Don’t be Afraid to Make a Change with Maxwell Ivey

And here on this podcast, I am definitely not going to encourage that.

Because you are the only thing that matters.

And what you like, what you don't like, what you love, what you're passionate about, that's what should direct where you take your life.

And so if you want to make a change, make a change.

Or if there's something that comes along that sounds interesting that you feel in your heart is what you're called to do, then nobody says you can't change directions.

And well, I want you to use today's podcast episode as inspiration to give you that fuel necessary to realize you don't have to always do the same thing in life.

You can make a change.

You're in the driver's seat.

It's your life, it's your right.

Welcome to the Lowdown with Kevin Low.

The podcast is shining light on the inspiring stories of ordinary people choosing to live out anything but ordinary lives.

All in the hope that you will be inspired to live out your best life.

Because this life is meant to be lived.

And this podcast is meant to inspire you to do it.

Hey, what's happening?

Welcome back to the podcast.

This is episode 88 here on The Lowdown with Kevin Little, the podcast shining light on the inspiring stories of people like today's guest, Maxwell Ivy, who has chosen to live out in anything but ordinary lives.

Because Maxwell Ivy, he was born into a family of carnival workers.

And he would go on to work in the family business, which you will hear all about.

And then he would go on to do more things, like deciding it was time to start selling equipment to other carnival workers.

And then things just keep rolling for Max, because Max realized that he has a lot of things that he's interested in, a lot of things he's good at.

And so why should he not explore those other opportunities?

Like writing, like blogging, like becoming a published author or a podcast host.

Now, here's the cool thing about Max.

Max is known as the blind blogger.

Because, well, Max, he is blind.

Yes, kind of like me.

So Max acquired this name, the blind blogger.

And so in today's episode, my goal was to unmask the blind blogger and find out who this guy really is.

What I found was a guy with a heart, a guy who lives life to the best of his ability.

Max is one of those guys who you can't help but just smile when you listen to him because you can hear the love in his voice.

You can hear the dedication he has for helping others.

And well, Max, he's just a really awesome guy that I feel very grateful for having the opportunity to meet and to have on my podcast today.

So I wanted to introduce you to Max, but of course, before I do that, I do want to introduce you to the sponsor of today's podcast.

Manscaped is a leader in men's grooming for both above the belt and below.

That's right.

Today's episode is sponsored by none other than Manscaped, a leader in being sure that you are looking good, feeling good, and even smelling good.

That's right, fellas, there's more to be trimmed than just what you go to the barber for.

And Manscaped, they're making it happen with products such as their signature Lawnmower 4.0.

Oh, baby, you want to talk about the most amazing trimmer that has ever been created?

You gotta check out the Lawnmower 4.0.

It makes all those grooming essentials a total breeze.

And oh, it just feels good in the hand.

Here's the deal.

Since you're a listener here on the podcast, you're gonna snag a sweet deal for 20% off and free shipping.

When you visit manscaped.com and use promo code LO.

That's L-O-W-E, all capital letters.

Again, just visit manscape.com and get 20% off plus free shipping using code LO.

L-O-W-E.

And for simplicity, be sure to check out the show notes where a link will be provided.

SPEAKER_01: I grew up in Spring, Texas, which is a suburb of Houston, but at the time was out in the country because Houston had not yet reached this far out from its center.

So I my grandfather actually moved his entire family out the spring when uh he started seeing the crime in Houston in the 70s getting too too bad for his liking, and that was you know 50 years ago.

So he bought a piece of property and moved the whole family out there, and each of the kids built their own house or brought in a mobile home.

And it was so it was uh really kind of a of a self-contained lifestyle, really.

You were with the family two-thirds of the time, you were in school maybe the other third of the time.

So, but I grew up in a family of people who operate traveling carnivals, and I also grew up knowing from about five or six that my vision was decreasing, and you know, would eventually learn that at some point I would lose most or or or all of my vision to retinitis pigmentosa.

But, you know, at five or six it was decreasing gradually.

By the time I entered junior high school, I had a big drop-off in vision, which is pretty common for men with RP.

There seems to be a drop-off in vision when men go through puberty that have retinitis pigmentosa.

So that was when I started using a white cane and going through instruction, orientation, and mobility and learning braille and those sorts of things.

And my vision stayed pretty much constant until I graduated from from high school.

And by the time I graduated from college, it had decreased down to what it is now, which is officially light perception, but which I find easier for most people to understand, I will tell them that I'm totally blind because it just seems to make more sense to most people.

