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January 31, 2025 18 mins

Chasing Balance is a real, relatable, and refreshingly honest podcast about the never-ending pursuit of balance—between work, family, relationships, and personal well-being.

Hosted by Matt and Deanna, parents navigating the chaos of raising three kids (from toddler to teenager), this podcast is a candid look at the joys and struggles of everyday life. Through personal stories, lighthearted humor, and no-expert-just-real-life advice, they explore what balance truly means—and why it’s not about perfection, but the journey.

Each episode dives into topics like work-life balance, communication, mental and physical health, and time management, with plenty of laughs along the way. And who knows? In the future, you might even hear from guests and listeners sharing their own real-life experiences.

Join the conversation, share your story, and let’s chase balance together—one imperfect, beautiful step at a time.

🎙 Subscribe now and follow us on social media to stay connected!

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Transcript

Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hey everyone, I'm Matt.

(00:03):
I'm Deanna.
And welcome to Chasing Balance.

(00:32):
This is Chasing Balance, the podcast where we navigate the art of juggling life, work,
kids, our relationship, and everything in between.
In this first episode, we're giving you a behind the scenes look at who we are, what
we're passionate about, and what you can expect in future episodes.
So it's an introductory podcast.

(00:55):
Who are we?
Who are you?
I'm Deanna.
Professionally, I work in the insurance company, or insurance agency.
We have three children together, all boys of course, ranging from teens to toddler.

(01:17):
And that alone keeps us very busy.
Lots of sports, a lot of chaos that we have to navigate.
But me personally, right now, I'm pretty passionate about reading.
And that sounds extremely boring.
But it's my own little chunk of me time that I can have in the day.

(01:38):
It's your own little piece of heaven.
It is.
Kind of escape.
Everybody needs that.
Yes.
What about you?
Who are you?
Nice to meet you.
I'm Matt.
As far as career goes, I work a few different jobs as the title of marketing manager.

(01:58):
My personal life highlights, besides family, kids, work, that's really all it is.
I really do try to stay active, working out, running, trying to do that at least six times
a week.
And that's really one of the big things that Deanna and I really put an emphasis on is

(02:21):
staying healthy, chasing that balance as far as family time work, and then also making
sure that our temple, our bodies are still physically working, physically ready to tackle
the next day.
So what do you hope to gain out of this podcast?

(02:42):
Or what came to mind when I was like, hey, you and I should start a podcast.
So I was a little apprehensive because it's something new that I've never really done.
So yeah, I was apprehensive.
But the more I thought about it, like I said before with the whole reading and carving

(03:03):
out a chunk of time, it kind of does that for the two of us.
Does that that chunk of time where we can sit and talk about stuff and fully get a good
idea of both of our sides and things.
We have a full day of kids and work.
So now we're going to sit down and record us talking about kids and work.

(03:26):
And mind you, we both work full time remote and we work in the same room.
So it's literally we spend every second of the day together.
We do.
Yeah, we never get a break from each other.
So yes, this was necessary.
More time together.
So what I hope to get out of this podcast and I'm talking to listeners like we have

(03:50):
hundreds of thousands of listeners right now, which we don't.
So it's one for me to vocalize my thoughts more obviously to you, just get them off my
chest, almost kind of like therapy.
And maybe along the lines down the road, whether this doesn't turn into success or whether

(04:11):
it does, this will be something that the kids can possibly listen to when when they get
older, kind of like how we would go through, you know, family time capsule.
Yeah, like family baby books, photographs.
You know, this is just the way it is now.
People are doing podcasts and hopefully in the future, you know, this this wave file,

(04:34):
this podcast will be somewhere ancient and our kids will be like, what is this?
What is this that mom and dad made?
A thumb drive.
Yeah, like how do I how do I get to this?
So how do I open this?
Breaking the ice a little bit.
What's a fun fact about you?
Fun fact.

(04:56):
It's not fun.
The first thing that came to my head was I went to school for four years for art and
I'm doing the complete opposite all the time.
Insurance is the complete opposite of art.
No one can take that a degree away from you.
Nobody can take that away.
Nobody can.
A little fun fact about me is that I'm comfortable.

(05:18):
I feel comfortable on the microphone.
I used to want to be a rapper, you know, the next Eminem.
I love entertaining.
It was beautiful.
So this is this is comfortable to me and I and I hope we continue to to do this and I
hope we enjoy doing this together, which I assume we will.

