00:00:03
well Happy Thanksgiving my ex-
00:00:05
homeschooler friends it's your friend
00:00:07
Jacob gunen and uh I told you I was
00:00:10
dropping two episodes this week and I'm
00:00:11
delivering on that promise first and
00:00:14
foremost a very Happy Thanksgiving to
00:00:16
each and every one of you I hope you
00:00:17
guys are spending time relaxing chilling
00:00:20
with family with friends with loved ones
00:00:22
um because that's what the holiday
00:00:24
season is all about so let's get that
00:00:27
out of the way today you're getting solo
00:00:30
for me um what are we going to talk
00:00:32
about we're going to talk a little bit
00:00:34
I'm going to share my story I'm going to
00:00:35
share the story of how the show came to
00:00:37
be um I'm going to share a little
00:00:40
glimpse into what to expect for the next
00:00:42
month for the month of December and a
00:00:44
little bit into
00:00:45
2025 and uh and then I want to just
00:00:48
share some thoughts of how I see this
00:00:51
show kind of changing uh in the next
00:00:54
year all good things right and then at
00:00:57
the very end you got to stick around
00:01:00
because I found a juicy video of me and
00:01:04
my good friend Derry Brooks performing
00:01:06
at a homeschool talent show and I'm
00:01:08
going to drop it in the closer of this
00:01:09
episode der I hope you don't mind I
00:01:11
didn't ask for permission so I'm sorry
00:01:14
but I'm putting it out there it was on
00:01:15
Facebook it's the world has already seen
00:01:18
this so let's talk about where the show
00:01:20
originates
00:01:21
from I've mentioned before on the show
00:01:25
that the purpose of the show was really
00:01:29
to catch up it's kind of selfish right
00:01:31
it's to catch up with old friends it's
00:01:32
to reminisce about homeschool days it's
00:01:34
to talk about The Good the Bad and the
00:01:36
Ugly of homeschooling and what I meant
00:01:38
when I originally said that was kind
00:01:40
of much more from a fluffy place right
00:01:43
when I when I said bad and ugly I really
00:01:45
meant like cringy and just like I don't
00:01:48
know looking back at your high school
00:01:49
self and kind of being like Oh man
00:01:52
shouldn't have worn red pants um and
00:01:56
what this show has become is a lot
00:01:58
deeper than that we've gone into like
00:02:00
religious stuff and we've talked about
00:02:02
some like uh abuse and we've talked
00:02:06
about mental health and um uh all these
00:02:10
different things right we've gone down a
00:02:12
variety of different paths
00:02:14
um and it kind of started with that to
00:02:17
be real honest with you
00:02:20
so as many of you know I've been in the
00:02:23
podcasting world since 2019 and I've
00:02:25
been an editor and producer and worked
00:02:27
on a variety of different shows from
00:02:29
business shows to relationship shows to
00:02:32
uh Tech and travel and all kinds of fun
00:02:36
stuff it's it's like the best education
00:02:38
in the world because I get to hear from
00:02:40
experts in all of these fields uh for
00:02:42
free and I get to edit them and make
00:02:43
them sound really good um but with that
00:02:48
always came this nagging question when I
00:02:50
would meet new people they go oh what's
00:02:52
your podcast about right and I didn't
00:02:54
have one um and I spit ideas out there
00:02:57
for a long time about oh I'm going to
00:02:59
talk talk about the podcasting world I'm
00:03:01
going talk about being an editor I'm
00:03:02
going to talk about this I'm going to
00:03:03
talk about that I'm going to do this
00:03:04
kind of a thing and nothing really stuck
00:03:06
nothing resonated with
00:03:09
me um until honestly Co hit right 2020
00:03:14
the world shuts down we're all stuck at
00:03:16
home and to be honest I started to go a
00:03:18
little stir crazy I start to have a lot
00:03:21
more anxiety and depression than I had
00:03:23
previously as most people
00:03:26
did and and I really started to isolate
00:03:29
myself from the world and from my
00:03:31
friends and from my wife even
00:03:35
and she encouraged
00:03:38
me to really to start reaching out to to
00:03:41
old friends and just say hey what's up
00:03:44
and so I did so I texted a few friends
00:03:46
uh I messaged them wherever I could find
00:03:48
them and I just said hey what's up I
00:03:50
would love to like catch up and hear how
00:03:53
things are and what's going on in life
00:03:55
and and most of those people were
00:03:56
homeschool
00:03:57
friends and so we would get together and
00:04:00