During that time I participated with my family's carnival, working on the weekends, uh helping take care of equipment during the winter.

I have done everything from setting up and taking down rides to selling tickets to working in a food wagon.

The only thing I never did was drive.

I did give directions a couple of times, but I've never drove.

And I during that time I I also became one of the few legally blind Eagle Scouts, graduated from a traditional high school and college, and I worked alongside my family in the family business until my dad's death in 2003.

And I operated kids' games, I did the bookings, and basically we just found a way for me to take part.

And my dad was happy with me doing whatever I needed to do, but he always insisted that at least one family member be there with me if I was uh helping take down or set up the equipment.

So he did not want to trust somebody who wasn't part of the family to look out for my safety.

So that's you know, he didn't mind me lifting a tote, and he just didn't want me to get hurt doing it, you know?

SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.

So, so so let me go back a little bit.

So when when you said that you had found out that you had something wrong with your vision, how did you guys discover that?

Do you remember?

SPEAKER_01: Well, it started with me falling down and running into stuff more often than the rest of the kids.

And I don't know who is whose idea it was to think that that might be vision-related, but they went and had me tested it.

And we had one of the few doctors here in this area who knew what retinitis spignitosis was and knew how to test for it.

So we knew from quite a ways off that I had it.

And that's that's how they discovered it.

The other thing that I think my my dad noticed maybe more than other people did, is I was already starting to have the effects of difficulty going in and out of from light to dark and back again.

SPEAKER_00: Yes.

SPEAKER_01: You know, uh our vision doesn't change, the the eye doesn't open and close as well, so it takes you longer to adjust when going from dark to light conditions.

In fact, that's one of the reasons why my very first memories of Disneyland are not very fond memories, because if you've been to Disney, you know most of those attractions take place in and out of dark places.

So not only do you not know what's happening to you or what's going to happen next, but you can't see it coming neither.

So that was another that was another.

I mean, my favorite my favorite ride was a small world because at the end of that ride it gets really bright and there's a wide open area and there's you know the people singing.

So but yeah, that was another thing that was noticed was uh was difficulty in in changing from light to dark.

SPEAKER_00: Okay, okay, gotcha.

And so with with that type of eye condition, it it's known that basically you you found it young, and then it was told then that to to you and your parents that over time you would lose most of your eyesight.

SPEAKER_01: Right.

Because one of the things with RP is is there's no way to know exactly how drastically it will affect somebody.

I mean, there are people who get to leg with legal blindness and that's the end of it.

There are people who have full-on macular degeneration and their vision goes white, and that's the end of it.

So, you know, you just that's the thing with retinitis pigments.

All they can really give you are the parameters of what's possible, not exactly what will happen.

SPEAKER_00: Absolutely, absolutely.

Now, did did you have uh brothers and sisters growing up?

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I have two younger brothers.

My brother Michael is a year and a half younger than I am, and my brother Patrick is, I think, seven, roughly seven years younger than I am.

SPEAKER_00: Okay, okay.

So I guess, I guess, like, you know, leading into this conversation of, you know, you mentioned that your family, you know, were carnival workers and stuff.

So tell me a little bit.

So, did you guys travel a lot?

SPEAKER_01: Back then, the carnival business was still a seasonal industry.

Nowadays it's a year-round industry.

So we would travel about 40 weeks a year.

And when I was in school, we me and my brothers would stay with a relative until school let out in in early May, and then go back when school started up again in September, but during the summer, travel with the family.

But uh, as an adult, we traveled, like I say, at least 40 weeks out of the year.

Sometimes more if it was a bad year and you had to stay out because you needed the money.

And uh we've we worked primarily in Texas, but we've we operated our rides as far away as Alabama and South Carolina going east, Tennessee and Kentucky going let's let's call it kind of northeast, up to Kansas and Nebraska going straight north, and then as far west would be San Antonio.

So we really didn't go too much west, but generally kind of like uh up and then right, and then kind of like draw an arc along that 90-degree.

Okay.

That's and we worked basically we'd work a we we were always trying to find a better summer route because Texas is pretty well suited with events in in the spring and the fall, but in the summer when it's 90 or 100 degrees and 70 percent humidity and along the Gulf Coast, it's not a lot of events.

So uh we we would go one way for a few years, and if that didn't seem to be working out, we'd go another direction for a few years.