(05:42):
Your fun fact was better than mine.
Your fun fact was better than mine.
Yours is actually fun.
Well, OK, so let's let's move on.
I am a little bit more fun.
So nobody's arguing.
The next thing is, is the podcast name is Chasing Balance.

(06:02):
So you know, I guess we need to define what is balance.
And maybe that's what this whole podcast is about, whether it's four episodes, you know,
10 episodes, 2000 episodes.
How do we chase balance?
How do we find that balance?
And we want to emphasize in it that balance is not about perfection, but the journey and

(06:26):
process of finding, you know, that balance between work life, you know, kids.
You know, the relationship between wife and husband or two parents.
Or even yourself.
Yeah, even yourself.

(06:46):
How do you pull yourself away from from work to focus on yourself for saying running, yoga,
reading, going to school for four years to get your degree?
Spending so much money.
So we're going to.
So that's what we're going to be focused on is trying to define.

(07:07):
You know, balance, which I don't know if anybody can ever like really.
You know, exactly pinpoint exactly what the perfect balance is, especially with a young
family and two parents that work full time.
Yeah.
I think from our side of things, it's like what balance is for us and, you know, maybe

(07:28):
maybe sharing some stories and how we've navigated those things in different scenarios will help
others.
And that's essentially, you know, what we kind of want to do because.
You know, figuring out and navigating all those things is very tricky.
And I know from personal experience, I've you know, I have gone on back in the day when

(07:53):
you would do like Facebook forums and like mom to mom groups and all that when you're
when we were first time parents and all that mom guilt and everything.
But there was there was some elements in there that was like, oh, I didn't even think about
doing that.
Yeah.
So even if we even like potty training secrets that the doctor would tell us or something
for, you know, that would ruin our weeks and then we talk to the doctor like, Doc, we don't

(08:17):
know what to do.
And he'd be like, did you try this?
Like what the easiest thing?
Why didn't we think about it?
Or like your mom first had our first born.
She's like, did you burp?
We were both like, no one told us.
Why?
Why would you do that?
No one in the hospital told us to burp the child, which is crazy, which seems like we
should have known even though we're sleep deprived and everything.

(08:38):
We were young.
So that's what this is.
This podcast is about creating a space to share, you know, hopefully relatable stories
with the listener or, you know, when our kids grow up and if they ever get to, you know,
ever happen to listen to this.
So we're going to be sharing advice and by no means, no means at all is this expert advice.
It's just stuff that we've, you know, came across.

(09:02):
We found out what works for us.
And you know, there's probably a lot of things that we're still confused about.
So scratch our heads like, how do we fix this this issue?
And we hope to entertain you with our stories and our humor with the challenges of our life.
And obviously we really hope that it's relatable to you and possibly what your family is maybe

(09:25):
going through.
So what to expect from this podcast?
The topics we're going to cover is work-life balance, relationships and communication,
personal and physical health, time management and possibly provide productivity hacks.
And maybe in the future we'll have some real life stories from guests and listeners.

(09:52):
So why does this podcast matter?
Why does chasing balance matter?
So do you have kind of a way to define why chasing balance matters and how you have struggled
with it and why it's worth pursuing?

(10:13):
Well, personally, I mean, I still, I go back to when we first became parents, you know,
and we really didn't know what the heck we were doing.
And I was home and you were, you know, you had, you were working.
And that was when I was on leave and I was left alone with this little itty bitty baby

(10:34):
that refused to eat.
And I do remember that when I went back to work, you, you were crying and you were saying,
I don't want you to go back to work.
It had to be scary to be home alone by yourself with just one kid and never doing it before.
Yeah.
I watched Ellen.
For what?
Inspiration?
No, I just vividly remember watching Ellen and I'm like, this isn't me.

(11:00):
I don't do this.
But anyway, after that, and after we kind of got a little stability and got our hands
kind of like on the reins of it a bit, I realized that that's the most important part is like
finding your, who you are as a person and also all of the things that you have to do.

(11:27):
Like you have to be, you know, now I have to take care of this little baby.
Now I have to go back to work and take care of this little baby.
And I have to figure out this new person that I am, you know?
So the balance is there in, in trying to figure out how it works and how you feel successful

(11:50):
is the most important part of it.
I agree.
And you know, I think, you know, finding that universal struggle or finding why a balance
is worth pursuing is I think that we've, I found this out how much easier life can be.

(12:12):
Definitely when you work remote, you get to work remote first before I did.
And I was stuck in, you know, a stuffy sales office.
It goes to the whole balance thing.
I was stuck in, you know, a large office and I was just miserable.
And then, you know, I came across a great opportunity to work remote.

