E294 – Tyler Christensen – How to start a blog about your passion and make an earning.

Junaid Ahmed 0:10
Thank you for tuning in to hacks and hobbies with your host Junaid. In Season Two of hacks and hobbies were visited by our amazing guests coming from all walks of life, what to learn their story, their struggles and their journey on how they got to where they are today. So stick around

In this episode, I get to speak with a teacher, a writer, and a speaker, Tyler Christensen. He is doing exactly what I'm doing but he's actually a teacher. He teaches fifth grade class and he's into a lot of different hobbies and we got connected through Spotify com. I know this is not a sponsor first, but I guess, but they are a really cool site and service that a free service they recently learned about. And so through spot a guest, Tyler Christensen reached out to me and said, You know, I've got a message that will serve your audience very well. So I was like, you know, let's talk. Let's get on the podcast. So here we have Tyler Christensen. Thank you so much for getting on the podcast.

Tyler Christensen 1:23
Thank you. It's great to be here.

Junaid Ahmed 1:25
Absolutely. Think. Good to have you. So. So the first you know, the first thing I get into stina How did Where did your journey start from and a lot of time we tell everybody in you know, we have it on our on our intros and BIOS, you know, a version of a journey that everybody's read about. But what's the version of a journey that's no one's heard of before. There's always things that we leave out, you know, that's probably not important. So, what's your version?

Tyler Christensen 1:58
Well, so this great question. Because I don't know if I've actually ever told anyone where my journey started. I I'm into a ton of different things. And part of it is because I've been in the teaching school for the last 15 years or so. And from the very beginning as a school teacher I knew at during summers and during the off times, I have things that I can work on. And you know, hobbies are great, but hobbies that make money are better because again, I'm a school teacher, so I don't get paid it out. You know, though, so I've I've tinkered with things for years and years, but it was when I was in grad school to become a professor, where I really thought I needed find something on the side that's not just research and publishing and things like that, but something that I'm passionate about that can bring that in, and my students actually helped me with this. I was teaching a class in educational technology and we were talking about blogging and and they said, well I was promoting this as like blogging is so good because you develop your voice and you become an expert on whatever you're writing about. And I had done a lot of blogging in the past, but I wasn't doing much at that at that moment. And so my students said to me, Well, what are you blogging about? And I didn't have an answer. So I went home that night, and I thought, What am I passionate about? And it was college football. I loved watching football. And so I thought I should start a college football blog. So I did that. And it kind of grew and evolved with time. It was for so my alma mater is BYU and I started just blogging about the football team and kind of their rivalry game and over a period of time, I started getting more and more serious into that where I was waking up four o'clock every morning, so I could do that before I went to school and, and I put out maybe 100 hundred 50 blog posts that first year and didn't make much money. I It was just something that you know, I was like, well, this is cool, and it's fun. But that was about five years ago. Yeah, that time now we've hit over a million views on the blog, and I've gotten press credentials to go to football games, I interview all their players I, I cover recruiting for the largest newspaper in my state now, and even started my own recruiting service. I have a separate website now, do you want recruiting, where I help high school kids try to get more exposure and get college scholarships. So it's really, you know, was just this small project that now puts off, you know, over $1,000 a year so I can afford to go to football games and stuff like that. So that's kind of where I got started with hobbies that make money. But I'm doing a bunch of other things now too.

Junaid Ahmed 4:47
That's pretty darn amazing, dude. I'm pretty impressed. I'm really impressed. Especially because you know, you you thought about it and you went after it and kept doing It and I've been blogging for a while, but it's, it's been never at the level that you know that you started because you were like, you know, it's gotta have a purpose and scale, you're going to have a specific niche. So you can actually get paid to write that content. Mine. I mean, I've had I've had two blogs for a while. And all I wrote about is, like, my mind, philosophy, philosophical stuff, and or technology that everybody else is covering didn't bring my own spin to it. But you know, there's this really good point, you know, having that ability to write and tell your story is super important, because then that can become into a book and I see that you published a book, you know, which is really friggin awesome.

