. But I set up my life for the continuation of that success and for a path that I am no longer on. And so I'm facing the reality that I need to pursue other lines of income alongside making hotter than ever. Even though all I really want to do is make this show and write a book and produce live events and make movies and tv shows and podcasts and books and stuff for us that celebrates us and that interrogates this moment in our lives and what is possible for us all. I really want to do every morning when I wake up is that work? But I got to make some more money. And I tell myself all kinds of stories in my head about what that means.
I mean, first of all, there's ego involved, right? I want to look good. I want you to be impressed with me. I want you to think of me as a successful person. And part of me thinks you might think less of me if I tell you how I've making this practical aspects of my life work for the past two years. But part of me feels like if the mission of hotter than ever is to uncover the unconscious rules we've been following, break those rules and find a new path, then I'm just going to break the rule of I'm supposed to pretend like this podcast magically gets made and that I magically have all this money and that everything is so successful and monetized that I don't need to worry. Because God forbid we talk about our underlying financial fears and concerns and realities in this very expensive time we're living in. So I tell myself all these stories about what it means to tell you the truth. And then I decide to tell you the truth.
I've been living on savings and some family help. I've done some consulting work while I've been making hotter than ever. I've written and produced other things and made some money that way. But I'm looking at the reality of being the primary breadwinner for two teenagers in Los Angeles in the year 2024. With a fledgling startup and a lot of ambition and stars in my eyes, I have a vision. I bet a lot of you do, too. A vision for the work you want to do in this world and what you want to say and the change you want to make. I want to share insights and strategies for how to navigate these next 30 years when it feels like the earth is fucking flat and you can walk right up to the edge of it and fall off.
I don't want us to fall off. I don't want to have to make radical changes to my living situation. And I don't want to throw in the towel either. Here's the truth, though. Before I came around to the realization that I need to find investment sponsors and consulting work, the voices in my head were so loud and so fucking mean about the fact that I wasn't an overnight success. I've had a ton of success with this podcast. The fact that you are listening today is an enormous success. The numbers are growing. All the things are pointing in the right direction. But there's a lot of competition out there.
And, you know, I beat myself up and say I haven't been practical enough about how I've been approaching this new chapter of my life and I don't have the right business plan and I didn't pursue this in the right way. And, oh, my fucking God, I mean, the voices in my head can be so brutal. I've heard myself say, how'd you think you were going to make this work, Erin? You don't have any business experience. Which is not true. It's totally not true. But that is what my inner critic wants to say to me.
Oh, you're just being a spoiled princess thinking you could just do whatever you want. And it doesn't matter how much it costs or how long it takes. You're totally impractical and unrealistic. What a brat. That is my inner voice too. Jesus Christ, shut up. I am not free of these voices. They show up differently than they used to and I encounter them with rational responses more quickly than I used to.
You know, the inner voices used to be about how I'm fat and I'm unlovable. That was like the first 40 years of my life. And now they're more about how there's so much I don't know and how naive I've been and how clueless I've been to be so optimistic. I'm so naive. That's what the voice wants to tell me today. Because for whatever reason, we have these inner critics that, like, want to take us down. And I really, really want to counter program against that in my head. And I want to do that by being honest, not exaggeratedly self critical, not running myself down or insulting myself for having had an amazing idea and for it taking the time that it's taking to get out into the world and to be shared with the people who need to hear it.
I don't think it's naive to be an optimist. But at this moment, I am having a bit of a reality check. I am right there with all of you in the figuring it all out part of the journey. And this is the money part, and we all have the money part. We all would do x, Y and Z if the money was endless and flowing, if we didn't have financial obligations, if we didn't have responsibilities, if we didn't have mortgages or marriages or children, you know, or social standing, professional standing. Like there is so much that we have layered into our lives as we've aged and matured and become the sophisticated, incredible creatures that we are today. And so where do I start? This next chapter of the figuring it all out part of the journey? Where I start is, what can I do for work that will pay me money, that will pay me enough money that is commensurate with both my needs and my expertise? What do I know how to do? Who do I know who I'm going to go talk to about consulting work? I know so many people, and I know so many things. I know how to do so many things.
And you know how to do so many things at this point in your life. So let's take stock at what we're good at, the practical things and the intangible things. I'll use myself as an example because I'm the one who's talking and because that's kind of what I do on this podcast. I use myself as an example to spark conversation and to engage people on an intimate level about what's really going on with them. And I am really trying hard not to bullshit you or bullshit myself.
So here's what I'm good at. I'm an expert at making high quality media products in everything from film and tv, scripted and unscripted, mobile, vertical video content, podcasting, and even augmented reality. I can run any creative project. I can lead a team to delivering something great. I can write well. I can speak well and communicate and make people excited and solve complex creative problems. And yes, business problems as well. That's what I do here. That's what I learned to do in my career at a very high level. That's what I've always done. I hold the bar high.
I interrogate and shape a project or an idea until we have a clear vision. I put together the right creative team and deliver something at the end that is aligned with that vision and that everyone involved can be proud of. It feels really good and really fucking embarrassing to say all of these nice, true things about myself. Try this if you're in a similar place, pitch your skills. Try it with a friend. Try talking about what you're great at and how all of the tangible and intangible things that you're great at can help lead you to the next job, the next career opportunity, the next entrepreneurial vision, the next consulting gig. This is one way I'm coming to terms with welcoming new sources of income into my life. And while I am working on getting investors and sponsors locked in, at this point, I'm not quite there yet.
