An Announcement

Hey Feel Good Fam, I have something to share with you in this short & sweet episode!

And it’s a little announcement about the podcast.

We’re also talking about bringing the feel good mindset to your pressure for productivity and unpacking some key FGE concepts.

Like perfectionism, all-or-nothing thinking, comparison, gratitude and the striving mindset.

Let’s make it happen! 

Here’s a glance at this episode

• [00:58] My quick announcement about what to expect from the podcast 
• [03:37] Unpacking social media algorithms, perfectionism, pushing for productivity and normalizing taking breaks.
• [07:00] Get a look behind the scenes of what it takes to publish an episode weekly
• [08:37] How to make values-based productivity decisions
• [11:00] How to apply the feel good mindset to productivity

Links Mentioned in this Episode

Join the Good List

Get the Feel Good Effect Book

Read the Transcript

Robyn Conley Downs: (00:01)

You’re listening to the Feel Good Effect. Hey, I’ve got something to tell ya. Let’s make it happen.

Robyn Conley Downs: (00:09)

Radically simple and ridiculously doable. The feel-good effect will help you redefine wellness on your terms. Hi, I’m your host, Robyn Conley Downs. And I believe that wellness isn’t about achieving another set of impossible standards, but instead finding what works for you, drawing from cutting-edge science on mindfulness habit and behavior change. This podcast offers a collection of small mindset shifts that allow for more calm, clarity, and joy in everyday life and allows you to embrace the idea that gentle is the new perfect. I invite you to listen in, as we cut through the clutter and find the small shifts that create huge changes in your life. Less striving, more ease. It’s time to feel good.

Robyn Conley Downs: (00:58)

Well, Hey, feel good, fam. I am so glad you’re here for this short and sweet episode where I wanted to share an announcement with you. I feel like when people say they have an announcement, they’re like two things that people assume that it’s about. And I assure you, it’s probably not what you’re assuming. So I am going to cut to the chase and do the too-long-didn’t-read version of my announcement and then I’m going to tell you why. So I’d love it if you stayed with me while I give you a little insight, because it’s very related to the feel-good effect in the work that I am here to share and to do. So, the too-long-didn’t-read version is that I am taking a sabbatical from the podcast. So that means there’ll be a short break starting next week. And going probably through just before the beginning of the year, my hope is that I come back around the end of the year, going right into January 1st so that we can kind of balance out the new year, new you rhetoric and help you really ground and feel good and use happy habits and healthy recipes to feel good in your life the way it is right now.

Robyn Conley Downs: (01:58)

So that’s close to just under two months off from the podcast. And so I wanted to tell you a little bit about my thinking, why this is happening and how it might relate to something in your life, and then also ways to stay in touch. So, number one, I want to start off by saying that you can stay in touch with us by going to www.realfoodwholelife.com/resources and jump on the good list. So that’s realfoodwholelife.com/resources and sign up for the good list. That is our weekly email, where we send all of the good things. And it’s such an amazing way to be part of this community to get the best and the newest of what’s going on with feel-good resources, from feel-good food, to everything going on with the podcast. You’ll be first to know when it’s coming back. And also we’re going to share a collection of some of our previous episodes to kind of keep you going with the feel-good effect.

Robyn Conley Downs: (02:51)

And honestly, there’s over 215 episodes of the show. Some of you have listened to every episode, but most of us have not. And if you have, there are some gems that I think are so relevant this time of year. So we will curate a list for you if you want to go back and listen to a handful from the archives to keep yourself in the mix. And then, like I said, you’ll be first to know when new episodes are out. You’ll be first to know about new recipes. You’ll be first to know, and we have deals and new products. It will be the first to know about our new free guides. We do a lot of amazing free guides for our community that we only share on that list. So really that’s where I hope you’ll do. I hope you’ll come and join us there and I will stay in touch with you each week.

Robyn Conley Downs: (03:35)

So it will almost be like the podcast isn’t even off the air for that amount of time. So I’ll be honest with you. It’s a little scary to take a break. I want to talk about the thinking behind taking a break and why we need to normalize that in just a second. But all of these platforms, Apple Podcast, Spotify, the internet, like Google, Instagram, they’re running on people’s content, my content and others who, who put it out every single week. And because they are able to monetize content like mine, the algorithm, the engineers who designed these platforms, they really reward you. If you do it every single day or every single week, there are a lot of incentives. And then there’s big punishments if you take a break. So for example, last year I did not post in the Instagram grid for about 11 months.