Tyler Christensen 5:48
You know, and the cool thing with that, too, is so I've you can blog about anything and the barrier to entry is so low because you can get a free blog and it and it's super easy to get into But it's super hard to get an audience that's, you know, get it out there and promote it and things and and it takes time and it takes consistency. My my wife tried that this last year she does Home Improvement stuff and that I blogged for forever. And I said, Look, you just have to commit, do one a week, see how it goes. And so she did that. And she was so frustrated, because for the first six months, he did one a week and put her heart and soul into it. And she'd get one view a day, five views a day. Yeah, she was making, you know, pennies a week. And then over the summer, she was making furniture and that really took off for her so she didn't have time to work on the blog. But over that time, because she'd been so consistent early on. Now she's making $1 a day $1 50 and, and isn't writing on the blog, but she has now enough in the archives that people are finding it and it's been a little thing for her. But the cool part of that too is she has enough content that I'm like well now you can write your Your first book, let's take some of your best content, put it together. And she's always wanted to do that. And so, by the end of this year, we're gonna have her first book out, and she's thrilled.

Junaid Ahmed 7:09
That's so awesome. You know, it's very true, being consistent and having that content. So everybody focuses on, who's looking at it right now, how many hits that I get, right, those likes, how many likes that I get, but nobody thinks about the long tail of it. Because the long tail is where it's at. And that tail can go really, really long. And if you have enough content on your website, on your blog, then you know, you're seeing those results, you know, she's seeing those results after all these months. And that's what I keep telling, you know, you've just got to have to put out the content and be consistent and, and if you can't be consistent, at least do it in batches. So then you can schedule it out and then build that audience in that manner. So there's multiple different techniques, as, as I'm sure you've you've learned of.

Tyler Christensen 8:05
Yeah, no, you're right on as long as you're consistent or and badging is a great way to do it. I did that early on with mine is I would get busy with school and but the summers were more available. So one summer I wrote like 100 posts, and then I just saved them. So I only got two a week during the year and I didn't have to write for several months. Yeah.

Junaid Ahmed 8:25
Yeah, that's, that's so that's so helpful. And we the tools that we have available, for example, the blogging tools, they let you pick what date you want that episode or that blog post to go out. And that's what I did for a lot of my episodes. I just didn't plan it, right. I you know, I had about 40 episodes recorded and I was like, all right, perfect. I've got plenty content. But instead of doing it, I'm going to publish it once or one a week. I was like, I'm going to do four weeks because I'm going to get more

Tyler Christensen 8:57
Yep.

Junaid Ahmed 8:59
I've got a big up in the middle of and then I was like, You know what? I'll leave that slump in there and just say that was a summer sabbatical, whatever, you know, summer break, kids are out. Right you have time. And that's totally fine because people want to see that realism, because my last published episode was, you know, July 25, or something like, you know, I just don't have the time I'm spending so much time with the kids. And that's the most important part. Having that time spent with the kids because their four year old or their three year old only that year, after they've learned everything, there are different personnel together and you're going to miss out on that if you don't, you know, cash in that time.

Tyler Christensen 9:42
I totally agree. My youngest is five now and and we're holding on to every moment because you know, you're only five ones.

Junaid Ahmed 9:49
Exactly. And growing up I was, you know, I'm, I'm so much in my kid's life. My four year old and my one year old. And I look at my older one he's nine. And I was like, you know, I I remember spending a lot of time with him but it's all a blur. And most of the times I did get to spend it was after work hours and sometimes you got to go out and do these things and it just feels like the older they grow the less time you have to spend them spend with them or have the hobbies to play with so I try to get my kids involved in into into things that I'm into like filmmaking and cycling and beekeeping so cycling they're into my, my older and my younger son, they're both into filmmaking as well to like, you know, let's make this film so I was like, go act that scene out with your logo pieces or you know, whatever we're having South here them making all these stories. So that's pretty fun. That's awesome. Alright, so you got into so we've heard of you know why You got into the different hobbies. Because, one, you're a teacher, you don't make them a salary. So you need something on the side. And so what are the different things that you got into and what keeps you motivated to keep doing them?