we you know jump on a zoom call or we
00:04:01
get on the phone or whatever and we
00:04:02
reminisce we talk about being in a band
00:04:04
together we talk about dance class or we
00:04:06
talk about whatever homeschool stuff
00:04:09
right we relate on that and then we'd
00:04:11
catch up and we'd be like oh what are
00:04:12
you doing today and talk about Job stuff
00:04:14
you know the normal catch up with
00:04:15
different stuff and through these
00:04:17
conversations I started
00:04:19
to realize and learn that the way we
00:04:23
viewed our homeschool years was so
00:04:25
vastly different and just our
00:04:27
experiences in general were vastly
00:04:29
different we were we all connected
00:04:30
through these
00:04:32
memories but the way we looked at it was
00:04:35
just different right and and I thought
00:04:39
man this is so interesting and I would
00:04:41
get off these chats and we would have
00:04:43
talked about you know I'm hurting with
00:04:45
this or I'm struggling with that or this
00:04:47
really makes me happy right and I went
00:04:50
man I think there's something
00:04:55
here and it just thought it kind of you
00:04:57
know bounced around in my brain a little
00:04:58
bit and so started mulling it over right
00:05:00
and I was like oh so there's a show here
00:05:02
there's something
00:05:04
here so the the title of the show The
00:05:07
ex- homeschoolers Club kind of came up
00:05:09
because also during
00:05:11
2020 uh a Facebook group popped up that
00:05:14
was like the ex homeschoolers of ventur
00:05:16
accy or something like that and I was
00:05:19
like man that that word ex homeschoolers
00:05:21
just like really resonated with me for
00:05:23
some reason and and it was more of the
00:05:26
same thing that I had already been doing
00:05:27
right it was connecting
00:05:29
all of us ex- homeschoolers from Ventura
00:05:31
County and we were reminiscing about
00:05:33
just like dumb stuff and just like
00:05:35
cringy moments and you know some of us
00:05:38
are may be going a little deeper than
00:05:39
others and things like that man again
00:05:42
this idea this show idea is like in the
00:05:43
back of my head man I think it'd be
00:05:45
really cool to interview these people
00:05:46
and talk to them and you know all this
00:05:49
stuff but there's also that imposter
00:05:51
syndrome side of me that is
00:05:54
going nobody wants this nobody wants to
00:05:56
hear about this right you're a bunch of
00:05:59
weirdo homeschool kids nobody wants to
00:06:01
hear that like I was convincing myself
00:06:03
that clients weren't going to hire me
00:06:04
cuz they were going to find out I was a
00:06:05
weird homeschool kid I was like I can't
00:06:08
deliver the quality of show that I want
00:06:11
you know all these all these types of
00:06:13
things all these lies basically that I
00:06:15
was telling
00:06:16
myself and
00:06:18
um So eventually I just kind of had to
00:06:22
say screw it right I just had to hit
00:06:24
record and so I called my friend Carrie
00:06:27
France and she agreed to come on the
00:06:30
show she was the second episode of this
00:06:32
podcast um but she was recorded first uh
00:06:35
before uh I did my solo um and we just
00:06:39
had a great conversation we just had fun
00:06:41
and after recording that and especially
00:06:44
after it went live but really just after
00:06:46
recording that I went I could do this I
00:06:49
got this and uh I still was kind of in
00:06:52
this mindset of like I'm only ever going
00:06:53
to get 15 people to agree to come on
00:06:55
this thing but it'll be a cool thing
00:06:58
that I'll have done 15 episodes just so
00:07:01
everyone knows this is episode 18 okay
00:07:04
and I've got a couple more already
00:07:06
recorded so we're already getting into
00:07:08
20s
00:07:09
um which is awesome it's gone farther
00:07:12
than I thought it would um but yeah had
00:07:15
a conversation with her posted it and it
00:07:18
really the response was amazing and it's
00:07:21
still probably the most listened to
00:07:23
episode uh of the podcast uh so thank
00:07:26
you Carrie um I you're gonna come back
00:07:29
on okay uh we're going to talk more
00:07:31
about homeschool stuff but
00:07:33
um it's been really cool
00:07:37
to see homeschool friends both old and
00:07:40
new come out of the
00:07:42
woodwork uh join the club essentially um
00:07:47
and yeah it's gone so much further than
00:07:49
I ever thought it would I mean we've
00:07:51
done thousands of views um thousands of
00:07:54
listens uh hundreds of followers at this
