Bruce Chamoff’s Journey As A Podcaster, Entrepreneur, And Engaged Dad

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Embracing the Journey and Overcoming Challenges In a heartwarming conversation on the Dads with Daughters podcast Bruce Chamoff a seasoned podcaster and entrepreneur shared insightful anecdotes about his journey as a father to his now 20-year-old daughter As fatherhood is a unique and deeply personal experience Bruce s revelations bring valuable lessons to the forefront shedding light on the joys struggles and growth that come with raising a daughter Welcoming Fatherhood The Journey Begins It s not uncommon to feel a mix of excitement and bewilderment upon learning about pending fatherhood Bruce s recollections of the day he learned he was going to be a father to a daughter paint a vivid picture of the emotions that accompany this pivotal moment He beautifully captures the blend of enthusiasm and uncertainty that fathers often experience highlighting the eagerness to embark on the journey of parenthood while simultaneously grappling with the vast unknown that lies ahead Navigating Fears and Challenges Insights from a Father s Perspective As Bruce shared his fears and concerns about raising a daughter he echoed sentiments that many fathers can relate to The apprehensions surrounding teenage years the challenge of letting go and the anxiety about protecting their daughters from potential heartbreak are universal themes Bruce s candid reflections provide a platform for fathers to recognize and acknowledge their fears while learning to embrace the inevitable challenges that come with guiding their daughters through adolescence Lessons Learned Embracing Uniqueness and Understanding Balance One of the most poignant moments from Bruce s narrative revolves around the realization that children especially daughters will never mirror their parents entirely This acknowledgment opens the door to a beautiful journey of comprehension and acceptance By understanding their daughters unique traits and embracing the differences fathers can forge deeper connections fostering an environment of mutual respect and understanding The elusive balance between work and family life is a feat that many fathers strive to master Bruce openly shared his experiences acknowledging the struggle to balance his entrepreneurial endeavors with his responsibilities as a father His insights underscore the importance of finding ways to integrate family into career pursuits emphasizing the value of involving children in a father s professional endeavors as a means of nurturing work-life balance The Impact of Podcasting A Tool for Connection and Growth Podcasting has been a transformative force in Bruce s life propelling him to connect with a global community and share his passions Through podcasting Bruce discovered a means to weave a rich tapestry of stories a skill that also enhanced his role as a storyteller in his daughter s life His experiences serve as an inspiration for fathers to explore creative ways to engage with their daughters fostering deeper connections through shared interests and joint pursuits Legacy and Continuation Parenting and Professional Endeavors In a heartening turn of events Bruce s professional journey subsequently intertwined with the personal domain leading to a collaboration with his daughter on the World Podcast Network This fusion exemplifies a harmonious blend of professional success and familial bonds underscoring the significance of involving children in parents passions and enterprises Through this alliance Bruce not only imparts invaluable skills and knowledge but also lays the foundation for his daughter s professional growth and development Navigating Fatherhood with Intention and Love Bruce s narrative offers an array of insights and reflections on fatherhood that resonate deeply with fathers from all walks of life His journey encapsulates the essence of fatherhood embracing the unknown with open arms embarking on a path of continual growth and fostering enduring connections with daughters His story serves as a poignant reminder that fatherhood is not solely about providing but also about nurturing guiding and fostering a legacy of love and understanding TRANSCRIPT Dr Christopher Lewis 00 00 05 Welcome to dads with daughters In this show we spotlight dads resources and more to help you be the best dad you can be Dr Christopher Lewis 00 00 16 Welcome back to the Dads with Daughters podcast where we bring you guests to be active participants in your daughters lives raising them to be strong independent women Really excited to have you back again this week You know every week I love being able to sit down with you to talk to you to walk beside you on this path that you re on in working to be the best dad that you want to be and working to make those meaningful connections that you want to make with your daughters Why is it important Well it s important because you signed up for it You signed up to be a dad You signed up to walk on this path to be there with your kids And sometimes the journey can be lonely Sometimes the journey can be challenging Dr Christopher Lewis 00 00 56 And being able to learn from other dads learn from other people and understand that you re not alone is just part of the battle I love also being able to bring you different people different people that have gone through this journey themselves They are going through this journey themselves and can share