Tyler Christensen 11:17
Sure. So I told you a little bit about blogging. I've done a bunch of blogs now. So I have a blog for my teaching. I have a blog specifically just for my classroom where I give them resources, and then another one for teachers. So I've done that. I, you know, all my hobbies are things that of course I am passionate about and enjoy. But the best ones are the ones that also I kick back. So one of my favorite things that I do now, and I do this with my kids too, is product reviews. I have companies send me stuff and I take a picture and throw it on Instagram or make a YouTube video. And in some cases, I just get the product for free so I'm getting a drone or escape border. backpack, headphones, something like that. But in other cases, I'm getting paid, you know, up to 100 bucks, yeah, to do something. And so we've made we make a probably a little over $1,000 a year doing that, and my kids do it with me. And then they get to keep all the stuff. So we get we have Christmas like every day because something's coming it through, you know, and that has been a really, really cool hobby because it's the normal stuff that we would have in the house or the toys that we just don't have to buy that stuff anymore. So it's really been fun to do that and I actually did write a book about how to get started with that called How to get free stuff. So it's that has been a real fun hobby.

Junaid Ahmed 12:41
I'm not to get that book for free so I can review it.

Tyler Christensen 12:45
I'll send you a no problem.

Junaid Ahmed 12:48
looks really cool and my you know, every time like for example yesterday, I ordered a a a leaf blower because the one that I've been using hasn't given me enough And it's an electric one with wired. And I've been thinking, you know, I need a backpack once I get have the mobility and reading reviews, and it's like $350 plus on these things, right? And I was like, let's see what let's check the reviews and I found this guy. And so every time we ups guys like, Oh, we got Bobby, you got your new thing, you know. And so it's really cool when you ups guy comes in, like, Oh, we just got this and we did that we got death, and they want to open up the gift. So this would be really cool. Because then my wife be like, what's going on? Why are we getting so many times? I

Tyler Christensen 13:37
know, you know, at the beginning, when I started doing I actually there was a year where we were transitioning as a family and I was unemployed. And that's when I started doing the product reviews because I didn't have stuff for my kids for Christmas. And so I was like, What's an easy way and my brother told me about this company that he worked with and nothing to do with brands and and so I started doing this and at the beginning it literally was for Christmas presents, but ever since then, I mean, I love it, I get home and there's packages on my doorstep almost every day or in the out in the mailbox. And it really is fun. I think I get more enjoyment from it than my wife and the kids.

I just love opening those packages up.

Junaid Ahmed 14:17
Yeah, it is. One thing that I love to do is whenever whenever we buy furniture, as soon as it comes, it's like, let's open let's start building it. Right? And it just gives you joy because you're, you're challenging yourself. You're learning something new about something that's like totally, you know, crazy or awesome. And that's one of the reasons that I've backed over 260 Kickstarter projects. Wow. And I'm waiting on this really cool slider gimbal because being in video production, get to have all these gears. So that's really cool, man. I'm gonna have to check out your book and probably get myself into it because they they've got you know kids right so so you do hit on a nerve that's been bothering me not really bothering but this like kids are watching these TV these YouTube channels where people are simply opening up candy playing with them I was like why do these guys have a millions of views we got all these toys Why can we make a story like this and have a YouTube channel but it's true you've got there's only so much time in the day and you got to get the whole family involved in in to be able to get to some things like that. So man we just went on a tangent here taking a tangent counter.

Tyler Christensen 15:50
Isn't your wholesale a tangent?

Junaid Ahmed 15:51
It is attended my my friend. He runs this Green River media and they have a twitch show where they live broadcast every day. And they have a tangent counter because he goes off tangent on a topic whenever it's talking about the games or movies or whatever, tend to encounter which is really hilarious. That's awesome. Like, no, I have to check that out. figure out a way to do that. But having the live show was totally different, you know, experience, because then you get the live feedback. So that's awesome. So it's so we talked about your journey, talked about your motivations, and do some different things that you've got going on. So and I'm looking at your website and I'm like, okay, what's the next thing we should talk Nina check on. I've been a cyclist for a while. For a very young age. So did you ever get into cycling? Or did you pick a different spot?

