Episode #45 :: Pablo and Birdy + Elsie Escobar

Today I’m chatting with Elsie Escobar, a podcasting pundit and all-round creative currently living in North Carolina, USA.

We talked about all sorts of fascinating experiences – from being an immigrant and the themes of belonging to having children later in life to creativity and the through-lines from theatre to yoga teaching to podcasting.

Elsie works in the cross-section of technology, digital media & holistic living with a heavy bias on podcast strategy and creative use of audio. She’s been a podcaster since 2006 and was one of the first female indie podcasters using audio to teach yoga. Elsie’s Yoga Class has now been downloaded over 4 million times.

She’s currently the only female pundit in the podcasting space with expert insight into indie podcasters’ impact, influence, and power.

Elsie’s obsession for podcasting got her a job working with Libsyn, the leading podcast host and distribution network and she’s since had the pleasure of working with hundreds of podcasters, sharing tools for better production, educating them in the fast moving podcasting space, as well as cultivating a strongly engaged community through The Feed: The Official Libsyn podcast which she both co-hosts and produces.

Elsie also co-runs the largest community for women in podcasting with a corresponding podcast (of course) called She Podcasts.

As a die-hard podcast junkie who lives, breathes and works the medium, her sole mission is to empower people to continue to share their voices.

Enjoy our ramble through the children’s story of Pablo and Birdy as well as Elsie’s relationship with her body and creativity.

Resources from this episode:

Connecting with Elsie:

Connecting with Janelle:

Reciprocity & Appreciation

This is an ad-free self-produced podcast, and I’d love to hire people to do the technical aspects of it, as well as to transcribe the show notes (because those aren’t my strengths!)

If you appreciate the Wild Elixir podcast, please support the show at: www.patreon.com/janellehardy or make a one-time donation with this paypal button:    

My first goal is to raise $100 a month so I can hire a transcriptionist! You can help over at PATREON.

Things we chatted about in this episode:

  • the children’s book Pablo and Birdy
  • the strength of the winds of change, how Pablo wants to know the truth of where he came from
  • how it’s a coming of age, rites of passage, letting go kind of story
  • on the experience of immigrating as a child – identifying so strongly with the original home yet feeling like you don’t belong in either place
  • On trying to focus on lovely stories of little girls, as she’s raising girls
  • The children’s chapter book Amina’s Voice and how it helps open up space for conversation with children and adults
  • how much the book resonates because of being an immigrant to the USA (from El Salvador) as a 9 year old child
  • being able to work through challenges around friendship and misunderstandings as young girls
  • relationship with creativity
  • on being from a creative family that has always trusted her
  • creativity has allowed her to ebb and flow through the things she’s done – actor, professional yoga instructor, becoming a podcaster and podcasting pundit/expert
  • how the throughline has always been about facilitating giving voice, about empowering people (including herself) to recognize the transformational power of their endeavours
  • because of having a throughline, she’s found her teaching has simply built on itself and become more and more distilled, regardless of the medium
  • relationship with body
  • On having always had a good ‘yay!’ relationship with her body
  • discovered a positive relationship with her body early on
  • knows she’s been blessed with a consistent weight and great genes
  • having come from a family of doctors, gotten into health and holistic medicine early on, and the empowered state that has arisen from that
  • finding it challenging being a mom – having had later in life (at 36 and 39) – how choosing attachment parenting, a family bed, homeschooling and extended breastfeeding, although a choice that works for her family, has also depleted her
  • how being an introvert and needing lots of quiet time has led to isolating herself when she’s needed support
  • how looking great on the outside doesn’t always reflect the depletion in the inside
  • on the intensity of seasons – especially the early childhood years