Welcome to "Open Forum in The Villages, Florida" with Mike Roth and Bob Baker! In this engaging podcast, Bob Baker takes us on an inspiring journey through his YouTube channel and shares how he built a remarkably influential platform centered around positive self-talk.
Join us as we delve into Bob's experiences, including encounters with some of the extraordinary individuals featured in "The Secret" film. Bob shares his insights on breaking free from the autopilot mode that often governs our lives, and offers practical advice on how to embark on a path of positive change.
With an impressive following of 340,000 subscribers and an astounding average of 1,200,000 monthly views, Bob reveals the methodology behind his affirmations YouTube channel. Discover the secrets to his success and learn how you too can create a powerful online presence.
During our conversation, we explore strategies for avoiding the victim mentality and maintaining a positive mindset, even in challenging circumstances. Bob's wealth of knowledge and experience shines through as he provides valuable guidance on how to stay optimistic and navigate life's ups and downs.
Tune in to "Open Forum in The Villages" as we uncover the transformative power of positive self-talk and gain valuable insights on living a more fulfilling and empowered life. Whether you're seeking personal growth or simply looking for an uplifting conversation, this podcast will leave you inspired and motivated to embrace positivity in every aspect of your life.
Open Forum in The Villages, Florida is Produced & Directed by Mike Roth A new episode will be released most Fridays at 9 AM Direct all questions and comments to mike@rothvoice.com
If you know a Villager who should appear on the show, please contact us at: mike@rothvoice.com
Welcome to "Open Forum in The Villages, Florida" with Mike Roth and Bob Baker! In this engaging podcast, Bob Baker takes us on an inspiring journey through his YouTube channel and shares how he built a remarkably influential platform centered around positive self-talk.
Join us as we delve into Bob's experiences, including encounters with some of the extraordinary individuals featured in "The Secret" film. Bob shares his insights on breaking free from the autopilot mode that often governs our lives, and offers practical advice on how to embark on a path of positive change.
With an impressive following of 340,000 subscribers and an astounding average of 1,200,000 monthly views, Bob reveals the methodology behind his affirmations YouTube channel. Discover the secrets to his success and learn how you too can create a powerful online presence.
During our conversation, we explore strategies for avoiding the victim mentality and maintaining a positive mindset, even in challenging circumstances. Bob's wealth of knowledge and experience shines through as he provides valuable guidance on how to stay optimistic and navigate life's ups and downs.
Tune in to "Open Forum in The Villages" as we uncover the transformative power of positive self-talk and gain valuable insights on living a more fulfilling and empowered life. Whether you're seeking personal growth or simply looking for an uplifting conversation, this podcast will leave you inspired and motivated to embrace positivity in every aspect of your life.
Open Forum in The Villages, Florida is Produced & Directed by Mike Roth A new episode will be released most Fridays at 9 AM Direct all questions and comments to mike@rothvoice.com
If you know a Villager who should appear on the show, please contact us at: mike@rothvoice.com
Speaker 1:
Welcome to the Open Forum in the Villages, Florida podcast. In this show we are going to talk to leaders in the community, leaders of clubs and interesting folks who live here in the villages to give perspectives of what is happening here in the villages. We hope to add a new episode most Fridays at 9am. We have converted all of our shows to Buzzsprout. Of course, you can still listen to Apple Podcast, Amazon Music and about 20 other podcast platforms. Your favorite podcast player will still work. We are now a listener-supported podcast. You can become a supporter for only $3 or you can choose to pay more per month. Go to openforminthevillagescom and click on Support in the black box. There will be a shout out for supporters in episodes. This is a shout out to supporters. Tweet Coleman, Dan Capellan, Ed Williams, Alvin Stenzel and major supporter Dr Craig Curtis at K2 in the Villages. We will be hearing more from Dr Curtis with short Alzheimer's tips each week.
Speaker 2:
So this is Mike Roth on back with Bob Baker. We're going to talk to Bob about his YouTube channel and on that channel he's doing positive affirmations and self-talk. Bob, how did you get started doing that?