Robyn Conley Downs: (04:28)

And when I started posting again and I’ve been posting again, I think for about six weeks now, the Instagram algorithm is still not showing my post to most of my followers. And it’s truly a punishment for not posting every single day. Eventually when I worked my way up to being a consistent poster, again, I will be rewarded for feeding the machine and it is what it is. I am fully aware of how this works and it’s the same thing with my website. If I don’t post on a regular basis, I’ll be penalized in that algorithm. Similarly with podcasts, if I don’t post every single week, I’ll be penalized in the Apple Podcast rankings, I’ll definitely fall out of rankings. Um, it won’t show up for, for people to listen to who are new listeners. And so that’s, I’m just going to be honest. That’s uh scary to me.

Robyn Conley Downs: (05:14)

I don’t want all the work to disappear. I don’t want it to fall off the radar. And frankly, I think that 215 episodes is plenty of episodes for people to listen to. So I was worried about taking that break and coming back and having to rebuild sort of what we’ve been building for the last four almost five years. So I want to be honest with you about that. And I do hope that you will be here when I get back and that you will subscribe. So, you know, when the new episodes come and that you’ll join us on, on the good list for the, you know, when new episodes are out. But I really don’t think that that’s a reason to keep doing something and not to honor the need for a break and in a society and in an algorithm.

Robyn Conley Downs: (05:59)

And these algorithms that are built to, to punish rest and to only incentivize the hamster wheel of production. I just, I don’t believe in it, it’s not what I teach and it’s not what I intend to do. So here’s why I’m taking a break. I have hit published on an episode or occasionally reaired an older episode every single week for almost five years. And I think that there’s such a misunderstanding about the side of content creation of how long and how much effort goes into something like a podcast or a blog post or, or running an Instagram account. I think in most people’s minds, it’s like I just sit down and I hit record and it takes me 25 minutes, which is how long you listen and that’s it. And of course that’s 100% not true, depending on an episode, if it’s an interview, there’s booking, going back and forth, finding a guest booking and guests getting something scheduled on their schedule, not mine, usually depending on who the person is, there’s research for the interview.

Robyn Conley Downs: (07:00)

Usually I read the book, record the interview, record the intro and outro. Then we do pretty in-depth show notes. So I actually pay someone on my team to do the show notes. We do a whole blog post. We promote it on all the different platforms. We send it out in the email. So even one episode could take anywhere from five to 10 hours of collective time. And that’s happening week after week after week, that doesn’t take into account any of the other work I do. So I put out at least three blog posts a week and have other projects on the side that are a different part of the business. I have social media accounts. So it’s a lot, it’s, it’s a lot and I have not taken a break ever. And so I’ve produced this podcast through a pandemic with my entire family, working from home.

Robyn Conley Downs: (07:45)

I’ve produced it through surgeries, through the flu, through family crisis, through everything. I’ve kept it going. And I’m always balancing that need to keep producing and keep putting something out against what I teach about, which is the striving mindset of perfectionism all or nothing thinking and comparison. And I’m always making sure that I stay out of striving, that all or nothing thinking, comparison, or perfectionism is not driving my decision-making and my life. And I tell you this because I was there. If you read my book, the feel-good effect, which, oh, I published this while I was writing the book while I was promoting the book. If you read that book, you know that my story in the first chapter is one of striving to always pushing through or completely burning out, putting myself at the end of the list. And I promised myself when I came out of that, when I learned the feel-good effect, when I learned the mindset and the method that I would never go back to that, and I’m always getting tested, right?

Robyn Conley Downs: (08:37)

Like with the job that I have, the constant need to keep going and never miss a day, never miss a week. And all the incentives that are built into that, I have to constantly check. I make sure, like, am I doing this? Because it’s aligned with my values and then aligned with my business goals and aligned with what I teach, or is this a perfectionism all or nothing comparison situation. And when I felt like I needed to take a break, I’ve been feeling that recently, I kept thinking I can’t because I have to, I should be publishing every week. And you know, that I teach when you start running your life with sheds, it’s a one-way street to nowhere. And when I asked what was good, what I really needed, and it was a break, it was a sabbatical so that I could regroup.

