Feeling Stuck? How to Jumpstart Your Podcast After a Break
Taking a break from podcasting—whether planned or unplanned—can leave you feeling disconnected, unsure, or even a little rusty. But here’s the truth: momentum doesn’t come from perfection; it comes from taking action.
If you’ve been away from the mic for a while, it’s normal to feel hesitant about restarting. The good news? You don’t have to dive in all at once. With the right steps, you can rebuild your podcasting momentum and reconnect with your audience in a way that feels natural and exciting.
In this post, I’m sharing three simple steps to help you jumpstart your podcast after a break.
1. Reset Your Mindset
Before you hit record, take a moment to reset your mindset. It’s easy to let self-doubt creep in after time away. You might find yourself thinking:
What if my audience has moved on?
What if my first episode back isn’t good enough?
Here’s the thing: your audience doesn’t expect perfection—they want authenticity. Give yourself permission to restart, even if it feels a little messy. Remember, the act of showing up is what matters most.
💡 Quick Tip: Write down one positive affirmation to help you reframe self-doubt, such as: “Each episode I create helps me grow and connect with my audience.”
2. Refresh Your Podcast Content Ideas
If you’re feeling uninspired, it’s time to revisit your content strategy. Start by asking:
What topics did my audience love in the past?
What questions are they asking right now?
What themes excite me as a creator?
You can also look at your analytics to see which episodes performed well and consider how you can expand on those topics. Another great way to spark ideas? Engage with your audience directly through polls, social media, or email.
💡 Quick Tip: Brainstorm three to five episode ideas that align with your current goals and audience interests.
3. Ease Back In with Quick Wins
Jumping back into a full production schedule can feel overwhelming, so start small. Consider:
Recording a mini-episode: Share a quick update or reflection to reconnect with your audience.
Repurposing past content: Highlight key moments from old episodes or expand on a popular topic.
Sharing behind-the-scenes content: Let your audience know what you’ve been up to and why you’re excited to be back.
These quick wins will help you rebuild confidence and re-engage your audience without the pressure of creating a full-length episode right away.
💡 Quick Tip: Treat your first episode back as a casual conversation—it doesn’t have to be perfect, just real.
Momentum Comes from Action
The most important thing to remember? Momentum comes from doing. The first step back might feel challenging, but with every episode, you’ll regain your rhythm, rebuild your confidence, and reconnect with your audience.
If you’re ready to take your podcast to the next level, I invite you to join my Podcast to Profit Challenge on January 30th. This five-day challenge is designed to help you grow and monetize your podcast while building momentum and staying consistent.
✨ What you’ll get:
Actionable strategies to turn your podcast into a powerful business tool.
Live Q&A to answer your burning questions about podcasting growth.
A supportive community to keep you motivated.
👉 Register now at wildhomepodcasting.com/profit.
Taking a break from podcasting doesn’t mean you’ve lost momentum—it’s an opportunity to reset, refresh, and come back stronger. By focusing on mindset, content, and small, intentional actions, you can jumpstart your podcast and make it even better than before.
Your audience is ready to hear from you. Let’s make 2025 your best podcasting year yet!
The Transcript for Share, Strategize, & Shine:
207: Feeling Stuck? How to Jumpstart Your Podcast After a Break
[00:00:00] It's a new year. And if you're anything like me taking a break, whether planned or unplanned can leave you feeling a little. Uh, shall we say rusty? Maybe you're staring at the mic, wondering where to even start or feeling like the longer you wait, the harder it is to hit record. Does this sound familiar to anyone? Well, you're not alone.
[00:00:20] And today I'm breaking down practical, no fluff strategies to help you get back into the groove, refresh your ideas and rebuild your confidence behind the mic. By the end of this episode, you'll have a clear game plan to restart your momentum and crush your podcasting goals in 2025.
[00:00:35]
[00:00:35] [00:01:00] Hello, everyone. Welcome back to share strategize and shine and welcome back to a new year. I have been on a very long break. I decided to take some extra time off over the holidays because I got super sick. Uh, first I got COVID then I developed a super terrible. Sinus infection and all of that, coupled with Jess trying to make the holidays magical and do all the things that we usually do. Was absolutely exhausting. And I was super excited to get back into the groove this week. And start back at work.
[00:01:54] Well, so I'm actually recording this, on a Friday. So this episode comes out the following Monday. So [00:02:00] I've already been working a week, but. It has not been all sunshine and rainbows. And I was sitting down, working on my podcast. Content calendar for January, February, and March. And I was like, you know, I would love to talk about this feeling of. I don't know if I want to come back to everything.