Speaker 3:
Well, that's a great question, because this is something I only started doing six years ago, so it opened up this whole new chapter of my life that I never saw coming, but it's been a great blessing. So, basically, i got on YouTube in actually 2006, which was the second year it was even in existence, and for the first decade I was doing a hodgepodge of different things. If people listened to the previous two episodes of your podcast, they know about you. Know I published books. I've done a lot of things in the arts.
Speaker 3:
And so my channel is just a wide array of things related to my life. There was no real focus on it, but I still managed to get about 3,500 subscribers by the end of 2016. And then just a little backstory, real quick. I've always been a student of personal development, back as far back as high school, When I was struggling with insecurity and all that. a friend of mine gave me one of I don't know if you're familiar with it an author named Wayne Dyer. It was very prolific. His very first popular book was called Your Aronia Zones, And that was just opened my eyes to a new way of thinking about how we use our thoughts and our feelings and our behaviors and how we have. we're not just a victim of our thoughts. It was like the first book or the first time I realized that if I'm feeling insecure, it's not necessarily who I am, it's just what I'm thinking and feeling at that time.
Speaker 2:
It's interesting you mentioned that because I was looking at the show statistics of these roughly 70 shows that we've done so far in this series, and one of the highest ones rated in terms of listens, especially in the first two weeks, was the power of the subconscious mind.
Speaker 3:
Oh wow, there's an interest in that.
Speaker 2:
People were seeking it out perhaps Seeking it out, and it's way above the number three show.
Speaker 3:
Oh cool. Well, I think this will come back when I yeah, i could tie this into what I'll share with my YouTube channel. So over the years I was in and out of that. So I've used so many things over the years goal setting, visualization, meditation. I've done affirmations on my own for many years, so for decades.
Speaker 2:
Vision boards.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, vision boards.
Speaker 2:
Sam, I was very into that franchise that I taught people for 25 years.
Speaker 3:
And so in around 2015, 2016, i was kind of going through a little bit of a funk with things were evolving with my solo entrepreneurial career, with my books, which we've talked about in previous episodes, and I was, and then I was, and so, as a result, i was also kind of struggling financially and you know, i was behind a few months and paying the mortgage, and so I was kind of at a low point, seeking out something to raise my own energy level and vibration and optimism, and so I was seeking things out on YouTube, looking for affirmations or guided meditations on abundance and prosperity and things like that, and not really happy with a lot of what I was finding.
Speaker 3:
You weren't happy with it, Not happy. Yeah, I was just kind of. You know, a lot of times entrepreneurs find things. When they seek something out and can't find it, they create it themselves, right.
Speaker 2:
Right, so probably 12 or 15 years ago a book came out in a video called The Secret.
Speaker 3:
Ah, yes.
Speaker 2:
What did you think of that?
Speaker 3:
I yeah, I was. I think I came out maybe around 2004-ish or something. Yeah, I think it did a great. And the secret there's no secret at all. It's been around for thousands of years thinking grow rich.
Speaker 2:
Yeah.
Speaker 3:
As a man think of you know, an Earl Nightingale. I'm sure you're familiar with Earl Nightingale. He kind of launched the whole audiobook personal development industry in the 50s. He came up with a vinyl record called The Strangest Secret which was and it boiled down to him we become what we think about. It was his whole mantra And so so, yeah, this the secret movie and book were just a new iteration of that. So I think it did a great job of getting and it was so popular. You know it became so popular.
Speaker 3:
Some people really liked it and believed it, and other people were repelled by it, yeah, and I think and I think a lot of, even people that were in the movie. I've actually had a blessing to know some of the folks that were in the movie, like Jack Canfield, michael Beckwith, joe Vitale. Those are all people I've crossed paths with And they and one thing that leaves out is the act, or what we didn't leave, leave it out, but it didn't stress it enough was the action part of that. You have to combine these positive thoughts and visualizations with actions in the real world.
Speaker 3:
I've always been very practical when it comes to this, to this stuff, so, but I think this remind it did a good job of reminding people of the power of their thoughts, because we all we all are, we all tend to live our lives on autopilot, you know. So that's one aspect of our brains that I've discovered that serves us well. Like, for instance, if I had to consciously think about how to brush my teeth or get dressed or drive the car, what you know steps to take every time. They would really be. Our lives would be consumed with those, with that minutiae. But once we learn a pattern, we can do it kind of subconsciously and so we can focus our brain power on other things. So that serves us well in practical ways like that. But we also can get stuck in patterns of thinking. Are we do it, seeing the glasses half empty versus half full? And there are people who go. Well, i'm just being realistic, that's the way.