And we never did find a perfect situation, but then we never really had the rides for it because we we generally had seven or eight rides, and we never had the the thrill rides, the adult rides that would bring people in when you were had to set up on a shopping center or a mall parking lot or somewhere where you had to depend on drawing the traffic as opposed to being in an event where the organizers delivered the the crowds to the event.

So considering the rides we had, we did pretty well, but we never did find that perfect place where you know we could go for June, July, and August and and at least, if not make money, at least not go in the hole before the good stuff started to get in September.

SPEAKER_00: Yep.

Yep.

I gotcha, I gotcha.

So now you said you you did that though, you worked basically in the family business until your dad passed away.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, he died in the winter of 2003, January.

And me and my brother Patrick were able to keep the business going uh until 2006 or 2007, when well we finally got to the point we weren't able to cover our insurance premiums for the upcoming year.

So we we joined our carnival rides with my uncle's carnival.

And my uncle Albert, who's since passed on, his son and grandkids are operating his carnival.

They work out of Corpus Christi, Texas, and they travel as far as from Corpus to Nebraska and back every year.

They're they are a year-round carnival with probably 35 rides now, and you know, probably seven figures worth of equipment.

So they are the one yeah, they're the one remaining arm of the Wagner Ivy Kraut Cerber family that used to operate at one time.

I think it was like five carnivals in Texas that were operated by relatives of mine.

So and he's the last one.

Now that sounds cool, but what it also means is that the people that we competed with were our family, and you know how that can be.

SPEAKER_00: Yes, yes.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah.

Matter of fact, back when I was a little more bitter about going, about going out of business and having to cooperate with my uncle, I used to tell people, I go, you know, it's bad enough we have to lose, but why did we have to lose to them?

You know.

There are other carnivals.

I mean, can we find one we're not related to, maybe?

You know, but I've since I've since realized that my life is better for not being in the carnival business proper.

SPEAKER_00: Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: I enjoy helping a few people a year sell sell their used amusement equipment.

I enjoy being an author and a podcaster and now a podcast network owner.

So I I and my my health is so much better because I, you know, I was uh in very bad health, was up over 600 pounds.

You know, I I eventually would have to would find out I had sleep apnea, and I got treated for the sleep apnea.

I eventually had gastric surgery.

So I've been able to address my physical and mental and emotional well-being by not being in the carnival business.

And just think about this for a minute.

I wasn't healthy, my long-term mortality was in danger, and I wasn't getting rich doing it.

You know, most people do one or the other, you know.

They're you know, there are rich people with drug habits, you know what I'm saying?

There are yeah, yeah.

There are poor people who are happy, you know, but I wasn't doing either one of those.

I was doing them both wrong.

SPEAKER_00: So oh my goodness.

So so when you got out of the carnival business, what what did you decide to do from that point?

SPEAKER_01: Right.

Well, you know how they tell authors when you're doing your when you're writing your first book, write what you know.

Well, that's what I did.

I had helped my dad sell our used rides because when you have a small family business, a lot of times you, in order to buy something newer, you have to sell something older.

So I figured I could do that.

I figured I could do that as a profession.

So I decided I was gonna do that only to find out that, you know, in 2007, which was really the very beginning of this, in order to really be an equipment broker, you had to be online.

So I'm deciding I'm gonna start the Midway Marketplace, which is the name of the website.

It's Midwymarketplace.com.

And I realized I don't know the first thing, and I've got to learn a whole bunch of new things.

So over the course of the course of about three years, let's say, because I'm still learn learning and relearning some of these things, but this is just a few of the things I had to figure out a way to do over the say from 2007 to 10 or so.

I had to teach myself how to hand code HTML because there is no what you see is what you get for a blind guy.

You know.

I had to figure out what to charge people, how to get people to list their equipment with me.

I had to decide what fees they were gonna pay.

I had to manage the media they were sending me.

You know, eventually social media comes along and I got to figure out Facebook and LinkedIn and Twitter.

I started a blog because people said you've got to have a blog if you're gonna have a website.

You know, I started recording some videos.

I built an email list before I even knew what an email list or a lead magnet was, but I did them because I because I knew that I needed, I mean, I I basically just said, okay, Max, this is the problem you have to solve this week.

Now, what works for Max?

And so, you know, I built an email list.

The the email list and the lead magnet was basically because my business model is I don't want to add something on top of your price.

I don't want to charge you a fee just to just to list the equipment.

I want to get paid when you get paid.

But most people didn't want to do that.