Tyler Christensen 17:05
This is a great thing to talk about because I actually just on Friday this last weekend, I ran I ran my first double marathon so I ran Wow. 52.4 miles. It was all night long. We started 7pm ran through the night. I ran till like 10 The next morning and yeah, so running is my thing. I I I don't know if you've even seen this on the site, but I lost 100 pounds last year I noticed and that's,

Junaid Ahmed 17:33
that's amazing, man.

Tyler Christensen 17:35
So but it's and it's I can't say that I lost the weight through running because I've ran all my life. I gained weight while running. It was diet changes and things like that. But I just I love we live out in the country and I just wake up and I head out on the country road and that's where I love to be. We actually live in a live in a great place for biking to wear just outside Zions National Park and oh my god. Awesome biking around here. And you know, that's one of the things I do want to get into more I actually review biking stuff all the time. But I don't do a ton of cycling. So that's something I want to get into more.

Junaid Ahmed 18:12
Yeah, you know, talking about reviews again, I'm just going back my, my brother in law, he's been cycling for about over 10 years. And he wrote some reviews for you know, some tire and stuff like that. And the, the manufacturer, you know, reached out to him and like, Hey, would you like to send us a review on this thing, and we'll give you this much, you know? Like, will give you a credit towards a product of ours. Right. I told him you know, he even started a blog and that's like, dude, keep doing that. You can make money off of it. Like, seriously, like, I don't know, he cuz he he's very, like what's, what's that word? He's very inquisitive. Here. He's very investigative. So he'll like do a really detailed review and like five, six paragraphs of review for a for a tire. Yeah, it rim and I'm like you that's that's what, that's the gold.

Tyler Christensen 19:15
Right? The course the whole thing with that if you're super detailed is if you have a blog or a YouTube channel and you have these like the authority on that product, then you just throw up an affiliate link and then not only are you getting paid by the company, but then if anyone buys one, you're getting some kickback for that too. So that's that's an awesome way to just start really small on the side and just you don't even have to be getting paid or getting free stuff. Do the stuff you love anyways just start writing for those because you can get paid as people buy it. So if you're putting value out to the world, you're going to get something back.

Junaid Ahmed 19:51
Absolutely. Absolutely.

Tyler Christensen 19:53
Yeah. And actually it so this is funny my next thing to review Yeah. Cycling backpack. It's like a Camelback but It has lights on the back that tells you which direction to go. So even though I'm not a big cycling person, that's that's all honestly, my next review is

back. So

Junaid Ahmed 20:09
that's really, really awesome. Um, so yeah, cycling. So. So since I've been cycling as well, I haven't reviewed as much stuff because I'm trying to I don't know what I'm trying to do, man. I'm doing a lot of different things, but I know for sure that I want to. I want to be in a spot where I can do films, because I love filmmaking we did. We did a couple of short films in 2016. We did. We did at least one short film earlier this year, we're working on four different commercials. And they end the pilot episode for a TV show. So that's my passion. That's what I want to go into more. And I even had some acting gigs. So that's been pretty fun experience as well. But yeah, Man, this podcast and talking to, you know, people like yourself is just what's keeping me up at night, like, you know, just to get, like, all right, what's the next step? What's the next spot, you know how to get ahead in life and then again, coming back to spending time with the family. And the one thing that keeps coming back to me every single day when I'm talking to people, you know, many people that say, I wish there was more than 24 hours in the day. I'm like, well, there are more than 24 hours in a day, you just gotta find people that will work with you. Right? Well, it and I hear

Tyler Christensen 21:41
that all the time. You know, for my students, I don't have time to do this, or I don't have time to do that. You know, I have tons of things I do. But um, I also wake up at four o'clock, you know, and so it's it's just depends on where you're putting your priorities.