I'm having conversations, and they're happening, and it's meaningful. But I'm not quite there yet, and I haven't found all my people yet. I'm accepting the need to magnetize money to me in a different and secondary way in order to keep this vision alive and growing. And when I step back, I realize I'm up for that. I'm game for that, because I know that whatever comes into my life will come into my life and change me and teach me and grow the skills that will help me grow hotter than ever into what I believe it will be. I really want to say that again. I am looking at myself and working hard to reframe this conversation about needing to find lucrative consulting work as a way to grow myself and my skills, my capabilities, so that everything can roll back up into hotter than ever for you, so that we can continue these conversations in all media, so we can figure out how we're going to do this crazy, uncharted next 30 years of our lives together. I need to talk back to those voices that tell me, just because I don't have hundreds of thousands of listeners, and just because I don't have hundreds of thousands of followers on social media, I am growing something real with you.
And it's big, and hopefully it's going to be all the better and all the more sustainable for this slow growth that I'm having. As much as I want. I always wanted to be a child prodigy. That was such a funny thing to want. But I wanted to be someone who was so successful so early at some specific thing that I could just, like, immediately impress everyone. I'm not gonna be a child prodigy today. I'm 53. I've pretty much come to terms with that, and I'm not going to be a straight out of the gate to the moon Alice like success in terms of the statistical markers of success, within the first year or two of a podcast or a sub stack or a content brand or a new media business.
And that's okay, because I know the change can happen in the blink of an eye. Change can happen so fast. It can also happen very slow. But one thing I know is slow is growth. And if you approach growth organically and honestly, and if you allow progress to take whatever its course is that it's going to take in your life to get you to a destination that is somehow adjacent to what you dreamed of, but that is different than what you dreamed of because we can only envision limited things. What is out there in the universe for us is so much more complex and sophisticated and nuanced and various than anything we can think of on our own. So what my hope is, is that where I go as a result of the journey that I'm on, both personally, emotionally, romantically, professionally, financially, that when I come through to the next chapter, it'll be even better and more aligned with who I need to be in the world. Change can be fast, but growth is slow.
And I keep seeing those fucking memes on Instagram that are like, the fruit is the last thing to grow on the branch of a tree. Like, you have to plant the tree, and then the tree has to grow roots, and then the trunk has to grow, and then the branches have to grow, and then you get the fruit, and it's like, oh, my fucking goddess, I want it now. I want everything now. I just snort. I sound like Veruca salt. I want an oompa Loompa now, daddy, but I don't have a fucking oompa Loompa. And it's better to be like Charlie in the chocolate factory, which is obviously the lesson of the fucking movie. Be earnest. Be yourself. Be sincere. Don't be entitled, don't be a dick. And then Gene Wilder will give you a chocolate factory.
So until my chocolate factory comes, I just want to give myself credit for the fact that I've planted all of these seeds and that I've been watering them for almost two years. What seeds have you planted? What seeds are you watering? What vision of yours is growing green sprouts? You know, I'm almost 100 episodes in, and I am so proud of the quality of the conversations we're having here and the depth and complexity and nuance we get into. And I also know we live in a quick, scrolling, endless feed culture and good things, deep things, complicated things, take time and labor and love to grow. So while we take time to grow hotter than ever, while you tell your friends about this podcast and about these conversations and what they mean to you, if anybody has insights on investments, or if anyone has leads for consulting work or feminist advocacy work, advocacy for women our age, you want me to host something for you? You want me to come facilitate something for you and your organization? Like, I'm fucking down.
I want to show up, and I want to be of service, and I want to make something beautiful at the end of the day, and I want to make things that we're all proud of and that are going to move us all forward into this next chapter of our lives. And for me, whether that just means making enough money to keep the podcast and the business growing while things take root, I'm going to be okay with that I'm still cranky about it, still having a slight internal temper tantrum about how come I can't just do what I want when I want. I know that's not how life is. I'm going to talk to my former colleagues. I'm going to talk to my professional friends. I'm going to pursue opportunities in the way that I normally pursue them, one on one, cultivating conversations, sharing what my value is, seeing what opportunities are out there. But I also thought I'd do something that's out of character for me and that is more vulnerable for me, which is to put it out there to you and say, what do you got? What do you got? Because I suck at asking for help. I bet you suck at asking for help sometimes too.
And I want to come off like I'm so certain and so successful and positive all the time, but it's more important to me to say I'm going through all of this too. I'm making this show about what's going on with our generation of women, and I'm willing to tell the truth so that you will feel free to tell the truth, too.
Thanks for listening to Hotter Than Ever. If you loved this one sided conversation but you found your way into it and could relate to what I was talking about, you can find out more about this and other episodes of the show on our sub stack at hotterthaneversubstack.com, or @hotterthaneverpod on Instagram, or any other social media platform. Comment on our posts. Drop us a note. Let us know how this conversation made you feel and what it made you think.
Hotter than ever is produced by Erica Gerard and Podkit Productions. Our associate producer is Melody Carey. Music is by Chris Keating with vocals by Issa Fernandez.
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