[00:02:19] I don't know. Like I'm having trouble getting back into it. And so I really hope this episode helps you today. It definitely is coming from a place of personal. Uh, feelings. This is how I feel about it. Uh, sitting down and recording this podcast episode was really hard to fit into my schedule this week. And not because I'm super busy, just it's just like getting back into it.
[00:02:41] So let's dive in. Let's chat about it. Let's go. First things. First let's talk mindset. Coming back after a break can stir up all kinds of doubts. What if I lost my audience? What if I sound out of practice, what if no, one's even waiting. [00:03:00] For my next episode. If you're nodding along. Let's just hit pause on all those worries.
[00:03:07] The truth is, is that momentum is never about stopping. It's about learning how to start again and starting is the hardest part. I mean, let me tell you, I met with my business coach this week and I sat with her for 45 minutes and we talked about how I felt like I had lost all the momentum in my business, all the work we had done everything we had been working towards over the break.
[00:03:32] So like, this is a thing, this is a real thing. But I want to make it easy for us. So step one. I want you to give yourself permission to restart messy. Your first episode back does not need to be perfect. It just needs to happen. And I think this is with any break that you take, whether it's a summer break, whether it's, you know, the back to school rush, and then you come back to your podcast, this applies across the board. Just [00:04:00] restart. Getting back into the motion of getting an episode out, sitting down, recording again. It can be very, very messy as this episode may turn out to be who knows.
[00:04:09] We'll see what happens. Step two. I want you to celebrate progress over perfection. So even if today's episode feels a little off, it's proof that you're moving forward, and that really is the important piece, right. Moving forward. I want to give you a quick mindset shift. I want you to think of this as a fresh season. Not just a continuation.
[00:04:30] You're not picking up the pieces, you're building something new, stronger, and better. And when I approach things like that, Then that word momentum means so much more to me than it did before. Like I'm already feeling better just having talked that out with you. So now that we've reset your mindset. Let's talk about your content plan, because if you're not excited about what you're recording, it's going to feel like a chore instead of an opportunity.
[00:04:59] [00:05:00] So we want to do a quick refresh of our ideas. I don't want this to be a long, crazy process. And here's a couple of things that we can do. One is you can revisit what worked. So go back and look at your analytics before the break, which episodes resonated most with your audience. And I want you to use that as a starting point for new topics or spinoffs.
[00:05:20] Like how can you dive deeper into a certain topic? Or what would go with that topic? The reason why it's important to go back and look at your analytics. It's because you will often find little gems, little hidden goldmines of content ideas. In your previous content. And so never hesitate to go and look and do that because let me tell you, there have been times when I've gone back and an episode that I didn't think was going to do very well did even better than I thought it would.
[00:05:50] And that gave me some things to really think about for my podcast episodes. The next thing you can do, especially during a break. And right after you come back from break is [00:06:00] ask your audience, you know, pull your email list or your social media followers. What do they want to hear more about this year? The answers may surprise you, but they will definitely inspire you.
[00:06:11] And I think this is one of the things that we forget a lot when we are podcasting. Sometimes it feels like we're podcasting in a silo, right? We're in our office by herself. I actually left my door open for this episode, just because I don't, I don't want to close it. I just don't want to be by myself in here. But we forget sometimes to connect with our audience.
[00:06:28] And so doing that as you're coming back from a break is a really good idea to get you going. The other thing I love to do is batch brainstorming. I talk about this a lot. When I talk about planning, I actually don't. Batch my episodes like batch record, but I do batch brainstorm. So you can grab a notebook, open a Google doc, you know, set a timer for 10 minutes and just write down. Every episode idea that comes to mind.
[00:06:53] No filtering. This will give you a momentum and it'll give you a list to pull from and bonus points. If [00:07:00] you even think about like, what do I have coming up in my business? What am I marketing? What am I selling when my promoting. What am I excited about? What, what things are people talking about in my industry and just do a brain dump, do a download and see what you can come up with.
[00:07:15] I actually did this yesterday for Instagram content. I was talking with, my Instagram coach, Elizabeth Marbury, who I love. And she was like, you know, even the talk more about this thing. And I was like, you are correct. And so what I did was in sat down and just brain dump. Like, what would that look like? And it really helped me come up with a lot of ideas and you can do the same thing for your podcast.
[00:07:39] I will often start with a brain dump. So. I'll just write down, like all. All kinds of topics. I'm thinking of. And then I will help use chat GPT to help me do that. Uh, help me brainstorm even further or dial in on those topics or come up with some topics, right. That I could talk about. And then I plug it [00:08:00] into my calendar. And if you are doing this and you're getting stuck. Here's a pro tip.