Junaid Ahmed 21:57
Yeah, exactly. You had two priorities, I do wake up early enough, because if you wake up at seven o'clock versus four o'clock, you got three extra hours. Yep. But again, you also have to, it also depends on who you are, if you're a parent and your kid just went to sleep at three o'clock, right or been keeping you awake? Well, it's hard to get up at four o'clock, because, you know, just went to sleep at three o'clock. So, I find those time find those days where I can get up early, and do my stuff. Or if I get if I can put the kids to sleep on time at a time, then I have an extra, you know, amount of hours that I can do work. So it's been it's been it's been a challenge, but it's also a learning experience. And every single day, I'm thinking, Okay, I'm doing this for my kids. I'm doing this for my kids. This is not for myself. And even if I'm doing it for myself, I'm doing it so I'm setting an example. So they can follow in the footsteps and be like, all right, this is the right way to do it. Or this is how you can get more things accomplished,

Tyler Christensen 23:01
right? Well, you know, and the interesting thing with kids so I have four kids, our oldest is 14, and our youngest is five. And for there's a season for everything. So I remember, you know, being up at three in the morning with the kids, because they were babies or whatever. And now that they're older, you know, I still I put my kids to bed every night. We tell stories, we read books and and we have that quality time at night. But we also as a whole family, we go to bed relatively early. And that does give me now that those morning hours are glorious, because it's not just the extra three hours in the morning. Three hours from four to seven is like five hours any other time of the day cuz you're not interrupted no one bugs you have one morning. So it's, it's great that you know, you do it when you can.

Junaid Ahmed 23:47
Yes, that's true. That's true. Fantastic, man. I'm thinking that I'm missing something. So we talked about your transformation. We talked about the running and how you're able to do in Double marathon men have so how did you train? Does that mean that well, how did it affect your knees? Because that's something that I keep hearing you know, it's bad for your knees or blah blah.

Tyler Christensen 24:11
Yeah, um, I think knees is mostly a myth. Okay, but running you know you're gonna wear down your joints with any physical activity but if you're smart about it, you know I run on trails and things like that. But for me, the bigger issue is I have foot problems and so I I'm just I've run in pain and I've learned to run in pain because we haven't been able to fix whatever's wrong with my feet. I've been to like 10 doctors this last year and was able to get control of it. Yeah, so I'm I'm just used to pain and that's fine. But the way I trained for a double is again, I have this summers, my summer schedules more flexible so even though I run your round, I can put in more miles over the summer, and kind of scale up and this summer I ran over five actually over 700 miles over the summer. What so I'm averaging more than 10 miles a day. But that's because mostly on the weekends, I'm still I don't sleep in on Saturday, I'm still waking up at four 330 and doing a 20 miler before my kids wake up. So that's how I trained was just putting in a lot of miles. And now, I haven't run in a week. It's like the longest I've gone without running forever. Trying to recover from this race. It was Yeah, you got it.

Junaid Ahmed 25:26
You got to be able to recover. So you so you can go back out there.

Tyler Christensen 25:30
Yeah. Yeah. So no, but it's just a lot of fun. The best part about running for me is that when I listen to podcasts, so I love getting out there. And that's my me time, you know, to be out and listen to a book or listen to a podcast and yeah, I just look forward to that time every day.

Junaid Ahmed 25:45
That's so awesome. That's so awesome. I don't have I don't have a time that I go do anything on my own right now. I used to commute to work in a lifetime to either record an episode or I listened to a podcast. But currently I'm not doing any of those. So I need to get back on my bike. That's what I need to do.