the experiences that they ve had as a father because you re going to learn from them And if you open yourself up to it you ll probably take a few things away from it to be able to help you to be that dad you wanna be and to help you raise that daughter that you wanna raise This week we ve got another great guest with us today Bruce Chamoff is with us today And Bruce is with the World Podcast Network I love talking about podcasting but we re not gonna be talking just about podcasting today Dr Christopher Lewis 00 01 43 We re gonna be actually talking about Bruce s experience in being a father to a daughter He s got a 20 year old daughter That also helps him with podcasting too by go down that pipe that path a little bit But I m really excited to have him on to have him tell his story and for you to learn from him Bruce thanks so much for being here today Bruce Chamoff 00 02 02 Hey thanks Chris It was Dr Christopher Lewis 00 02 03 my pleasure Know one of the things that I love doing 1st and foremost is I love turning the clock back in time I said that you had a 20 year old daughter So I wanna turn the clock back maybe 21 years You know back to that first moment that you found out that you were going to be a father to a daughter What was going through your head Bruce Chamoff 00 02 19 Well I was at work and my wife called me Actually we re not married now but she called me at the time and she said are you sitting down And I didn t think of hearing that she was pregnant So she said I said yeah I m sitting down I m pregnant I was excited I mean I think every parent gets excited when they hear that but they re also dumbfounded at the same time And I had that going through in my mind Bruce Chamoff 00 02 40 And then right away we were talking about names And that was the whole conversation And yes I was excited But you know that you just wanna be a parent And you know that the day you hear that you are going to be a parent you want those whole 9 months to just fly by And that s what was going through my mind I m like okay Yes Bruce Chamoff 00 03 02 I m gonna be a dad Yes She s pregnant Perfect I wish that that 9 months would just come tomorrow You know And that was it But it was a really good journey that whole thing I got that new dad book series Bruce Chamoff 00 03 15 I forgot who the author was I was reading that like from literally the first week when I found out that I was gonna be a dad and I was prepared And that was it You know the whole family was excited I mean you know how that whole thing goes Dr Christopher Lewis 00 03 25 So I talked to a lot of dads and a lot of dads say to me that in having a daughter there s some fear that goes along with that You talked about pulling out those books and reading and trying to immerse yourself and learning what you need to learn and trying to figure it out But as you think about the moments you ve had with your daughter and raising your daughter what was your biggest fear in raising a daughter Bruce Chamoff 00 03 47 What I ve been hearing about from most people and that is oh love her right now because when she becomes a teenager she s not gonna wanna know you And then you gotta watch out for all the guys And of course I m thinking well I don t really care about that now We re gonna go through 10 or 12 years of her not me not worrying about that and that s what happened But when she hit about 13 she was acting like a teenager and that s when everybody says just watch the guys They re gonna come They re gonna blow on I m like okay Bruce Chamoff 00 04 12 And I believe that s the big fear from Dr Christopher Lewis 00 04 14 It is scary And now how did you get through that for yourself Bruce Chamoff 00 04 18 I mean really you can t prepare for that You just have to go through it My friend Jay has I forgot how old his daughter is now but it s funny because he was telling me I love my daughter She says I m the greatest dad in the world I m like yeah you know my daughter told me that too And after a while it becomes sort of the opposite when it become a teenager So just appreciate all the compliments she s giving you right now because those compliments will go away for at least 4 to 5 years and then they ll come back And then he said to me well I m playing Roblox with her Bruce Chamoff 00 04 49 I said oh yeah I played Roblox with my daughter He says they were around back then I m like yeah They re very big company They re now public They have a stock People are investing in the stocks Like I didn t know that Bruce Chamoff 00 04 58 I m like yeah I didn t know that either But I m now giving him advice that no one gave me because his daughter I think is about 5 years younger than mine So what I went through and honestly my daughter and I get along really well now I m excited to know what s going on in her life She calls me almost every day She s working for me on the podcast network We get along great and it s amazing Bruce Chamoff 00 05 19 I just said Jay it s gonna be a little bit of a ride when she becomes a teenager And I tell all the dads if your daughter is not a teenager right now and what people are telling you about your love her right now and appreciate all the love that she s giving you because when she becomes a teenager she s not going to know you And honestly most people told me that All I can say is you can t really prepare for that All you can do is prepare yourself because you can t change your daughter Your daughter s gonna go that way She s