00:07:57
point it's been awesome um and it really
00:08:01
hasn't slowed down and so so I just want
00:08:05
to say thank you from the bottom of my
00:08:06
heart because I genuinely thought 20
00:08:08
people were going to listen to this and
00:08:10
it was mostly going to be like my family
00:08:12
who I was begging to listen to this
00:08:14
thing um so thank you thank you all
00:08:17
um so that's kind of the backstory now
00:08:20
let's let's touch on what's what's kind
00:08:23
of to come what's coming what's coming
00:08:26
down the road so in December December is
00:08:29
going to be the month of the goodness um
00:08:32
I've already recorded with both my
00:08:34
parents and I'm working on my solo
00:08:36
episode but you're basically you're
00:08:39
getting three weeks of us okay so first
00:08:41
week you're going to get an episode with
00:08:43
my mom we're chatting about why she
00:08:45
chose to homeschool us what that process
00:08:48
was like some of the hard stuff the good
00:08:51
stuff would she do it again um yeah I
00:08:54
think she does a really good job of
00:08:56
explaining her thought process behind
00:08:58
the whole the whole thing and um yeah so
00:09:01
we're going to touch on that we're touch
00:09:03
on what she's doing today um and all
00:09:05
that good stuff and uh yeah it was just
00:09:08
a lot of fun it was a lot of fun to
00:09:09
record I'm looking forward to putting it
00:09:11
out into the world uh week two you're
00:09:14
going to get my dad so my dad was went
00:09:18
from like 0% involved in homeschool
00:09:20
aside from being like yeah you can do it
00:09:23
to being a huge advocate and a huge part
00:09:26
of our homeschool experience by the end
00:09:28
of it um
00:09:30
so that interview was really good um
00:09:34
because I mean it's a dad in a scent
00:09:36
talking
00:09:37
about this change that happened um and
00:09:41
it just was really good it's just like
00:09:43
I'm not even going to I I don't even
00:09:45
want to tease anything because it was
00:09:47
just so good you guys are going to hear
00:09:48
it soon enough okay and then week three
00:09:51
you're getting a solo with me um a
00:09:53
couple months ago I did my Purity
00:09:55
culture episode that did really well it
00:09:57
resonated with a lot of you I asked
00:10:00
um because religion is obviously a big
00:10:02
part of Purity culture but I asked in
00:10:03
that episode if you wanted to hear my
00:10:06
religious story my religious upbringing
00:10:09
um and my experience with religion and
00:10:11
where I sit today and enough of you said
00:10:14
yes that I'm going to give it to you so
00:10:17
uh I'm currently working on that it's
00:10:19
coming very very soon and then that
00:10:21
fourth week in December is Christmas so
00:10:23
I'm taking the week off we're all just
00:10:25
going to relax everybody's going to
00:10:26
enjoy being with their family being with
00:10:28
loved ones uh opening presents if you
00:10:31
celebrate Christmas if you
00:10:33
don't sorry go listen to a previous
00:10:35
episode um but then we'll be back in
00:10:39
January for some new things I've got
00:10:42
some cool stuff coming um I'm the show
00:10:46
has enabled so many people to reach out
00:10:48
which is amazing so in addition to we're
00:10:51
going to get more episodes with the
00:10:52
achieve and the group Solutions people
00:10:54
the people that a lot of us know and
00:10:57
love but we're also going to start
00:10:58
introducing some new faces so I've had a
00:11:00
couple kids well they're no longer kids
00:11:03
I've had a couple people reach out who
00:11:04
were homeschool kids in the ' 80s and
00:11:06
the '90s um and they're going to share
00:11:08
their unique experience with that and so
00:11:11
that's going to be a lot of fun um I've
00:11:13
got a couple College friends coming on
00:11:15
who are going to share their homeschool
00:11:16
experiences as well which is going to be
00:11:18
a lot of fun and I'm cooking up some
00:11:21
other stuff that I think will be
00:11:23
interesting and hopefully helpful um in
00:11:27
2025 so
00:11:29
yeah so here's a couple of the things
00:11:32
that are kind of changing that I maybe
00:11:34
need some help with that I would love
00:11:37
some feedback on so first and
00:11:40
foremost nothing drastic is changing
00:11:43
about the show okay um it's still going
00:11:45
to
00:11:46
remain what it is at its core right an
00:11:49
interview with homeschool kids about
00:11:51
their homeschool experience an interview
00:11:53
with homeschool parents about their