They wanted to list their equipment on free sites that had sponsorships.

So they want to know why I should take my equipment that's on a site where people can see it that doesn't cost me nothing, and put it on a site where you're gonna get 10% of my money if I sell the ride.

And so I had to get figure out why, well, what am I gonna do to get people to open my emails?

And I finally figured out, well, I got to give them a reason.

So I noticed that a lot of people really hadn't started using the internet yet.

So I started searching the web and I would find directories of carnivals and amusement parks and party rental companies, and I would add links to their businesses on my on my website, and I would send them an email and I'd say, look, I just added this link to my website.

It's gonna make it easier for people to find you.

You may even get some business from it.

All I ask in return for this to stay on my website is for you to agree to get one email a week from me.

And that worked.

Wow.

You know, I've built an email list with thousands of people on it, and and quite often new listings came from people reading the email about the current listings.

They would go, well, yes, you know, so it was one of those things.

I didn't know what I was doing, I did not understand what an email list or a lead magnet was.

Okay.

I just did it because it made sense.

You know, so those are so many, you know, so many things I had to learn how to do in order to be an equipment broker.

And of course, if you're a blind guy, if people think they generally refer to you by whatever it is you do or whatever your talent is, because we're rarely, there are rarely groups where there's more of one of us in that particular group.

We are usually it, you know.

So so people started calling me the blind blogger on LinkedIn.

And when and after a while, when I decided I wanted a new website, they said, Well, you we've been calling you the blind blogger for a while, so you ought to go ahead and see if that's available.

So I ended up at the blindblogger.net is my website.

But the the thing is, is, you know, I was doing all these things and basically not really thinking about it.

I was just like, Max, you've got to do this, so do it.

Basically, the the same way we used to approach every week in the carnival business.

And people started noticing, and they said, you know, Max, we'd love to hear more of what it's like to be an entrepreneur who happens to be blind.

And so I started this other website where I do share, you know, my experiences, some of them from my past life as a carnival owner.

If I can find stories that I don't have to worry about a statute of limitations being involved.

And, you know, some stories from my past as an author or a speaker, because I things tend to happen to me when I go places or do things that I haven't done before.

So, you know, I basically just tell stories and And and point out what I think the important lesson from those stories are.

And that is what I do at the blind blogger.

And people, you know, they're very encouraged by it.

And the main thing that people compliment me on about the blind blogger, well, two things actually.

One is they compliment me on how honest I am that I will share things that they don't think most other people online will.

And I tell them I just don't know how to censor myself.

And if I ever do figure out how to censor myself, it probably won't be as much fun.

But the other thing is, is people will say, you know, Max, if you can do this stuff, then what's my excuse?

You know, so I I've enjoyed having the blog.

I loved writing in junior high school.

They beat the fun out of it in high school and college, but eventually I came back to it as an entrepreneur.

And so I love, I love the writing.

And having the blog lets me, like I say, I share these experiences.

And, you know, sometimes I make people laugh and sometimes I make them cry, and sometimes I make them think.

SPEAKER_00: Yeah.

I love it.

Absolutely love it.

So then, so then what made you then transition from blogging doing the to podcasting?

SPEAKER_01: Right.

Well, I still do write some blog posts either for my website or other people, but podcasting was actually something that started before the blind blogger, and it started kind of a backwards sort of way.

I started doing podcast interviews in 2013 to promote the Midway marketplace.

My first show was on Blog Talk Radio for a guy named Brian, Brian the Hammer Jackson, who I'm still friends with now.

He did a small business roundup on Friday mornings, and I went on his podcast.

My first experience on his podcast was horrible.

We got disconnected twice.

He goes, hey, he goes, hey, Max, what's wrong?

Are you blind or something?

And I say, well, yes, I am.

And that leads to about 60 seconds of just total silence.

Now, for anybody who has no experience with live television or live radio, you should know this.

The only thing worse than profanity is dead air.

So it's the worst thing.

You know, getting your signal docked down is better than dead air.

So uh finally I started laughing about it, and he laughed about it.

And we we had a good conversation from then on.

I end up ended up going on his show every Friday morning for about six months promoting the Midway marketplace.

And I've done hundreds of podcast interviews, either as Mr.

Midway or the blind blogger or both.

And I enjoy having these conversations.

But after doing podcast interviews for a while, hosts started saying, you know, Max, you're really great as a guest.

When are you going to start your own podcast?

I'm like, I'm not going to.