Speaker 2:
But you know, both half empty and half full are wrong.
Speaker 3:
In what way They're both the same right. Well, they're both wrong. Yeah, They're both wrong. How's that?
Speaker 2:
Because the glass is always 100% full. It's got a certain percentage of air in it and a certain percentage of water.
Speaker 3:
That's that is that's a good way to look at it.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, that's the way I look at it.
Speaker 3:
So you're just a glass full kind of guy, Yeah that's the question of what's it full of?
Speaker 2:
you know You're right exactly. Exactly, and some people are a whole little better stuff than others, you know.
Speaker 3:
And some people are just full of it, right. So to me, this whole like real, just being real, realistic, we all are just living And I I talk about it in the book that I published related to this call the power of affirmations and positive self-talk, and point out how we're all viewing the world through this lens, this filter that we have developed over the years. There are experiences, there are thoughts, there are patterns. You know what people told us, what our parents you know things.
Speaker 2:
there's our product. that would happen, that our family 75 years ago, right, and that got beat into us as a kid, right, and you know we're used to that.
Speaker 3:
That's what we think, that's our reality, right, but everyone has a different perception of reality, and so i think that through that, you can, if you don't like the way you're viewing the world, if your life, the circumstances of your life, is not exactly where you want it to be i think you have more people just sort of give in. This is, this is my, this is my life. I think you actually do have power to change that. It's a combination of thoughts and actions and so. But so what i focus on, i guess, with the youtube.
Speaker 3:
So what i did back, go back to late 2016, is i, when i said i just i'm not resonating with some of the voices and finding doing these affirmations, doing these guided meditation. So i thought i know my way. On the microphone, i had the you know i've been a musician for years of in podcasting, like you. I had the equipment, the software. So i said i'm gonna start recording some stuff, just putting it out there. Not even there's no business plan or anything. Just curious, does anybody care? you know, resonate with my voice, and i put some things out there and you really kind of turn my back when a few weeks went by and i check the stats and said, oh, these things are getting a few more views now these podcasts, or you, dudes, these were youtube yeah, i recorded my voice, added of some visuals and put it up on my youtube channel, right.
Speaker 3:
And then that was the first time that i'd done that and i was really nervous about it too, because it was so different than the things i'd done previously that i was thinking that people were gonna go what are you doing? but this is kind of woo, woo so how did people find you?
Speaker 3:
well. So, dovetailing back to what you said earlier about your most popular podcast, was about the power of the subconscious mind. What i've done is i'm i bless that i create content that people are actively seeking out, and once i saw that these things were resonating with people, it took me like really like nine months to a year before i totally saw that this was a viable thing, and then i just took a deep dive into learning best practices and there's there's there's actually a ton of youtube channels devoted to how to build a youtube channel you know, and they tell you things about titles and thumbnails and descriptions and tags and all that stuff and best practices, and so i learned how to label things in a way like what are people searching for?
Speaker 3:
this is like to give it a workshops on how to build a youtube channel, where you gotta put yourself in the shoes of a person who's in need of this type of material. What are the? what words are they putting into youtube? to seek this stuff out and make sure your titles represent that right and and then things you say in the video.
Speaker 2:
Back back that up this is today's brain health tip from dr craig kurtis. Dr kurtis, how important is it for people to keep their brain shop?
Speaker 4:
it's extremely important. So we all lose a little bit of our cognitive abilities as we age. Everyone's brain starts shrinking in our fifties. However, we can still maintain good cognitive health into old age by making a few good daily choices, including keeping your brain active. Crossword puzzles, seducu, just getting out and socializing is good for the brain. Good thank you, dr kurtis, you're welcome and the beauty and i love.
Speaker 3:
I've been active online and social media. I'm on all the you know i got i got instagram and twitter and even on tiktok and all this stuff. But i what i love about youtube it sets it apart is that it's the word, it's it's owned by google so it's the world's second largest search engine.