gonna be influenced by peer pressure She s gonna be influenced by other teenagers and there s nothing you can do about that Bruce Chamoff 00 05 51 You can only change yourself as a dad and how you deal with it and just learn to accept it know it s coming and also you can take comfort in the fact it s gonna go away a couple years later And that s what I thought as Dr Christopher Lewis 00 06 02 I mentioned things are not always easy As you said you get into those teenage years and sometimes they could be bumpy but there s heart there s times that ll go simply and they just flow There s times that will be challenging and you get through those and you push through those What s been the hardest part for you in being a father to a daughter Bruce Chamoff 00 06 21 That s kind of a loaded question I mean I would say probably another mistake that parents make and I made this too and this is what the hardest part is is trying to get your child whether it s a son or a daughter to be exactly like you And I tell all the dads that s never going to happen And you know what My dad got ups He got upset with me too because I wasn t into the things that he was into And you have to realize that your child especially a daughter will never be like you They ll have some of those traits Right Because they are your kid but they ll never be exactly like you Bruce Chamoff 00 06 52 And also the mother you re whether you re married or not your co parent is not like you either So your daughter is going to take some of those traits as well and your daughter is going to take some of the of the traits from your entire family that also might not be you So the hardest part for me was okay determining how is she like me how is she not like me and how we actually end up in the middle and accept all those things that she s not like me And I m doing it And it s it s really cool thing because now I m learning from my daughter My father told me when I was a kid that daddies know everything And of course when you re a kid you don t know much You don t have an education So you re going to believe that your father knows everything Bruce Chamoff 00 07 27 And then as I started growing up and learning computer programming I realized my father doesn t know how to program So now at this point daddies don t know everything And now my daughter is teaching me things that I never knew So it s great Learn from your kids Dr Christopher Lewis 00 07 42 You definitely can learn from your kids I find that with my own daughters that I learn things from them you know sometimes things that I don t wanna know but but you definitely are still learning things and growing with them And and that s important because you know the the minute that you turn that off or the minute you re not willing to learn from others and from your daughters specifically that s gonna close off the relationship And so it s really important to be able to keep that relationship open in that regard I know you re a busy guy and you ve got a lot of things going on You re an entrepreneur You you have this network that you re doing as well You re doing a lot of different things and you ve been doing this for quite a few years Dr Christopher Lewis 00 08 21 So as you look at the life that you ve had and all the different things that you have done talk to me about balance and what you had to do balance the things that you were doing outside of the house and what you were trying to be inside the house to be that dad that you wanted to be Bruce Chamoff 00 08 40 I ll be honest with you I m not the best at balancing and I m still learning that as I go through my life Work life balance I understand is absolutely important in anybody s life So especially people who work And I ll be the first to admit that I m a workaholic And at times when my daughter was growing up there were times that I worked so hard that I did neglect her and I was always there for her I mean anytime she needed me I I jumped and stopped what I was doing But I always worked so hard and there were times when I said to myself I just have to stop what I m doing right now and just be a dad and not be an entrepreneur and not be a workaholic Bruce Chamoff 00 09 20 And it s it s hard because you re a workaholic for a reason you know it s just like an alcoholic you cannot stop drinking alcohol that easily and workaholic is the same thing So I learned to just cut myself off at a certain time You know when 5 o clock came I said that s it I m done working I know I have a lot of things to do Still I have a lot of unfinished projects that I wanna keep on working on And it s not just about the work life balance It s also for your own health and your own stress level Bruce Chamoff 00 09 49 If you re a workaholic and you find it hard to stop being that way my solution is to force yourself to just stop working at a certain time of the day If you have to set an alarm which is what I had to do the alarm goes off and that s it You stop working and you spend time with your family and that s it So that s what I ve been doing And you know I m in I m now in my fifties So the one thing that s actually in my advantage like if if you re in your if you re in the older generation your circadian rhythm which is your sleep cycle shifts to an earlier time of the day which makes it easy to stop working later on that day So I used to go from to start working at like 8 o clock in the morning to now I start working at 4 30 in the morning And that s easy for