How can you handle an insane work load? How can you manage to get the impossible done? How do you stay fired up over the years with your work?
John Lee Dumas from Entrepreneur on Fire did what even his mentor considered stupid: he launched a 7-day-a-week podcast interviewing entrepreneurs. Three years later and he has over a million downloads per month and is known for being a podcaster with a vibrant and dedicated community, Fire Nation.
In this interview we talk about how he literally gets so much work done and also what keeps him going day after day, year after year. We discuss writing, community, email, and his new book, The Freedom Journal. All packed into a very compact interview. John knows how to bring the value!
Listen to Create If Writing – Episode 034
Here are a few of my favorite links to some of my favorite interviews & resources from John!
- Free Podcast Course
- Get Your First 10,000 Readers– EOFire interview with Nick Stephenson
- The Many Voices of Freedom– EOFire Interview with Fizzle’s Chase Reeves
- Elusive Freedom– EOFire interview with Amy Schmittauer (who was on episode 32 of Create If Writing!)
- JLD on Snapchat
- The Freedom Journal

Highlights from the Interview
- Working in batches can help you accomplish even huge tasks– like interviewing at least seven people every week for your podcast.
- You will go to bed at night the same way if you get a few things done or a lot of things done. It’s your choice.
- Look at what you’re great at and focus on those strengths.
- The focus for every entrepreneur needs to be creating free, valuable, consistent content.
- You want to ask people what they are struggling with as you engage with them. This reveals their pain points or problems. Your job is to create a product, service, or community to help serve that need.
- Be yourself and connect consistently with your audience.
- If you want to get better at a craft, whether writing or podcasting or something else, you need to be brave and DO IT. Write. Start a podcast. Be brave and get better as you DO.
“We need to amplify our strengths and ignore or hire for our weaknesses.” -John Lee Dumas
Do you want to accomplish ONE goal in the next 90 days? John’s latest passion project is The Freedom Journal, which helps walk you through accomplishing one smart goal in 90 days. It’s not a one-time thing, but a way of focusing on one important thing at a time. John is on his third iteration, so I always love hearing from people who USE their own things to be sure they work.
I always ask my guests but often forget to ask YOU. What’s inspiring YOU this week?
Really enjoyed being a guest on your show Kirsten! Thanks for the great opportunity!!
It was great to talk with you! And man, you’re FAST with the comments! Appreciate it. 🙂
On my must-listen list! Anyone who loves the Oxford Comma and follows JLD advice is good in my book. 🙂