(12:37):
And when I was hired, the boss just said, you know, as long as you get your work done,
I really don't care how much you work, which I know is not a luxury for everyone.
But it's given me, and I don't take advantage of that, but it gives you when you get to
work remote, I was able to find a little bit better balance as far as, you know, mental

(12:57):
health and physical health.
Because you know, you're in a stuffy office, you're in some big, you know, corporate building
or something like that.
You go and you eat lunch in a stuffy, overlit break room for 30 minutes.
Yeah, it doesn't do anything for you.
It's just you're just a robot.

(13:18):
So around people that you don't even like.
Like, let's be let's be honest.
Most of the time, you don't even want to have a conversation about alone.
Eat with them.
Exactly.
Or you have that one person where you're just like kind of staring at because you know that
they're thinking the exact same thing you're thinking, but you can't really say it because
you're just around a bunch of people.
So you're just like, hey, what'd you bring for lunch today?
So you know, now it's turned into me being able to be home, obviously help with carpool,

(13:44):
make lunches, dinner, lunches, you know, breakfast, all that stuff.
Which I'm sorry, which in it in itself was very interesting from my side of things because
you became full time remote during COVID, which also happened to be the time that we
had our last baby.

(14:04):
Knock on wood.
No, there's no knocking on wood.
Just done.
So you were now around us during what would have been considered my maternity leave.
That's true.
24 7.
Yep.
And the way I mean, granted, you're an amazing father from the beginning, but see, I mean,

(14:30):
what can I say?
Go ahead.
Go on.
But seeing the way that you were with our last compared to the way that you were with
our first is completely different because you have been there 100% of the time.
Yeah, I mean, you know, and that's one of the episodes I want to talk about.

(14:50):
I do want to talk about COVID and a further episode, so I don't want to ruin too much
or give too much away.
So no, that's okay.
No, that's fine.
So yeah, COVID was definitely eye opening.
And that is also more than likely what put the plan in action to allow this company to

(15:11):
allow workers to work remote.
And that's why I probably got that job.
It probably would have been an office job if it weren't for COVID, you know, whatever
silver lining is there.
And then prior to mine, I think I was going in maybe once bi weekly or going in two times
a week.
Oh, yeah.

(15:31):
Was I?
I think so.
I think our headquarters is like an hour and a half away from where we actually live.
So it was just like a full day.
It was ridiculous.
And then when COVID happened, and everything shut down, they were like, you know what,
you just stay home.
You don't need to see.
So Skype will do just fine.
So going back to chasing balance, why?

(15:55):
Why is it worth pursuing?
I think that's kind of a dumb question.
But I mean, you know, you know, there are some people out there that say, oh, you shouldn't
chase balance, you should just let life be what life is going to be.
And that's honestly bullshit, because if you don't plan it, you know, if you just let life
be what it's going to be, then I will, you know, let my kids, you know, wear whatever

(16:18):
they want to school if it's dirty or clean.
The house won't be clean.
The you know, I'll go to work.
I'll eat like shit.
Exactly.
I won't work out.
And at that time, then you're really lazy, and then you sit down, you read your book,
or I play my video games without working out.
And then that depression just creeps up.
And then, you know, wash, rinse and repeat, and it happens all over again.

(16:42):
So you know, the term of you shouldn't chase balance is ridiculous.
And you should always be improving your life, the way it lays out.
And I hope everyone has the courage to do that.
And we'd love to hear stories from people that have done that or what struggles that
they have.
So this is going to wrap up our episode.

(17:03):
Was there anything else that you wanted to include in this introductory?
No, I think we covered a lot.
We did.
We did cover a lot when we were just supposed to be saying our names and now we're talking
17 minutes later.
So so we will be posting this podcast on all of the social media platforms and all the

(17:25):
platform channels like iHeartRadio, Spotify, things of that nature.
So we do ask you to subscribe, leave a review if you like it, and encourage you guys to
follow us on social media to where you can share your own stories and get updates from
us.
We just want to thank everyone for tuning in.

(17:47):
And we are really excited about our next episode.
And what is that one about?
The next episode is going to be about if we are putting too much unrealistic expectations
on our kids.
That should be a good one.
Yeah.
All right.
Juicy.
Once again, this is Chasing Balance.
I'm Matt.
I'm Deanna.

(18:08):
And once again, thank you for tuning in.
Bye bye.
Bye bye.
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