me to do to get up that early Bruce Chamoff 00 10 34 But with that said I also cannot work past 5 o clock at night So at that point if a dad is in that particular age range I would say probably 40 years in age of up and up It s easy to get up earlier to start working and stop working and then spend time with your family So to me I think that younger dads will have a hard time with the work life balance than older dads That s my experience Dr Christopher Lewis 00 11 00 Now I know that I mentioned at the beginning that you re a podcaster You run this network called The World Podcast Network You ve been podcasting for quite some time and I am a podcaster I m a podcasting fan And I know what drew me in to this genre But you ve been doing this for longer than I have So talk to me about what drew you into podcasting from an early point and how that impacted you as an ad Bruce Chamoff 00 11 28 When I was in college I wanted to join the college radio station and that was Kean University in Union New Jersey which at the time was called Kean College And I graduated in 1988 I love heavy metal I still do And my daughter and I have seen a lot of hard rock and heavy metal concerts which I m so happy that she was into that music for a long time And it also made us a little closer having the music connection together And I wanted to play my favorite heavy metal music but I couldn t get on to the radio station because it was booked All the DJs the radio station was just full of DJs and there was no there were no openings Bruce Chamoff 00 12 07 So life went on I graduated college I ve got a I got a degree in marketing and I got a couple of jobs 2005 when everybody was buying the iPad like almost everybody had an iPad and I realized podcasting was out there I ignored it And then I was in a bookstore and saw from Todd Cochran of the Blueberry Network the book for introduction to podcasting Like oh this is a real thing because there s a book here I didn t think twice Bruce Chamoff 00 12 35 I just didn t even look at it and I just took it off the shelf It was a shiny silver cover with green lettering You can t miss that among other books The artwork on the front cover was just there to grab your attention and it did And I read that book literally within a week And I m like I m starting my podcast And I did And that s when I started my first podcast called the Fresh Music Series which is I finally got to be the DJ to play my music Bruce Chamoff 00 13 01 Now I was on Long Island at the time and I went on to Craigslist and put in that I had a podcast And And because I m also a musician I m a songwriter and I m still putting music out If anybody wants to check my music out on Spotify it s just look up Bruce Chamble So I wanted to promote my own music but I m like I m not gonna be selfish about this Maybe I could get other podcasters to come on to my podcast And I put that Craigslist ad out and literally I had about 10 bands saying hey Play my music Play my music Bruce Chamoff 00 13 30 Play my music Okay But you have to first email me that I have your permission that you re not gonna sue me in copyright infringement And they said yeah you have my permission I have it in writing I went ahead and put people s music on my podcast and not once did I get sued for that So I m happy about that And then I realized that there is something called the pod safe music directory started by Adam Curry of MTV and I started downloading all that music Bruce Chamoff 00 13 53 But my main goal is to promote my own music and other local bands And that s what I did Being a web developer and a marketing visionary I envisioned more than one podcast And I figured maybe I should build a website It wasn t called The Podcast Network yet where I have multiple podcasts I know there are other podcasters out there So I built a website called the Long Island Podcast Network And I called it a podcast network because I wanted to be like a radio network a TV network a network of podcasts Bruce Chamoff 00 14 27 There was no podcast network out there yet So I coined the term And from there 100 of podcast networks have sprung up all over the world now But I went back on Craigslist and put an ad out there to the community and said if you have a podcast sign up Here s the link And I got 20 podcasts literally within 2 2 months And then I had to expand the network I got health sports technology business I mean everybody was doing all types of podcasts Bruce Chamoff 00 14 55 And then I got called by Newsday which is the biggest newspaper out there on Long Island I m like do you wanna do an article on my network I m like this is like huge And they came to my house They did a whole a whole photo shoot on me I started the podcast network February of 2006 so exactly 18 years now And then 11 months later in November it came out And I was like blown away It was a it was a page and a half and it s a huge network Bruce Chamoff 00 15 18 There was a band called The Mondays that was founded by a friend of mine or fronted by a friend of mine named Ken Carmen He joined the network and they re a pretty big alternative band They re really talented rock band And I played saxophone with them a few times and that s it Like he he told other people people joined So it s great Now to answer your other question how did this affect me as a dad and my relationship with my daughter I just decided to get my daughter involved So my daughter was how old was she She was 4 or actually yeah