00:11:54
homeschool experience um that's going to
00:11:56
be the core of everything we do
00:12:00
here's what's going to
00:12:02
change I want to learn to become a
00:12:04
better Storyteller and I want to the the
00:12:07
episodes that have come out that have
00:12:09
really resonated with people have this
00:12:13
unique story arc to them um and every
00:12:16
episode has been amazing uh every person
00:12:18
that's come on thank you so much um but
00:12:22
there's certain ones that have really
00:12:23
just struck cords with people and so
00:12:25
I've been paying attention to that and I
00:12:28
want to continue to create
00:12:30
episodes that have some kind of through
00:12:34
lesson or experience or something that's
00:12:37
tangible that we can grab on to and
00:12:39
learn something from okay so whether
00:12:41
that's religious
00:12:43
parenting uh
00:12:47
sexuality education you know uh mental
00:12:52
not Mental Illness but like mental
00:12:54
well-being and things like that business
00:12:56
I don't know there's going to be there's
00:12:58
I got a lot of ideas bouncing around
00:12:59
okay um but I want to create these
00:13:01
through arcs that we can talk about with
00:13:03
with people and
00:13:05
so so yeah so that's
00:13:08
coming and 2025 is going to be a big
00:13:11
year okay um a big year I feel it I'm
00:13:15
manifesting it okay guys and uh let me
00:13:19
tell you for me a little bit
00:13:22
of I'm not always good about this but
00:13:25
I'm trying to be better and set an
00:13:27
intention for the year and my intention
00:13:30
for 2025 is that as a person I want to
00:13:34
learn to listen more I want to learn uh
00:13:37
I want to learn to learn
00:13:39
more uh if that makes sense uh I want to
00:13:42
Advocate more um and I want to educate
00:13:44
more and kind of where we sit right now
00:13:49
as a country in the US is really uh
00:13:52
scary for a lot of people
00:13:55
um and
00:13:59
where we sit just as people I think can
00:14:02
there's a lot there's a lot going on in
00:14:04
the world as a whole um that scary and
00:14:08
confusing there's a lot of voices that
00:14:10
don't get heard um that kind of a thing
00:14:13
there's a lot of Education that could
00:14:15
just be better and things like that and
00:14:17
so I want to recognize that I have some
00:14:21
privilege it's a straight white guy um I
00:14:24
have a voice that tends to get heard um
00:14:28
and so I want to I want to do some
00:14:30
things I want to listen to voices that
00:14:33
don't get heard um as much um I want to
00:14:38
uh learn to ask questions um of those
00:14:40
people and learn from them to listen to
00:14:44
books listen to books yeah listen to
00:14:46
books read books listen to podcasts
00:14:48
watch movies do whatever to help educate
00:14:51
myself with strong healthy knowledge um
00:14:56
I want to be an advocate for those
00:14:57
people again who have have less of a
00:14:59
voice um and then I want to educate and
00:15:02
what I mean by that is I want to the
00:15:05
stuff that I learn I want to help
00:15:08
educate more and more people
00:15:10
um with those things right and have
00:15:13
tough conversations
00:15:15
and have the facts to back them up and
00:15:18
stuff like that
00:15:20
so that means a lot of things hopefully
00:15:23
it's not too dark hopefully I didn't
00:15:25
scare too many people off um I could go
00:15:28
down a lot of rabbit holes um with that
00:15:32
I'm going to not I'm going to stop right
00:15:33
there if you got questions about it
00:15:34
reach out to me I i' love to hear from
00:15:37
you and answer questions and you know
00:15:39
whatever else
00:15:41
but here's what I need help with from
00:15:43
you guys
00:15:45
so the ex- homeschoolers Club is meant
00:15:47
to be a community it's meant to be not
00:15:50
just me having conversations with uh one
00:15:54
person every single week having
00:15:56
conversations behind the scenes with
00:15:57
people um which is happening constantly
00:16:01
um but it's also meant to be a place for
00:16:04
you guys to reconnect with each other to
00:16:06
meet new friends to make new connections
00:16:08
all those kinds of things
00:16:10
so I know other podcasts do Facebook
00:16:14
groups they do slack channels discords
00:16:18
subreddits some kind of community
00:16:20
element I want I'm thinking about that I
00:16:23
don't know what the best choice is for
00:16:25
that um if that's even something you
00:16:27
guys would be interested in so I want to
00:16:29
hear from you um there's going to be a
00:16:31