It ain't happening because I can't see myself having a conversation with somebody while I'm worrying about the technology and wondering in the back of my mind, is the recording thing actually working?

You know, can they hear me?

You know, what's ending up on tape, you know, or on digital?

You know, I'm so I would tell them, and this is a dangerous thing, I'm going to warn people about this in advance.

This is a dangerous thing to do.

I said to many podcast interviewers, hosts, I said, look, if when I find somebody who's willing to just take on the technical aspects of having a podcast, all I have to do is show up and have a conversation, I'll do it.

Three weeks later, Frederick Bai from Montreal, Canada shows up and says, okay, Max, I'll take you up on it.

And we started working together, and he was my co-host.

And he was my co-host for about six months before he finally did the magic feather routine on me and got me to start doing it by myself.

For anybody who doesn't know, the magic feather is from Dumbo when you know the scare, when the the crows, you know, give Dumbo a magic feather and tell him that he he will be okay as long as he has the feather, and then later on they have to tell him well the feather was meaningless.

So Fred Bai did his version of the magic feather and got me to start recording my you know my podcast on my own.

But it really just started, people said, you know, Max, we think you should, we think you'd be good at it.

And then, you know, somebody showing up and making it where I pretty much couldn't say no, because then I would have looked like a chicken if I had backed out at that point, you know.

And then just following the process to the point where, you know, now I do these conversations on on my podcast by myself.

And yes, I'll admit that I could use help.

Unfortunately, most help has this bad habit of wanting to get paid regularly.

So, but you know, but my podcast is is called What's Your Excuse?

And what I've figured out, and that's not that's not the first name, it was originally called Leading You Out of the Darkness, then it was called No Excuses, and finally we settled on What's Your Excuse.

But what I've done is with my podcast, is I lean into my branding, which is there are so many excuses that people allow to keep them from going after their dreams or their goals.

They make up this long list of things that they think they have to know how to do or have to do.

They look at their budget and think they don't have the money, they don't have the time, they don't have the energy, they don't have the talent, they don't have the skills.

And so when I do my podcast pretty much by myself, except for the guest, of course, and I put my content out there without editing it much, and you know, I basically share myself with the world pretty much unedited, authentic.

To me, that fits in with my brand.

Now, you know, if if I were more of a business podcast, maybe that brand wouldn't work, but it's worked so far.

And what I'm finding out is that if more people understand that a podcast doesn't have to be heavily edited or scripted, it doesn't have to be perfect or anywhere near perfect in order for you to grow an audience, then I remove those excuses that keep somebody from ever pressing record, or if they've pressed record, the excuses that are keeping them from publishing their content and putting it out in a world where people can benefit from it.

So I, you know, so I don't edit.

I basically just let it all go out there.

And so far it's it's worked for me.

And in fact, some of my most highly responded to content has been the stuff that I screwed up.

SPEAKER_00: No, that's awesome.

I love that.

I love that.

And and I love to like I love just your whole principle behind it of just keeping it real, you know, and and making it like life, where life isn't perfect, it isn't scripted, it's just it's real, honest conversations.

And and honestly, that's what I think the appeal of podcast is to me, is the fact of it's not listening to something that's highly produced, it's listening to just real conversations that people are having.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I agree with you.

And uh the research backs it up.

The last uh up until COVID, I had attended Podfest, uh, which is a international conference for independent podcast hosts in in Orlando Ford.

I had attended it twice and went to the seminar both times on uh podcast statistics from uh I think the gentleman was from Spotify or somewhere, but they they put up the statistics and they found that they found two things that I remembered because they were important to me.

One was the most downloaded shows on average are not the 15-minute or the 20-minute or the less than 30-minute.

The average time of the highest-rated shows was somewhere around 47 or 57.

It was was much higher than I expected it to be.

And they said basically that's because those hosts decide they're going to tell their story.

And if the story needs 20 minutes this week and 90 minutes next week, they're going to be good with that because they're just going to they're going to give the story the time it needs to tell itself.

And that was one thing I thought was important.

The other thing was is they found that people who script their shows and record multiple shows in advance of releasing are much less likely to succeed because they don't give their audience the opportunity to participate in the growth and improvement of the show.

So, like if I record 12 episodes, that means it's three months before, even if even if the audience says something I like, it's three months before I'm going to be able to implement their advice or suggestions to make the podcast better.

So that's another thing that I took from those statistics.