Bruce Chamoff 00 15 48 No She was 3 at the time And I m like you know what Work life balance If I m gonna do this I wanna get my daughter involved and I think that s another thing that my advice to dads are whatever you re doing if you re a workaholic like me find a way to incorporate your daughter into your work and make it fun because that s work life balance Right You don t it doesn t have to be just you And here s a good example When I was 8 years old my father he was a CPA And when I was 8 years old he was working very hard during tax season Bruce Chamoff 00 16 19 IRS needs everybody s taxes filed by April 15th So he would get bombarded He would be working overnight and overnight and overnight and he decided to incorporate me into his business So he had me doing filing at 8 years old And that s a good example It doesn t matter what you re in I mean if you re if you re a busy lawyer then somehow you must have law firm law forms right people fill out Have your daughter come Bruce Chamoff 00 16 44 Let her do some filing Teach her early how to be an entrepreneur and find a way And I got my daughter involved and it was just amazing My daughter also and I we we did have a podcast called the daddy and daughter podcast It was only like 4 episodes and it just it it didn t work after a while but it s still out there on YouTube So no that s what you gotta do Dr Christopher Lewis 00 17 02 It is what you have to do And you have to find that not only for yourself that niche for yourself I mean I run about 5 different podcast myself I m either hosting or producing and each is just a little bit different And it goes to that multi passionate aspect I hear people talk about people being multi passionate and having those different things that are you re you re so passionate about And and I guess for me you you know bringing your daughter in and having her involved right now how is she involved with your podcasting network And how is that framing what she wants to do with her life Bruce Chamoff 00 17 36 My daughter is the maintenance manager of the World Podcast Network We have grown so fast We have over a 1000 podcasts that now we need to do maintenance every single day And my daughter does the maintenance She looks at the analytics because we give podcasters analytics You can see your downloads and everything else I mean just like Buzzsprout and Anchor and Podbean they have their analytics We have analytics as well and so does Spotify Bruce Chamoff 00 18 05 So we keep data like we collect the data And my daughter will look at the analytics make sure that they re up to date they re working well Sometimes the podcasters they don t like their analytics So they say well why is this graphic high Why is it low And my daughter looks at that and she analyzes it but she does other things too Like she ll she ll do some data entry for the podcast network She ll run reports She ll generate reports And she has a whole admin screen and a collection of reports that she actually maintains Bruce Chamoff 00 18 35 And she does a really good job with it So I m really very proud and to have her working for me And the other thing too is when I work for my dad and he passed away in 2005 so maybe he rest in peace I feel like I m giving back to my father by having my daughter work for me So it s coming around full circle and I love that aspect of it Dr Christopher Lewis 00 18 54 Now have a go going from where you were to where you are today where do you go from here Bruce Chamoff 00 19 00 That s an interesting loaded question I would have to say that we just keep on defining our mission and making our mission better and trying to help people I mean my mission is to help podcasters succeed in a lot of ways growth monetization and just getting their message out like whatever the theme of their podcast is And every podcast has a theme The question is are you reaching the right people Are you reaching your target market I mean I m a marketing guy like I said so I think in terms of target market and demographics and things like that So yeah I think about how do I make The World Podcast Network better for the community And how do I make The World Podcast Network help podcasters succeed And I just sit down and plan out that goal and I build it And then my team test it and we go back and forth with feedback and it s a cool thing you know That s why I keep going Dr Christopher Lewis 00 19 51 No I love what you re doing and bringing podcasts together and being able to bring people together Now podcasters are storytellers And podcasts to be honest I mean for anyone are stories And individuals that run podcasts love to tell stories or bring those stories out As a father you re a storyteller as well And many times fathers speak over the years are oral tell storytellers in trying to help their daughters help their kids in many different ways How have you found that being a podcaster has influenced you as a storyteller but also as a father in being able to better lead your own daughter in the ways of the world Bruce Chamoff 00 20 37 Interesting question I mean I m a public speaker I have absolutely no problems telling anybody anything in public And to me the more people I speak in front of the better And most people are the opposite Right Nobody likes most people don t like public speaking but I love it And my daughter has actually traveled with me in a few to a few places when I ve spoken at WordPress conferences or WordCamps She s traveled