Tyler Christensen 26:08
Yeah, well, it's fun. You know, I actually started a podcast from Ronnie, just especially as I was losing the weight. I would get done with a long run and I'd have so many things that I thought about during the run. I was like, I should start recording this. So I did, I just started recording on my phone. Nice. After I had like 50 recordings, I was like, Okay, it's time to put this into a podcast. So I have a little show called after the run, where it's just whatever I recorded and it's horrible audio, you know, on my phone while I'm walking and sweating and breathing hard, but then I can share all the things I've learned about health and fitness, you know, and I still putting that out into the world. So it's,

Junaid Ahmed 26:50
it's kind of a cool little thing. That's really cool, man. I like it. I like it a lot. So, I was checking out your website some of the links on Danny, since I've been a web sanity, there needs to be a HTTP to be added in front of the some of these links because they're just going as other pages on your site. Okay? So underwriting so underwriting when you have be a BYU Insider, when I click on it, it actually takes me to Tyler Christensen com forward slash ww to Luda. No problem. It's like to you know, make sure you got that right.

Tyler Christensen 27:34
Yeah, no, I you know, it's funny because I do that's one of the things we haven't talked about. Yeah, we're gonna get to it work design, but I hardly had spent any time on my own side. I just like a hurry and get up. But I haven't even checked links

Junaid Ahmed 27:48
on it. So I need to I need to get my site up too because it's been it's been a while. Alright, so we're going to get into the low portion where we have some questions that I asked all of my guests, what is the one hobby that you wish you got into? And we talked about a lot of hobbies that you have.

Tyler Christensen 28:07
Yeah, well, so the one thing that I have, and you probably saw this a little while on my spine is I'm a speaker. But I did a lot of public speaking early on in my career, and then got away from it. And now that I'm in fifth grade, instead of college, I miss being on that stage, I miss having big audiences. And so I'm getting back into speaking now. And I'm not doing a ton of paid gigs, but I want to be you know, and so that's really the thing where this summer I actually met, I have a mentor that's walking me through the speaking process. And I'm doing a ton of research right now and figuring out you know, I want to get on a TED stage and I want to do other things. So that's really the hobby that I'm passionate about that I've done it in the past, but I'd really like to level that up. So public speaking for sure.

Junaid Ahmed 28:55
Fantastic, and you've got a lot of niche topics and that's what That's what TEDx or Ted, you know, that Ted stage looks for, as well. Guess I spoke with yesterday. She was like, you know, you know, when I was doing my audition for the TED TEDx talk, they're like, you know, what are you going to talk about? And instead of her telling her what she's going to talk about, she asked the interviewer, are you replaceable? Hmm. And she was like, you know, I've never thought about am I replaceable? And a lot of people will say, Yes, I'm replaceable, because, you know, I'm doing something that somebody else can do as well. Or some people will think, you know, No, I am not in you know, I'm irreplaceable. So, that's what got her her end into being a speaker. So that was a really, you know, interesting thing to learn about because you've got to have that unique because if you go to TEDx, or Ted calm, there's topics. I mean, people have talked about Every single thing that you can think about, right, but only you bring your own story. And so that's, that was a good takeaway. I spoke to another speaker who runs a company out in Florida, they help speaker find gigs and, you know, get that message straight so they can get those speaking events and engagement so I can connect you with her for sure. Go on. Yes. Gotta have some really good stuff on their on their site. They can, you know, get you next above them. I mean, you already working with a coach, which is which is so, so, so important working with coaches. And having mentors is super important because that's what gets you to the next level.

Tyler Christensen 30:48
Yeah, I think the coolest thing about working with a coach is you can see what's possible. And so that's really for me that's been invaluable is to be able to say look, this is where I'm at, and I see where you're at how new bridge that gap and exactly,

Junaid Ahmed 31:02
yep. Beautiful. All right, what is your favorite movie or TV show?