Speaker 3:
So people go there, unlike how they use facebook and other platforms. They go there to look for things and what's and what's used, to find things that you like. Then it starts serving you up more things like that, you know, and so i take advantage of that. You know. I realized i just play into what youtube is, how they're trying to serve their viewers and so so how many people are listening to your youtube channel now?
Speaker 3:
yeah, so i kind of mentioned i was right around 3500 when i started, when i posted my first affirmation video in late 2016 before long, like within a year and it got to 20,000. Then it doubled and it went to 40,000 six months later went to 80,000. I remember a few three years ago i hit the 100,000 subscriber mark when they sent you the silver plaque, which is really cool. So i said, hey, this is this is this is getting viable, i think as of this morning as a recording, this it's around, it's close to 100 oh sorry, it's close to 340,000 subscribers. And also, in the total views across the entire channel every month is like 1.2 million views a month of all the videos right.
Speaker 2:
So so if you monetize these, i do, yes, so i.
Speaker 3:
There's a minimum threshold that you need to, as far as, like we call the subscribers and watch time that you have to achieve to to apply to be what's called the youtube partner. I i hit that many years ago, even before i started doing the affirmations, and then with. One of the perks of being a partner is that you can allow youtube to run ads on your videos. I have no idea what ads you know, or you have no control over who is and it isn't and it's, and most of them are those little ads where you can skip, you know at the beginning and they, and basically youtube, will split what any ad revenue that they collect with the creator.
Speaker 3:
It's like a 50 50 split, which is pretty, is pretty, is pretty nice. Now there might be a penny per month, what they call a monetized view right so a small channel.
Speaker 3:
It doesn't add up to much, but when you have a million views a month, it's the primary way that i support. But we support our household. You know, and i've been consistently posting about two new pre-recorded affirmation videos every week and then every sunday. My wife, pookie, and i stream live every sunday morning for many more, from 60 to 90 minutes, and while those live streams are not the most popular videos, we have this like community that we're building, that they, you know, hundreds of people show up every sunday. It's kind of kind of like if we don't call it church or ministry, is it's not?
Speaker 2:
it's not based on any religion or spiritual practice or whatever, but people call it their church, you know there are a couple of people in the village is producing a youtube channel video like that about once a week oh cool, i had a new commerce to the villages is one that comes to mind nice.
Speaker 3:
Oh yeah, there, any topic. You think there's somebody doing a youtube channel on it.
Speaker 2:
You know probably that doesn't oh yeah, dozens, i mean my 3d hobby. 3d printing hobby is uh yeah totally consuming, uh, those those youtube videos on how to and what to do if yeah, but i never saw, like i said i, there was no business plan.
Speaker 3:
I never saw this coming, but i've and so i previously had some modest success online, in particular as an author.
Speaker 3:
You know i had you know, thousands of people around the world who benefited from a lot of the books that i published prior to this era of my life and i felt i was, yeah, yeah, making an impact and felt good about that. But this is like 10x or more of that as far as volume number of people i'm reaching, and it's just really satisfying to be able to make a living doing something that's genuinely helping people and the, the comments that i get from people that literally will like, will queue up and you know you're a voice guy, you know, uh, but the people like literally will queue up my voice every morning and it gets it and many, for many people has gotten them through really dark periods in their lives when they were low point how long is each one of your affirmation business?
Speaker 3:
they are the standard. I play around with length, but around 10 minutes is actually an average and so i don't. They're not really long, so it's kind of geared for people maybe not have.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, we just want to want something to boost them when they first get up in the morning and some people play them before they get out of bed or after they make their coffee, you know, and that's really the best time to set the tone for the day. Instead of just launching into your day, start reacting to things and checking your stuff into your subconscious mind yeah, you say how do i want to feel today?
Speaker 3:
hey, how, what would and like, and i, there's simple. After affirmations like today, i'm gonna look for and appreciate the good you know, instead of looking for reasons to be offended, which a lot of people have that leaning. You know all of them. I find I'm going to find the good things to celebrate, kind gestures. You know, things to be happy and be grateful for.
Speaker 2:
Have you ever stumbled into Dr Eric Stoltz and his adversity quotient books?
Speaker 3:
That rings a bell, but I'm not overly familiar.