Robyn Conley Downs: (09:20)

It’s certainly not a sabbatical from all the other things that fill my time that are part of my day job. And it’s certainly not a break from being a parent or taking care of myself. It’s a break from this corner of things that I realized that’s what I need to, to kind of refresh, restore, get ready for the next, you know, 200 episodes really think about how I can serve you best. We’ve evolved as a listener community. I also know many of you on it connected me and either get coached by me and, or connect with the other people who are listening. You all listen alone, and there you have so much to connect with each other about, so I want to think about a way that we can make that happen. I also in turning my attention to our feel-good effect coaches and the certification that’s coming up in the spring, we are an opening enrollment for our coaches again, next spring.

Robyn Conley Downs: (10:10)

And so I’m taking some time for that. And so really, I want you to know two things. One, we are almost at 2 million downloads. We have hundreds and hundreds of collective hours together, and I do not take your time and your commitment to the feel-good effect lightly. It’s one of the most valuable things I do. It’s one of the ways I feel most connected with you and I will never ever take for granted when I get an email or a DM from somebody who says that this work has changed their life in some small or even big way. Um, I get emotional talking about it. It’s I can’t think of anything more um worthy of my time and legacy to know that even one person has been impacted it’s I can’t explain how much it means to me. And that’s why a break is so important.

Robyn Conley Downs: (11:00)

And then second, I’m absolutely utilizing that feel-good effect mindset, which is in the book, which is what I teach and which I always endeavored to live by. I do not say one thing and do another, I absolutely practice what I preach. And so the feel-good effect mindset is self-kindness, self-compassion, it’s flexible thinking and it’s gratitude. And so when I employed those three things, that way of thinking, it became clear because I was really feeling like, okay, maybe I just need to be done with the podcast. Maybe it’s time for it to end, or I just need to keep pushing myself to do every week. And I know that you listening can tell me right now what the problem with that way of thinking that was all or nothing, black or white, nothing in the middle. And when I just thought about it and use the feel-good effect mindset, I thought, of course, I don’t have to stop and I don’t have to push through.

Robyn Conley Downs: (11:48)

I could take a break. So I used flexible thinking instead of all, or nothing thinking. And I use self-compassion kindness instead of perfectionism, what do I need right now? What is the kindest choice? And by making that kind choice to myself, I will be able to come back and serve you better. And I can tell you from all the experiences in my life, that it’s such a better thing to take a break then to push through until you burn out and quit, unless it’s something worth quitting, but this isn’t that for me. And then that gratitude piece, instead of comparing myself to other people who have never taken a break from their podcasts and bypass 500 episodes, I just have the gratitude of this community. And of being here with people who I think are wanting a different way to, well, who want to feel good without striving all the time.

Robyn Conley Downs: (12:35)

And so that is where I stand. So, like I said, some of you won’t even notice that the podcast is off the air for a little while. Um, if you do notice, please come join us at www.realfoodwholelife.com/resources on the good list. I love to stay in touch with you there. I also would love to be doing more writing and sharing some behind the scenes ways that I’m living the feel-good effect in my life, which I’m not able to do right now, with so many things going on. So definitely invite you to go there. If you haven’t picked up the book yet, and you listened to the podcast, I really think it’s the time I get messages all the time that people are hesitant to pick up the books. They feel like they’re going to have more to do with it after they read it.

Robyn Conley Downs: (13:14)

And really it’s the opposite by reading it, they feel like they have less, less to do. And more things that are important to focus on. It’s also a really great gift as we head into the gifting season. And then if you want to continue to support the show, leave a positive review and subscribe so that when we come back, we don’t lose our momentum and I’ll still be on Instagram @realfoodwholelife. And I have a lot of boundaries and balance there. So I feel good about it, but definitely a way to stay connected there as well. So as always, I want to thank you for being part of this feel-good moment or being part of this community and for living the feel good effect along with me, for honoring a need to rest in a need to take a break and the value in a sabbatical where you can rest recharging, come back for 200 more episodes rather than burning out and giving up. I so appreciate you. Thanks again. I’ll see you on the other side. Here’s to feeling good.

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