Tyler Christensen 31:07
So my favorite movie of all time and it's not even close. Remember the Titans. I love that show. Really good show. It's just brilliant. It's one that I watch every few years especially now the fall with football season. I still love football and so it just gets me pumped up and inspired. So that's definitely my favorite movie. My favorite TV show. All Time is a show called monk I love monk. Where it's that this detective that's what's that called? OCD. And I just love that show. We still watch reruns but no on that on that network. So going back to hobbies the is it USA that Phil monk I think so anyhow, they have they have the show. psych which is another one of my all time favorite shows and the flash Arrow and all those shows I really enjoy. And one of my hobbies is I, for a good 1015 years I've done website on the design on the side. And five or six years ago, I thought, you know, how can I scale up this business and I decided to reach out to some of my favorite actors on my favorite TV shows and just so funny. Hey, can I build you a free website? I want to grow my business and get better name recognition. So and one of them wrote back, sage Bronco playing Kusama. He's Jr. Detective buzz McNabb. Yeah. So he wrote back and he's like, yeah, my mom's a school teacher. I'd love I've always wanted to have a website and sure let's work together. So I built him a site and then he referred me to his friend, Patrick, Ivanka, who's on the flash. And so I built him aside and then they referred other friends. And, you know, it's cool to build websites for actors, but it's cooler to be friends with actors. Oh my god, me and sage. You know, we we chat all The time and we've worked on other businesses together. He's doing real real estate now and I helped him build a site for his real estate business. And so we chat because I've been doing some real estate investing. It's so fun to just have these friends that are in Hollywood or in in this case, they're up in Vancouver. Yeah. And just to see what they're up to and get the scoop you know when they were filming a psych movie this summer and he got the big show stars of the show do lay Hill and James Roday they did a cool shout out to my kids on Facebook and now

Junaid Ahmed 33:38
their favorite show and so that's been a really cool thing. So I have to say I love the show. Like you know, under the people on it and and so that's been really cool to work with them and and of course I just love the show to know that show is so so awesome. And we absolutely loved the show and I keep I keep looking for James or day and you know, the other actors, you know where they were, they don't where they, where they go now. And I know one of the actors he's in suits,

Tyler Christensen 34:09
right? Yeah. Do they know

Junaid Ahmed 34:11
yet and Israel there, he's done he's actually done some other roles and other other shows too. And then I was like, Where's James road? I haven't seen him do anything. And then he showed up on million little things. Right. And that was that that's an awesome show too. And the character that he gets to play and being you know, being a passionate about the film industry and in the movie industry, it's it's really good to see that, you know, there's other angles to you know, talk to your favorite people. And I got to speak with Tom Malloy, who's a producer and the writer on this book called bankroll, and he wrote this book almost 10 years ago, and people you This has the Bible on how to find money for production and filming. So the really, really, really cool stuff. Awesome, man, I love it. And I've been thinking, you know, I want to reach out to these actors and actually, you know, talk to them or, or bring them on. And but that's, that's a really cool new angle that you know that you just taught me.

Tyler Christensen 35:24
Yeah, well, we'll tell I can get you some contacts, so no problem.

Junaid Ahmed 35:27
Awesome. Alright, so you've got your favorite TV show you got your favorite movie, and that their movies really awesome. Hands down this question, what movie would you choose if you had to forget to play a character in it?

Tyler Christensen 35:49
So that's funny. I've listened to a bunch of your podcast episodes, and I haven't heard this question. But I've heard news, your favorite, favorite superhero and I'm going to combine these two questions. Okay. I would love to be Superman. Yeah, that would be amazing to fly. And, you know, the reason I love Superman so much is he's just a good guy, you know? Yes, he has to have a weakness. So he has kryptonite, but his weaknesses is that he's tempted by things or that he wants to go and have all the money in the world. He's just a good guy and I would love to be Superman, you know, there you go.

Junaid Ahmed 36:23
Nice. So that would be a superhero. And you got to play Superman and the movie. So now okay. You want to play Superman in a movie? Which movie would it be?

Tyler Christensen 36:34
I you know, I don't like any of the Superman movies. Even the old classic ones. None of them are amazing. I they have done a few good TV shows with him, you know, and it almost pains me to admit it. But I love Smallville. I know it's like a little teeny girl TV show, you know, but I love Smallville. And even the one before that with Dean Cain, the Lewis and Clark. I thought that was very Fantastic. So if I could pick any of those to be in, I'd be in Smallville. Probably Nice, nice. Awesome. So you're discovering your powers. You're like, wait, what is this? Where did it come from this? Yeah, it's cool. Like that.

Junaid Ahmed 37:14
Alright, last question. If you were a board game, what would it be?