Speaker 2:
No, Yeah, his whole theory with the difference between high performers and low performers is that the high performers have the ability to recover from adversity rapidly Right. High performers take the adversity as that's the way, it's going to be forever Right, and they have a slow recovery time, right.
Speaker 3:
So it's a little about reframing failure. I think Tony Robbins has talked about this a lot of years. You didn't fail, you did something, you got a result.
Speaker 2:
Well, that's the Edison theory that you know. The failure in the experiment to build a light bulb happened 100,000 times, but he kept going until he learned what didn't work and then he did something that was different, that did work.
Speaker 3:
He successfully figured out 999 ways that you can't. Yet that won't work, so you reframe that into learning. You know what's the lesson here and how can I do better next time. And so, yeah, it's all it's like yeah, you're, maybe you're playing tricks with your mind, but if, like people say, oh, you're just being delusional, if you're looking, you know, for rainbows, and but I think we're all being delusional in our own way. And I figured, if I'm going to be delusional, why not do it in a way that's going to empower me?
Speaker 3:
or I'm going to have fun and enjoy life instead of being mad at everything all the time, you know, or you know downtrodden, but I again, I take a very realistic approach and, yeah, and if you do, there's no doubt that life can be challenging and that we all have hardships, and I never encourage people to just look the other way or bury your head in the sand. When those negative things come up, you should fully feel them. You know death of a loved one or a pet, or you know you get fired from a job. You know, fully feel that frustration, but don't make it part of your story. That's the thing that people like to get into this victim mode where they just anyone who listened. They'll tell them about how they've been wronged and it becomes part of their identity.
Speaker 2:
Well, you got to move on Right, exactly, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:
And that resilience, right, right.
Speaker 2:
And that's one of the things that I learned from Stulls is that you have to stop for a moment. Mm-hmm, Think I have an high adversity quotient. How do I move on from here? What did I learn? What do I got to do differently?
Speaker 3:
Exactly, and then you move on and And do better the next time.
Speaker 3:
Exactly, you know, deny those things that ever happened to you. But it's like, what am I going to do from here, exactly? And so that's why, yeah, and I just think that, like, we all are influenced by what we expose ourselves to, and that's like the media. You know, what type of music are we listening to? the people in our lives in particular? are they encouraging us? Are they, you know, are they watering down our ambitions? And so, the more you can stay in that positive realm and expose yourself to things that will uplift you podcasts, music, affirmations all of it just builds your optimism and your sense of I can do this, you know.
Speaker 2:
Mm-hmm. Yeah, thanks again Yeah.
Speaker 3:
And I don't know what it was, because I was raised by a single mom and she wasn't, like, particularly entrepreneurial or ambitious necessarily, but there was something within me that was always willing to when I saw something. That's how I did somebody things in the arts which we talked about in an early episode.
Speaker 3:
I would see people, somebody doing something planned in a band or doing stand-up or doing improv they go. that would be so fun to do. What do I need to do? What steps can I take to make that happen sooner rather than later, and without waiting for somebody to give me permission to do it, You know, to create my own?
Speaker 2:
So you saw a model whether it was a musician or an improver and then you decided to do what was necessary to do to make yourself match the model.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, but not necessarily following the ingredients or the other, because the typical model was like. For instance, I've always used the example of open mic nights. When I first started doing stand-up in my 20s, It was a weekly open mic night.
Speaker 2:
Right, so you did stand-up.
Speaker 3:
I did stand-up for like a 15-year period off and on. I did song parodies and funny original songs too with my guitar and singing. But like a lot of open micers, you could, you know, getting a few minutes on stage once a week. That's not a lot to develop. You need a lot of stage time.
Speaker 2:
You need a lot of stage time. You need a lot of practice. You need to repeat the stuff that works and dump the stuff that doesn't work And record yourself and listen and all that. So I did all those things, but most of the Did you walk around with a pen and pencil to write down your ideas during the day and week?
Speaker 3:
I probably had a way to capture them in some way. yes, Yes. And I had a little cassette, little mini cassette, like not quite a walk-in. I would record my. I've sat out on a stool on the stage and record my early routines and listen back to figure out how I could tweak things, you know.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, and where did the audience laugh and where was it growing?