[00:08:05] You can think themes. So, for example, you could do new year new habits. Something around the new year. Everybody's thinking new year, they're starting new things. It's a good time to do something around that. Right. Uh, top trends in your industry. I think I mentioned this for 2025. Like what's coming down the pipeline in your industry for 2025. What are you already seeing a lot of, what are people already talking about that you can build on or myth bust, anything like that is going to be really great.
[00:08:36] And then you could even do some behind the scenes.
[00:08:39] You know, what were some lessons that you learned during your break? What are some things that you worked on? Themes make planning easier and then keep listeners coming back for more, especially if you do mini series, which I love doing mini series. I think they're great for building up your listenership. So, those are just some ideas to think about. [00:09:00] As you are doing your brainstorming.
[00:09:04] Now let's talk about some quick wins because I think one of the fastest ways to build confidence after. A break or any moment of self doubt around recording. Is to take action and see results. So the first thing you could do. Is simply record a mini episode, you know, instead of diving. Right into a full length. 30 minute. Who knows how long episode start with a 10 minute update or even a Q and a session. This is going to lower the pressure, right.
[00:09:38] To deliver a huge episode, something super impactful, something that's going to do all the things right. Let's lower the pressure, but this is going to keep you consistent, which is important because what we want to do is start developing those habits back that we had before that were helping us stay consistent with our pop, our podcast. The second thing you can do is [00:10:00] repurpose past content.
[00:10:01] This is not done enough. So if you're like me and you're in. You know, It's your 200th episode plus, or your hundredth episode plus, or maybe you've been podcasting for a few years in different iterations. Look at your past episodes. Do you have one that you could re error? Could you pull out the highlights and create a best of recap? This is one of my favorite things to do when I absolutely do not have time to record or want to record or feel lost on the topic. Because inevitably you have a, I call it the library of knowledge. It's literally this archive of everything, you know, in podcast form. And the cool thing about it is. More often than not, you can go back and pull some of those episodes and they are still relevant.
[00:10:53] So definitely. I think about reusing past content. It's a win-win you're going to save [00:11:00] time and your audience is still going to get value. And then one of my favorite things to do is to share up as high in the scenes. So post a quick video or a story on Instagram. Talking about what's coming up on the podcast.
[00:11:14] Okay. So what does this have to do with building momentum? Well, here's the thing. If you are teasing out new content, Uh, not only is it going to build excitement for your audience? But it's also going to help you build some accountability. So knowing that well, I said I was going to do the thing now I have to do the thing.
[00:11:33] You know, sometimes we need a little external pressure to get going. But this also gets your audience involved. This tells them that, Hey. I'm coming back from a break. This is going to be really exciting. I'm going to be talking about these things. And it makes them part of the process and that's what your audience wants.
[00:11:53] They want to be part of the process. They want to feel like they have an inside track to what you have going on. That's where [00:12:00] that connection really forms and those bonds build with your listeners. Right. So don't hesitate to do some kind of teaser. Whenever we do a podcast refresh. This is actually one of the things that we will do. Before we relaunch or refresh the relaunch, we start teasing it because we want our listeners to. I get excited about it, to think about it too.
[00:12:24] Oh, that's right. I used to love this podcast. Now she's coming back with a new iteration. This is kind of the same concept. So, you know, even though I did not post a new episode last week, I did reshare an old episode to my email list, which actually got a lot of clicks. Um, it was something that I felt was really relevant and actually wasn't a super old episode.
[00:12:44] It was, it was from recently, but it just felt really relevant. I reassured that with my email list and, and said, you know where you are going to have a new episode coming out next week. And so that just built some excitement. It built some accountability. And it's helping me sit down and record [00:13:00] this episode right now. So there you have it. Three simple steps to get back behind the mic with confidence. After a break, let's just go through those steps again.
[00:13:11] So you can remember what they were reset your mindset. Refresh your content ideas. And use quick wins to ease into recording. Momentum does not come from thinking about podcasting, right? If we're thinking about the thing, that's not creating momentum. It comes from the actual doing it. So before you overthink it, I want you to just hit record and start. That is the most important thing. And if you're ready to take things to the next level. I've got something super exciting and special for you.
[00:13:45] I am hosting my popular five day challenge podcast to profit. This experience is designed to help you not only build momentum, but start growing and monetizing your podcasts. So you can head to wild home podcasting.com/profit to [00:14:00] join. And we are going to have a live Q and a session on January 30th. So be sure to look for that. And let's make 2025 the best podcasting year yet. I know you can.
[00:14:13] I know that I can, and I'm here to help you. Thanks so much and I'll be back next time with a new episode.