couple ways that you guys can answer
00:16:33
questions from me one I'm going to put
00:16:34
together a Google form it's going to be
00:16:36
at the very top of the show notes okay
00:16:38
it's going to be like link number one
00:16:40
it's the most important thing okay that
00:16:43
is going to just be a place for you to
00:16:45
like Drop thoughts of like here's what I
00:16:47
want to hear on the show here's what I
00:16:49
think a good Community would look like
00:16:50
here's topics here's people I want to
00:16:52
hear from okay so there's going to be a
00:16:53
couple questions in there answer what
00:16:55
you want leave blank what you want um so
00:16:59
that's hopefully going to be at the top
00:17:00
of the show notes top of the YouTube
00:17:01
channel whatever you are consuming this
00:17:03
content on it's going to be there okay
00:17:06
the other way you can reach out to me
00:17:08
you can always DM me uh Instagram exhs
00:17:11
Club um or you can email me at exhs
00:17:16
00:17:17
so those are other great ways to get a
00:17:19
hold of me I just wanted to create a
00:17:21
form
00:17:23
that had those questions in place that
00:17:25
you guys could just answer and then it
00:17:27
drops all that information in to a
00:17:29
spreadsheet for me it's a little easier
00:17:30
to to digest excuse me um but yeah so
00:17:36
there's
00:17:37
that uh and like I said it's going to
00:17:40
have a couple different questions on
00:17:42
there more things you want to hear on
00:17:44
the show people you want on the show
00:17:47
topics you want us to hit on um really
00:17:50
anything you want to see okay I just
00:17:51
want to I want to know your thoughts uh
00:17:54
what we could be doing better what you
00:17:55
already thought was great all that kind
00:17:57
of stuff so I'm I'm looking at my notes
00:17:59
I'm trying to figure out if there's
00:18:01
anything else I wanted to ask before we
00:18:04
go yes there's one more favor I want to
00:18:07
ask of you so after you've done with
00:18:08
that I would like for you guys if you
00:18:11
wouldn't mind cuz uh one of my goals for
00:18:14
the end of 2025 or excuse me the end of
00:18:17
2024 is I would like to hit 2,000
00:18:20
subscribers on YouTube and I would like
00:18:21
to hit 200 followers on Instagram I'm
00:18:24
actively working towards that but it is
00:18:26
hard
00:18:27
so one if you could share those accounts
00:18:30
with people share an episode with a
00:18:32
friend maybe it's your favorite episode
00:18:35
uh whatever send it out to somebody who
00:18:38
maybe hasn't listened the show maybe
00:18:39
they have listened the show I don't know
00:18:41
but reconnect with somebody shoot them
00:18:43
shoot them the podcast if you wouldn't
00:18:44
mind um tell them to give it a listen
00:18:47
maybe give me a follow if they like it
00:18:50
that kind of thing um it's a vanity
00:18:52
metric but I think we can do it okay I
00:18:55
think we can do it so there's that okay
00:18:59
I think that's everything I'm looking at
00:19:01
my notes is there anything else I got no
00:19:04
okay so with that I'm going to say this
00:19:08
Happy Thanksgiving uh it's been an honor
00:19:11
um and it continues to be an honor every
00:19:12
time I hit record and then hit publish
00:19:16
um to serve you guys and so yeah with
00:19:19
that I'm going to let myself and Derry
00:19:22
Brooks play you out with our rendition
00:19:24
of Home by Edward sharpen the Magnetic
00:19:26
Zeros a little bit of context of what
00:19:28
this is so if you were not part of
00:19:30
achieve uh this was a homeschool talent
00:19:32
show that we that our hes School group
00:19:34
would put on every single year uh and
00:19:38
yeah we were musicians so this was this
00:19:40
was us being musicians all right until
00:19:44
next week I will see you all right peace
00:19:48
[Applause]
00:19:56
[Music]
00:20:23
my I do love my mom mom not the way that
00:20:28
I do
00:20:31
[Music]
00:20:33
you my
00:20:39
[Music]
00:20:48
[Music]
00:20:56
[Music]
00:21:03
home you
00:21:08
[Music]
00:21:55
I'll follow you into the through the
00:21:59
through the I've never one like
00:22:04
[Music]
00:22:23
you only
00:22:26
me something to see
00:22:29
[Music]
00:22:39
you yes I'm
00:22:42
home home is
00:22:44
[Music]
00:23:00
la la la la take me home Daddy I'm
00:23:06
coming home
00:23:10
[Music]
00:23:30
home home is
00:23:33
[Music]
00:23:51
I home yes I am
00:23:56
home home is
00:23:59
[Music]
00:24:22
home is where I
00:24:25
you home yes I'm
00:24:30
home home is where I
00:24:35
[Applause]