with me to Cincinnati and I don t don t I think she s I forgot where else she traveled me to but she saw me and she said that she s not really a public speaker Bruce Chamoff 00 21 12 I don t think that she would get in front of people and speak at this moment in time Maybe she ll change on that But I really just love showing my daughter that I have no problem getting in front of a group of people and speaking It s given me confidence And she did tell me in Cincinnati that she was impressed with how I can just control an audience I thought that was awesome Dr Christopher Lewis 00 21 30 Well I really appreciate you sharing that I think it s important and it s important to be able to see where you ve been and where you are today and where you re going in the future And that helps your own kids to be able to set a path for themselves Now we all always finish our interviews with what I like to call our fatherhood 5 where I ask you 5 more questions to delve deeper into you as a dad Are you ready Very cool Let s do it In one word what is fatherhood Bruce Chamoff 00 21 52 I ll just call it joy Dr Christopher Lewis 00 21 53 When was the time that you finally felt like you succeeded at being a father to a daughter Bruce Chamoff 00 21 58 Around 2006 when I started coaching her soccer team Dr Christopher Lewis 00 22 02 And what did you find in that that made you really feel that way Bruce Chamoff 00 22 05 Just the fact that my daughter and I connected in a particular activity that we could do together I coached and she played It was nice connection between the 2 of us And also just the fact that like I said before we went to a lot of rock concerts together I think my daughter and I have been to if I had to count we ve been to 6 concerts together I think And and that includes some pretty classic rock bands like we ve been to the kids concert together too Dr Christopher Lewis 00 22 26 Now the question is is did you dress up like the band when you were there with the paint face paint and everything Bruce Chamoff 00 22 32 No Not at all But I did before like I think in 1995 I did open up for Furley s Comet So that was exciting That was in New Jersey Dr Christopher Lewis 00 22 40 That s awesome Now if I was to talk to your daughter how would she describe you as a dad Bruce Chamoff 00 22 45 Hopefully my daughter would describe me as a very caring dad and a very hardworking dad to make us successful and giving Dr Christopher Lewis 00 22 53 Now who inspires you to be a better dad Bruce Chamoff 00 22 55 My dad That was an easy question Dr Christopher Lewis 00 22 57 Now you ve given a number of piece of advice a number of number of things that you ve learned along the way that you ve shared today As we finish up what s one piece of advice you d wanna give to every dad Bruce Chamoff 00 23 07 As I mentioned for the younger dads with younger kids don t worry if they become teenagers and they stop talking to you Just learn to accept it Don t stress over it and know that that will go away when you become a little older and never stop loving them No matter what they tell you no matter how disobedient they are just give them your heart and be patient with them and everything else will just fall into place Dr Christopher Lewis 00 23 29 Well Bruce I wanna say thank you Thank you for being here Now if people if people wanna find out more about you your podcast network etcetera where should they go Bruce Chamoff 00 23 38 You can look up Bruce Chamoff on all the social media LinkedIn mostly I m on Facebook just like everybody else or a lot of people And I m just starting to get on the TikTok but you can always go on to the world podcast network at well podcast dot network and send me a contact form message Dr Christopher Lewis 00 23 55 Well again Bruce thank you Thank you for being here Thank you for sharing your own journey as a father and I wish you all the best Bruce Chamoff 00 24 00 Thanks for having me Chris It was a lot of fun being on your podcast so thank you so much It s my pleasure too Dr Christopher Lewis 00 24 06 If you ve enjoyed today s episode of the Dads with Daughters podcast we invite you to check out the Fatherhood Insider The fatherhood insider is the essential resource for any dad that wants to be the best dad that he can be We know that no child comes with an instruction manual and most dads are figuring it out as they go along and the fatherhood insider is full of resources and information that will up your game on fatherhood Through our extensive course library interactive forum step by step roadmaps and more you will engage and learn with experts but more importantly dads like you So check it out at fathering together org If you are a father of a daughter and have not yet joined the with daughters Facebook community there s a link in the notes today Dads with daughters is a program of fathering together We look forward to having you back for another great guest next week all geared to helping you raise strong and powered daughters and be the best dad that you can be Dr Christopher Lewis 00 25 04 We re all in the same boat And it s full of tiny screaming passengers We spend the time We give the lessons We make the meals We buy them presents and and bring your a game Because those kids are growing fast The time goes by just like a dynamite blast Calling astronauts and firemen carpenters and musclemen Get out and be the world Choose them Be the best dad you can be Click here to visit this podcast episode