But the thing I really love about lately, the one thing I love about COVID, I that I really hope is is freeing a lot of potential aspiring podcast hosts is watching all these big time TV and radio stars having to suffer through not having a hundred people and millions of dollars of technology.

Ain't that fun?

SPEAKER_00: That's right.

That's right.

Oh my gosh.

So today, you know, you you you've had like this really, like to me, really cool story that you shared with us.

And and so I guess I'm wondering, you know, today that you're you're doing the podcast, and then I'm assuming that, you know, as much joy as you have doing the podcast is is helping and teaching others and getting them podcasting like you were talking about.

I was wondering, like, could you give me an example of of either some of the people maybe that you've been working with helping start their own podcast, or maybe even just, you know, somebody interested in listening to your own podcast, like what kind of guests that you've had on, like what kind of stories they can expect.

SPEAKER_01: All right.

So we'll start with the second question first.

My podcast and what they can expect from it.

I love having conversations with people who have overcome adversity.

That doesn't necessarily mean disability, but sometimes it does.

I enjoy people who have thrived in spite of life's circumstances because it seems like there are lots of people who come from horrible beginnings who end up being amazing people.

And I like to try to figure out how that is and maybe share that with my listeners.

I love people who have gone out on their own and started unusual, unique businesses because I've had to do that myself a couple of times.

And then there are people who are just Max is interested in or inspired by.

So if somebody I'm curious about, I will reach out to them and ask them to be on the podcast.

Or if somebody reaches out to me and their story is something where I'm like, yeah, I got to find out more about that story, then I'll have them on.

I warn my guests, and quite a few people in my audience know this now.

There will be at least one point in every episode where Max is going to ask a question, if not a series of questions, that Max personally wants to know the answer to.

And he just hopes that his audience also wants to know the answer to.

That's Max's hope.

Okay.

So those are those are things people can expect on the podcast.

And I've been trending more towards people with disability lately, mainly because I feel like as the the main show or the name show for the the new What's Your Excuse podcast network, that my show needs to be better, a little more focused.

Don't worry, people, I'm not gonna go corporate on y'all and you know, and and just go all over to the dark side and hire a producer, an editor, a show.

No, no, I'm not gonna do that stuff.

But as the name host for the network, I felt like maybe I should be focusing a little bit more on people with disabilities or those who support people with disabilities.

So that's that's my podcast.

Now, as far as people who I've helped, we were talking about one of them before I came on here, Emily Trapagnier, blind snowboarder from Vancouver, whose goal is to first get the International Paralympic Committee to recognize blind downhill snowboarding alongside paraplegic downhill snowboarding, and then be the first gold medalist in the event.

So she's hoping for she was hoping for 20 for 22.

That obviously isn't going to happen.

So now she's hoping for 26.

And her podcast is called Shredding for Gold.

And quite honestly, she's done a great job handling the technology, reaching out to guests, having ideas for shows where she records her thoughts or shares information with people that they would like to know.

She's done really good at that.

And the other thing that uh she's been really helpful with is just really all I have to do is get the audio from her to the podcasting platform.

She is um, you know, very self-sufficient, which I shouldn't be surprised considering that she's a highly trained Paralympic athlete.

But um there was something else I was thinking about with uh with Emily.

Oh, yeah.

The hardest thing that me and Emily had was coming up with a name for her podcast.

That was our that's our that was our hardest job because we couldn't come up with nothing.

And finally she was looking in the dictionary one day and she found the definition for the word shredding, which she's a snowboarder, and shredding is a common term in snowboarding, skateboarding, and surfing.

But as it applies to snowboarding, shredding means performing at a high level of excellence while competing on difficult, challenging terrain.

And so she decided shredding was a great word, and since her goal was the Paralympics, it ended up being shredding for gold.

And so she's been going for about three and a half months now.

We're gonna have a new episode out from her today.

I don't think that her show is going to be a every Monday show for the next couple of months because she has to balance her work as a special education teaching assistant, the gym training to keep her body ready, and then the actual on the snow on the hills training.

But, you know, we've had a we've had a great thing.

The other thing we learned is that Max stinks at virtual podcast launches.

So if if if I'm going to help anybody in the future, Emily Tripagne is now the podcast launch party planner for the What's Your Excuse Network.

SPEAKER_00: Right.

SPEAKER_01: She has volunteered to take that job on.

She enjoys a good party, even if it's just, you know, an online party.

And I just have trouble with the technology sometimes, especially the live technology.

