Background

Podcasts are still relatively new to me, but given my interest in constant learning and experiencing new things they seem like a great fit. Thus, this month I was to listen to a completely different podcast every day. Jen provided me with a list of recommendations and I will of course went exploring on my own, too. Here we go…

The List:

1. This American Life: Is That What I Look Like?
2. Freakonomics: How to Create Suspense?
3. Stuff You Should Know: How Karate Works
4. Invisibilia: How to Become Batman
5. Mortified: Steve – Gringo of the Year
6. Happier with Gretchen Rubin: The One Minute Rule
7. WTF with Marc Maron: Interview with Barak Obama
8. Planet Money: The Big Red Button
9. #GoodMuslimBadMuslim: No Muslim Is Safe
10. The Thrilling Adventure Hour: #117 – Tales of the United Solar System Alliance, “New Frontiers”
11. Stuff Mom Never Told You: Pole Dancing Beyond the Strip Club
12. Serial: The Alibi
13. Half Size Me: Changing Your View of Beauty with Kaila
14. 99% Invisible: Of Mice and Men
15. The Creative Language Learning Podcast: I’m Not Dead Yet, So I’d Like to Keep Learning
16. The Memory Palace: Dreamland
17. Slate’s the Gist: A Different Stroke
18. The Greater Good Podcast: Kristin Neff on the Power of Self-Compassion
19. NPR – Tell Me More: Inside the Mind of a Sociopath
20. Stuff You Missed in History Class: A Brief History of Harmonicas
21. A Better Life: Law of Attraction: Part 1: Vision
22. Sleeping with the Boss: Emotion vs. Logic
23. Grow the Dream Show: These Top Marketing Trends for 2015 Surprised Us
24. The Mystery Show: Source Code
25. Snap Judgement: Spooked v Innocence Lost
26. The Moth: Diane Kastiel – Triste
27. The Dumbasses Guide to Knowledge: Vagina!
28. Fail
29. Fail
30. Fail
31. BBC World Service: Truth About the Body Mass Index

Successful?

Yes… Jen and I have given ourselves a margin of error of 10%, meaning I was allowed to miss up to 3 days and still pass, which I did! I listened to a completely different podcast each day and there was little rhyme or reason to my choices.

Thoughts on the Podcasts…

There were certainly some which pleasantly surprised me, and others which I felt were a waste of time. Without question, my favorites were:

1. Invisibilia: How to Become Batman… I loved the idea of people overcoming challenges and succeeding by creating high expectations of their abilities. I saw lots of personal applications to this ideas, as well as work applications.
2. Mortified: Steve – Gringo of the Year… A hysterical story and very well told. Simply put, it made me laugh : )
3. Serial: The Alibi… Delightfully addicting. A fascinating story, very well told, and one of the only podcasts I listened to beyond the once off requirement of this challenge.
4. The Memory Palace: Dreamland… Short but super powerful storytelling. Loved all the stories I listened to.