Tyler Christensen 37:20
That, you know, that's a really hard question. I thought about that a little bit. And the one I thought probably would be best for me is, you know, Robert Kiyosaki the guy who wrote Rich Dad, Poor Dad. He has a game called rat race. And I've actually I've never played it, but I've done you know, I've read about it and I know kind of the idea behind that and I thought that's perfect for me because so much of my life is between, you know, having a job and being tied into the nine to five, but then doing everything I want to on the fringes and you know, the five to nine. So I think rat race would be a good one for me just because I am kind of spread a little thin right? Now I'm just because of my interest, but I certainly want to have that financial freedom and I'm working towards that. And so I think maybe that would be a good one for me. I don't know. I hopefully it's fun. I've never played it.

Junaid Ahmed 38:12
Oh, it's a lot of fun. So I've played I haven't played the actual board game because I didn't have access to it. But I did find the software version of the game. And I played that probably 1010 years ago and that was a really interesting game. I learned a lot about real estate, learn a lot about stock because they start with so he teaches you first. You learn about you know, because you have little amount you start with a small capital to make that small capital large. You start with the stock market. Once you've made sizable amount now you can invest in in you know, the real estate area. So it was it was a really cool I learned a lot night I wish I played more of it to, you know, get even more detailed understanding of the date teach you pretty good for a beginner level so you understand puts and you know, and like how do you set up person host setup? I can't remember those terms.

Tyler Christensen 39:18
But you know, it's funny in real life I when I was learning how to day trade and inputs and stuff, it was it felt like a game when I first started doing day trading. I'm like, this is a game. It's not this this can't be real. This isn't real money, you know? And I quickly learned you can lose that money Really? Really? Oh, yeah. I even I did penny stocks in blockbusters now. You know. Yeah. But timing. Yeah, but I love that with the rat race game. You know, I'm not I need to get a copy of it. Because I love that you can learn about the real world. You know, it's a game and I love the whole concept behind it. I think that's really cool.

Junaid Ahmed 39:58
Sweet well That. That was an awesome awesome ballgame and I haven't thought about that in a very long while. And so Rich Dad, Poor Dad is an amazing book. You know, he even mentioned in there you going to give it to your 10 year old. They need to learn this as soon as they can. Because money something school doesn't teach.

Tyler Christensen 40:21
Yeah, well, it's funny I teach 10 year olds and I'm actually reading Rich Dad Poor Dad right now to my class. So yeah, I'm doing

Junaid Ahmed 40:28
it, you know. So you're an awesome teacher, man. That's what we need. My son will be in fifth grade next year. So

Tyler Christensen 40:37
it's an awesome grade. It's a fun one to teach because kids are, you know, discovering what they're capable of in their potential. It's awesome time.

Junaid Ahmed 40:46
Fantastic. Well, what what were so the last question will is, where can my audience find you?

Tyler Christensen 40:56
The easiest place is just Tyler Christensen calm apparently. I need Check some of my links on it. But that's redirects you to all the other things I'm doing. So if you go there, then you can connect with me through social or through some of my other sites. And if you want to get the how to get free stuff book, it's linked up there and stuff like that. So

Junaid Ahmed 41:17
fantastic. I love it. Thank you so much, man. Yes, was and this was a very, um, what's that word? Very informative, and very practical episode for myself, because I learned so much about you. And I see how you've, you know, created different sites for different things that you're doing and actually put in the time to make that flower or dead plant grow and then step aside and then, you know, work on different things. So that's, that's really awesome. Love it.

Tyler Christensen 41:56
Thanks. Appreciate that. I certainly have a blessed life. There's lots of cool things going on. So it's been a pleasure to talk to you about it. Absolutely. Thank you so much, Tyler. We'll talk soon. All right, thanks a lot. Bye bye.

Junaid Ahmed 42:13
Thank you so much for taking the time to listen to this episode on hacks and hobbies. We absolutely appreciate your contribution. You can find additional notes on hacks and hobbies. com. please share the podcast with your friends and tell them what you learned about our guests today.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai