How 5 Years of Podcasting Changed My Life

“Adam, why hasn’t My Food Job Rocks had an episode since November?” Said no one ever. People do miss the show, and I still get comments about the podcast often, but after that interview with Harold McGee, I stopped.

I’m a serial quitter. I quit a lot of things. I quit people, I quit cities, I quit companies (even a company that I founded) and now I quit the podcast. When put through this lens, it sounds like I’m a horrible person.

If I change the story and say “I have a lot of friends, I’ve lived all throughout the United States, I started a company that was able to survive the pandemic, and I made a podcast that has over 245 episodes”, then that perception changes.

Both scenarios are right.

I’ve been fortunate to move to Boston Massachusetts last year and meet a lot of people. I don’t like telling how “cool” I am to some people, but sometimes I do because I’m an egomaniac and people treat me differently when I talk about how important I think I am.

It took me a long time to admit my significance at Better Meat Co but through a lot of reflection, the company would not have existed without me and through telling the story of how it was founded over and over, and working at my new job, I’ve realized that I’ve grown significantly thanks to that experience. It was an interesting low point where I was broke, overworked, stressed and had existential crises because every single day because I felt insignificant to the world (by the way, all of this this was 100% my fault) but as I look back at that experience and now, I’m the opposite of everything I’ve mentioned and it makes me appreciate my life more.

The pandemic seems like an afterthought now-a-days as everyone is going back to partying in clubs, going to events, and hanging out. Everyone’s life has changed during the pandemic. Some for better, some for worst.

Those that used the time to reset and reevaluate their priorities seem to be the happiest. They move somewhere, they start families, they adopt dogs, they take risks. During the pandemic, I’ve changed jobs, met new people, experienced snow, played videogames and started getting into the process of enjoying life for what it is. Adapting to change takes practice, so when the pandemic hit, I just took the same principles as I’ve always applied for adapting and it seems I have a formula down. What a wonderful world.

Why End My Food Job Rocks?

I joined Motif Foodworks last year and they pay me pretty well. Even if I made a standard amount of money side hustling the podcast, the energy to reward ratio would not be worth it. Motif Foodworks is an extremely rewarding place to work at. The combination of Type-A-best-in-the-industry professionals, significant and positive milestones, and the joy when people taste our progress makes the hard days worth it.

Though we’ve had a lot of press about fundraising and technology, we are doing a ton in the background and I’ve been learning a ton on how to be a better scientist.

?In contrast, the podcast just became more and more complex, with not much output on lessons learned. I enjoy being in the lab, but it was so hard to do the podcast when doing experiments. Not only that, but I had roommates, and because my reputation was tied to Motif and the podcast was getting popular, it was getting harder to choose the right guests.

The guests kept flowing in thanks to being connected with PR firm, but at that point, I’ve already interviewed so many fascinating people and I wasn’t learning as fast as I was learning at Motif. Balancing it out, there were diminishing returns for continuing the podcast. Energy over time is a resource that is hard to get back and I wanted to do different things. So after Harold McGee, I went on hiatus…forever.

However, the trail left from My Food Job Rocks has helped many students and young professionals throughout the years. I’ve met so many amazing people through doing this and made actual money from just sharing the wonders of food science. In the past, I’ve always treated My Food Job Rocks as like one of the food products I’ve developed. Messy at first, but over time and through trial and error, make it become something truly unbeatable. As someone who gains joy creating something, this has always been an amazing journey.

A Year of Fiction

Escapism is an interesting word, everyone has their own ways of doing it. Some become hedonists and others turn to stories. I did both. I drank more than I did before but I also played a lot of video games. I haven’t played videogames so intensely since high school but I ended up playing a lot of video games during the pandemic.

What really gravitated to me were videogames with really good stories. I think Japanese games specifically do a great job using the videogame medium to tell a story with compelling characters. So I played a lot of Persona and Yakuza. Don’t get me wrong, some western video games do an amazing job. In particular, I played 200 hours of the game, Hades.

Besides that point, playing videogames while I was locked up in Austin Texas during the pandemic was one of the fondest experiences I’ve had. Sad? Probably, but I’m going somewhere with this. Trust me.

A New Creative Outlet

With everyone locked up, people had to communicate online. Sure, you can play video games, but have you ever heard of Dungeons and Dragons?

I’ve dabbled with a few Table Top Role Playing Games like D and D and I found them to be really fun and immersive but most importantly, you are hanging out with your friends having a good time. Though we couldn’t play at the table, the pandemic allowed me to connect online and play this silly game rolling virtual dice.

Eventually, there was a point where I was playing D and D with my friends from high school, my friends from Sacramento, my friends from Phoenix, my friends from Austin, and by the end of it, my friends in Boston. It was a fantastic experience to strengthen the bonds with my friend groups around the United States. The fragments of my life connected through this simple act of escapism. The beautiful thing about crises is that you find ways to reinvent yourself and have the opportunity to commit to something new. This hobby was something I wanted to commit to.

I’ve been listening to a few podcasts where actors or writers would podcast out their DnD sessions. You could have rules-heavy 4 hour episode games like Critical Role recorded, or a funny, rules-light and heavily edited DnD podcast like Dungeons and Daddies (trust me, it’s good) in the same genre and people loved both of them with Critical Role crowdfunding $11 million dollars to create an animated show and Dungeons and Daddies having over 10,000 patreon subscribers paying $5 dollars a month or more.

The medium of recording a story where someone has to guide a group of people to build a narrative using randomized dice rolls fascinates me. It’s a combination of storytelling, improv, and collaboration. For the past 5 months, and a few failed attempts, I was able to convince my friends in Boston to create this type of podcast. We don’t do D and D, we do another fun and niche game called City of Mist.

It’s called Second Shot City, a podcast where we play a detective game and my friends act out as unique characters. We’re experimenting with bringing a variety of guests as the series progresses and it’s been a blast setting this up and having the opportunity to play live. I’m the game master and I’ve been enjoying writing and thinking of scenarios to put my friends through the wringer. It also allows me to practice how to be funny and think on the fly. Developing a story that can be interactive and fun for my friends. It's like a videogame, and it gives me so much joy.?It’s also an extremely energizing process to podcast, record, edit, and publish under totally different rules and the experience is very similar to the first 50 episodes of My Food Job Rocks. When it was a hobby.

(you can find it wherever you find podcasts)

Just like My Food Job Rocks, it’s not for everyone. Also, it's not a podcast for professionals so I act a bit differently on this one. For one, I curse (oh no!) but the point of this podcast is to be entertaining and tell a good story. For me, it’s about having a good time with friends and have them express their creativity through this unique medium. Everyone has the power to be creative.

A Happy Year

When I was a kid, I had trouble smiling. Now strangers say I have a great smile. Maybe it’s because now we don’t have to wear masks, but maybe I’ve learned how to show that I’m happy. It’s not just the actions, but through my voice and through my writing. When I was chatting with my food science friends in college on Zoom, they noticed through my actions, I was a lot happier than I was in college.

I think I write about being happy or sad in every one of these pieces. I think growing up is about really understanding what makes you happy and what makes you sad and then you find ways to make yourself happier. You also realize that how you view happiness might be different than how your friend finds happiness as you mature. Kids want to impress other people all the time and will call out their status to act like they are cooler or happier than you. As you grow up, you generally care less of what other people think. Everyone grows older, but some people never grow up.

During the pandemic, I followed Scott Galloway a lot. He’s funny and crude but then he hits you with deep, thought-provoking insights about life. (For a glimpse of that, read Algebra of Happiness). One thing he keeps hammering on what it means to have a happier life is to focus on your relationships.

In the past, I had a rocky relationship with my mom. I visited California for 2 weeks in January and my dad had to take care of my grandma for most of those 2 weeks. Because I had to remotely work, and I couldn’t do anything because of the pandemic, mom would cook me breakfast, lunch and dinner every day and we’d talk every meal for a long time. The relationship is better now and we’ve seen each other grow.

I’ve amended, apologized, and reconnected with a few colleagues this year and it’s been rewarding to bury the hatchet on some of the demons. Time generally heals all wounds

Though it’s hard to reach out to everyone, the people with whom I’ve reached out to and the people who reached out to me have been rewarding experiences. Every conversation I’ve had, I just feel so happy that they’ve survived and I feel even happier when they’ve thrived.

One of the most rewarding things that happens when I create something is that it changes people’s lives. Though selfish to say, imagining that if I didn’t exist would affect people’s lives makes you appreciate your life a bit more. There’s a handful of emails I get that talk about how they found out about food science because of My Food Job Rocks, or they chose to get into the food industry because I talked to them about it. It’s a divine experience and I’ll continue to talk to people about food science throughout my whole entire life.

I think it’s my North Star to tell stories in unique ways.

PS: I used to post a ton on LinkedIn. Probably won't be posting as much anymore. I'll eventually get back to more food science media projects, but now, I just want to play some games.