And uh, but she enjoys decorating her apartment, decorating, uh, you know, dressing up the dog, getting, you know, just getting all, you know, just making a party of it.

So, but that's one person I really enjoyed working with.

I've had a lot of great conversations with people, but even after I address many of their fears, it's still there's still a lot of people who will talk themselves out of starting a podcast.

But there's one guy in particular I spoke to recently who I'm going to share because I think he will eventually join the network, but because of an idea I had for him that I think would be helpful to a lot of people out there.

So here's the thing a lot of people have a YouTube channel or a TikTok channel or an Instagram profile where they post video, but they don't think of it as a podcast.

So what I was I was talking to this guy's name is Paul Maganga, and his organization is called Disability Sausage Media, and he's wanting to do podcasts about uh accessible technology, advocating for people with vision loss, topics that quite a few podcasters in our community address.

But, you know, considering he's from Africa, his take will be a little different.

But here's the thing he's already recorded 12 podcast episodes, except he didn't think about them as podcast episodes until I talked to him about it.

I said, you know, there's no reason you can't download that video, or you can't, if the video is still on your laptop, that you can't rip the audio from that video, create a podcast account at you know, somewhere.

I recommend blueberry because I have an association with blueberry, and and they are currently sponsoring my podcast and the what's your excuse network with hosting.

So I recommend blueberry, but I'm I'm not fanatic about it.

So but I told him, I said, you know, just rip the audio and we can start uploading that audio, and you have three months worth of content already created.

I mean, then you got three months to work on the other content.

I said, plus, it's been on YouTube, so you've had people have had the opportunity to comment on those videos, so you know whether people are liking what you've done.

It's just a matter of putting it where they can get at it because more people will listen to it on a podcast player or on their wireless devices than will watch it on your YouTube channel.

SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.

No, that's brilliant, brilliant.

Well, that's awesome.

Well, well, Max, man, it's so cool hearing your story.

So cool hearing what you're up to today, especially now with the with the podcast network.

It's just really awesome.

Any any plans for the future, or just kind of uh seeing seeing where uh all of this takes you?

SPEAKER_01: Well, I try not to think too much about the future because I've learned throughout my life that quite often God has bigger plans than I do.

When I started this network, or when I said I was going to start this network about a year and a half ago now, when I was uh pitching the Holman Prize Committee, I really didn't know that it would ever happen.

And and I actually had no idea what the response would be to it if and when I did start.

I was shocked last year to see all the social media responses to my pitch video where I where I outlined what I hope to do with the network.

I've been surprised by the response from people who are not creating new podcasts, but are allowing me to add their podcasts to the WyExcuse.com website.

I'm hoping more people will find these people's work on the website by connecting us all together.

I'm also hoping to create a sense of community where we can promote each other and support each other and hopefully grow towards monetization for those who are interested in it.

So the the network, I've been really surprised.

I have gotten emails from people who they're, like I said, allowing me to include their content, and you would think I was curing cancer or something.

I mean, it's like my basic plans for the the web for the network are to create community among people with disabilities and those who want to support us.

Or as as you wrote in your email, stakeholders in the industry or in the community, I want to help people gain more exposure for their content because if people don't hear these conversations, they can't be changed by them.

I'm hoping more of these people will monetize as a result.

I'm hoping that we can eventually get sponsorship deals based on pitching larger companies to promote their product or service to the entire network.

I'm hopeful that there's going to be a book at some point based around the stories of the people who are on the network.

And I wouldn't be much of a network owner if I wasn't hoping that someday they'll there will be a conference, either virtual or in person, to celebrate the community of people with disabilities who have podcasts.

And that's the thing.

There are lots of us out here.

You know, I still get questions from sight of people about, you know, Max, it must be hard to get.

I can only imagine what it's like to be a blind guy with a blog or a podcast.

There are still people who ask those kinds of questions when I talk with them.

But me and you, we both know there are hundreds, if not thousands, of us out here.

It's just nobody or very few people know of us because we're all trying to get our audience on our own.

So I'm really hoping that we can combine our efforts, we can promote each other's content, we can support each other emotionally because there are going to be those days where we're like, man, my downloads ain't where they're where I want them to be.

I might quit, I might quit, you know.

So emotional support, financial support, and uh who knows, maybe creative.

Maybe in the future, when somebody wants to create a new podcast and they want to do an interview-based show, I will be able to say, You want to do an interview-based show?

No problem.