Speaker 3:
I got to drop that one. Are you in a different, better setup or different way to deliver it? Pause, before I deliver the punchline, or you know all that good stuff.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, here are the villages. When I see a stand-up who's not recording what they're doing, Yep, you're not going to learn. Or they're going to learn very slowly, very slowly.
Speaker 3:
But back then a lot of the open micers were complaining about, oh, the like, the funny bonus was our club in St Louis. They should do more. It's like what? like they were victims, like, oh, they should do more for us. And I'm like, okay, i'm going to ask a better question. I'm going to ask, like, what do I want? Because what I want is more stage time. Okay, That leads to the question how can I get more stage time? And it led to us. What that led to is I had just met a friend of mine was bartending at this club in South St Louis And I met the owners of the and I went there and I, on a Wednesday night and which is kind of dead during the week, they're most of their things with bands on the weekends where they brought the crowds.
Speaker 3:
And I said what are you doing here on Wednesday nights? Because I think open mic night was Tuesday. At the funny moment I said nothing with why, why, why, yes, what if I brought in a comedy show? I'll host it, i'll arrange it, i'll book the talent or bring the talent in. We'll charge five bucks at the door. I'll take that money, it won't cost you a thing, but I'll try to bring a crowd in And they said, great, sure, we're not doing anything else. And so I got stage time. I got my open mic friends to come and play for four and make, mostly for free. Also, when I formed an improv group around that same year that we stand up, comics did the first half and our improv group did the second half, and there were some nights that was, yeah, it took a while to build, but I created my own circumstance that I wanted, instead of waiting for someone else to create one for me. That's just always sort of driven me, but that comes from both thoughts and actions, you know.
Speaker 2:
Thoughts actions.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, so yeah, if I had just looked at the negative, i would just want to be a complainer, continue to be a victim, you know. But instead I kind of took my creative, the circumstances that I wanted. So, that's my story and I'm sticking to it, Mike.
Speaker 2:
And Bob, why don't you tell our listeners how to find your YouTube channel?
Speaker 3:
It's simply my name, so Bob Baker, b-a-k-e-r. If you're logged into your YouTube account or in your app in your phone and you start typing in my name, the first suggestion will be Bob Baker affirmations. Go ahead and click that. You'll see my lovely mug there with the silver hair And you can subscribe from right there And then go to the channel and just start checking out Tons of yeah And oh. You know, i think I hit a new milestone. I had eight videos that now have over a million views each. The most popular one over six and a half million views. The most popular one.
Speaker 2:
What was the subject of that?
Speaker 3:
one. It was all. not surprisingly it was on abundance and prosperity And the money. affirmations are very popular, gratitude affirmations are popular And confidence, success, those kind of all in the upper tier. So I tend to do a lot. I just hit those from a lot of different angles and different form. More mats Yeah, people always want to make more money, right.
Speaker 2:
That's right, we were talking about stand up for a minute. I'll just give two suggestions to people. One is they read the Kevin Hart book on how Kevin became a stand up comic. It is a great book. It's also on an audible. And the other book that I always recommended a few people actually take me up on the recommendation It's called The Improv Nation.
Speaker 1:
Oh right.
Speaker 2:
And that is really the story history of going all the way back to Spolen Viola.
Speaker 3:
Spolen Yes.
Speaker 2:
The originator of Improv in the 1930s.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, during the depression and all the way through Saturday night, live at Acroyd and Bucci and Viola's son was called Paul Sills And he took up actually his mom's work and he was one of the co-founders of Second City in 1959 in Chicago.
Speaker 2:
Yeah.
Speaker 3:
I've learned a lot about that history, yeah.
Speaker 2:
It's fascinating, fascinating business. I'm glad you had a chance to talk about your success on YouTube.
Speaker 3:
Absolutely.
Speaker 2:
And Bob thanks again for being on the show.
Speaker 3:
It's been a pleasure here. Everybody stay positive.
Speaker 2:
Stay positive Okay.
Speaker 1:
Remember our next episode will be released next Friday at 9 am. Should you want to become a major supporter of the show or have questions, please contact us at mikeatrothvoicecom. If you know someone who should be on the show, contact us at mikeatrothvoicecom. We thank everyone for listening to the show. The content of the show is copyrighted by Rothvoice 2023, all Rights Reserved.