I got 37 people I can hook you up with.

You're good for the next year.

Just show up and start pressing record.

SPEAKER_00: Awesome.

Awesome.

I love it.

I love it, Max.

I love all your ideas for the future, dreams for the future.

And and you know, though I I agree with what you said right at the beginning of that question was trying to not focus too far ahead because uh we we we don't know where life's gonna take us.

We don't know what big plans God has in store for us.

And the most, I think the most important thing is to focus on making the most out of right now and just seeing how life, you know, goes and and what path we go down.

SPEAKER_01: So I mean, this is 2022.

In 2003, I didn't know what I was gonna do with myself.

In 2007, I thought I was gonna be an equipment broker for the rest of my life.

In 2013 or 14, I found out, well, maybe I'm going to be a blogger or a coach for the rest of my life.

In 2014, I wrote my first book.

Well, maybe I'll be an author.

And, you know, in 2015 or 16, I started my first podcast.

So maybe I'll be a podcaster.

I have been an online media.

Media publicist.

I am a storytelling motivational speaker.

I keep hoping that I have found that one thing that combines everything I've done up to now that's going to allow me personal satisfaction and financial reward as well.

And I really believe that this podcast network could be that thing, especially as it will still have to incorporate some of the things I've been doing, like training people to be great guests, booking people on podcasts because that generates income for me to sustain me and the network.

You know paid speaking, the next book, the next and who knows?

I've I have a friend who has challenged me to continue the songwriting.

So who knows?

Maybe a year from now we'll be talking about an album.

Oh my goodness.

You know, it's uh Yeah, I know.

There's a guy, and his name is Casing right now.

He wrote a book called The The Four Zone, uh, the he calls, I think the book is called The Zone of The Zone of Genius.

And he breaks life down into four zones.

And after I read his book, uh he breaks it down into the zone of incompetence, the zone of competence, the zone of proficiency, and the zone of genius.

And the sad thing is, is I'm either blessed or cursed with too many things that fall into the zone of competency.

There are too many things that I have figured out a way to do over the years to the point that, you know, I have to a lot of times I have to just go, no, Max, you can't do that now.

Don't do that now.

But, you know, I'm I'm easily distracted, uh, and that can be a good thing or a bad thing.

It was uh it was a good thing last summer when a friend of mine challenged me to write a song, and I wrote my first song called If You Don't Ask.

So it's uh as you say, the best thing we can do is to be in the moment, to have faith, or to have that faith in uh in the universe, if that's your thing, and really to just continue to show up.

And if you one of my favorite quotes that I've picked up in the last few years came from Elizabeth Gilbert, who everybody knows as the author of Eat Pray Love, but she's been a working freelance author for years, and even after that book, she had to continue working.

And she likes to say that curiosity will carry you through when passion deserts you.

So I find myself either blessed or cursed with the ability to have curiosity in a lot of things.

SPEAKER_00: Yes, absolutely, totally love it.

Well, well, Max, man, once again, thank you so much for for taking the time out of your day to to be a guest here on my podcast.

And um, you know, I can't wait for everybody to check out your own podcast.

I will be sure that links are left in the uh episode show notes.

And anyways, Max, just thank you.

SPEAKER_01: Well, thank you so much, and I'm looking forward to the you know the time down the road here where I'm gonna have you on my podcast.

So people can be looking forward to that as well.

And uh I just want to make sure I I I like to make sure I don't forget this.

I started doing podcast interviews in 2013, as I mentioned earlier, mainly because I didn't have a way to leave the house and meet people face to face.

So without people like you, there really it wouldn't have been a the blind blogger or Mr.

Midway or this whole what's your excuse thing.

So I just want to make sure you understand that you have and are an important part of my story and an important part of my journey because without you and the opportunity to spend some time with you and you know be overheard by your listeners, there I really couldn't keep doing this.

So thank you.

SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.

Well, you're most welcome.

Max, pleasure to get to talk with you today.

And for you listening today, I hope that you have enjoyed just uh another awesome guest here on the podcast.

Max, as you see, he's kind of done a little bit of a whole lot of things and in really stumbling at the ball.

And and I don't know, I can only imagine where where the future leads this awesome guys.

So as always, I hope you have taken something away from today's conversation that will positively impact your life, making tomorrow a little bit better than today.

And the slowdown with the low.

I hope today's episode inspired you, motivated you, and excited you to get out and enjoy life.

No matter what obstacles that may be standing in the way.