Within the last year, I’ve found myself listening to more and more podcasts whilst I’m at work, out on a run, walking around town and generally everytime I’m not watching TV! If you’d asked me a year ago if I’d listened to the latest podcast, I’d of told you can I watch the YouTube video instead?!
I’ve always listened to the odd podcast here and there if someone I follow online has been interviewed by someone, but I wouldn’t then listen to the other episodes from that particular podcast. Whereas now, I’m actively searching out podcast episodes to listen to and subscribe to.
Going with the same kind of films/documentaries I like to watch, I mainly listen to ones surrounding conspiracy theories, serial killers, motorsport, sports criminals and science facts. I love learning stuff and I’ve found that listening to podcasts is a great way for me to do that.
So, without further ado, let me introduce to my favourite podcasts!
My Podcast Library
These are the ones I have in my library on Spotify at the moment and the ones I’ve been listening to the most over the last year.
My end of year Spotify wrap up is going to be wild this year!
Ologies
Science Vs
Mr Ballen
The Broke Generation
Deathbed Confessions
Conspiracy Theories
Collapse: Disaster In Surfside
Real Dictators
F1 Nation
F1 Beyond The Grid
Chequered Flag Podcast
Sierra Unfiltered
Kingpins
Sports Criminals
Medical Murders
Solved Murders
Malicious Moms
To go into each one here would be make this post way too long, but these are the main ones I listen to whenever they release new episodes, or if I’ve already listened to it I’ll trawl through their back catalogue to find episodes I’ve not previously listened to.
Thankfully with the amount I subscribe to, there are plenty of episodes for me to listen to so I’m never without something to keep me entertained! I feel I have the perfect mix of crime, sport, real life, science and history.
Finding New Podcasts
Most of the time I’ve found new podcasts to listen to is via adverts for other podcasts whilst listening to my current podcast! This is especially true for the Parcast Network, who have a wide variety of podcasts – most of which cross over with one another.
Their wide variety of podcasts ensures that I’m never left without anything to listen to or something new to learn. Having these cross over episodes also allows me to see if I like a particular podcast first before I commit to it.
I’ve recently unsubscribed from a few I wasn’t really listening to and this has allowed me to fully commit to the ones I DO listen to instead, as well as making room for newer ones too, of course!
I particularly love listening to podcasts where I learn something. Podcasts like Ologies, Science Vs, are of course, educational so therefore it would be silly to NOT have learnt anything by the time I’ve finished listening to them!
Other podcasts like Malicious Moms, Sports Criminals, Conspiracy Theories, Real Dictators and Collapse: Disaster In Surfside are more on the interesting scale for me, I still learn something, but they’re not in the educational sphere so much as the historical one.
There are also a few podcasts I listen to which aren’t educational, historical or even really important. But I really enjoy listening to them and getting to know the hosts a bit better. These include: F1 Nation, Chequered Flag Podcast, Sierra Unflitered and F1 Beyond The Grid.
I’m a big Formula One fan so I listen to a lot of podcasts and driver interviews which I find incredibly fascinating. These podcasts delve behind the race and from all of them I gain insights into the behind the scenes of what’s it’s like to be a Formula One driver. Plus, of course, previews and reviews of the qualifying and races as well as their thoughts on new tracks coming up in the new seasons.
I love Sierra Unfiltered because I’ve really enjoyed following her on Instagram and of course, watching her Youtube channels. So it was only natural that I would of course, watch/listen to her podcast when she launched it.
This podcast, for me, is just a bit of fun. Nothing too serious and I get to learn a little about Sierra in the process of listening to it!
How Podcasts Help My Anxiety
For someone who suffers with anxiety (mostly social) and who prefers to block out the rest of the world, wearing headphones and disappearing into another world really helps me. Since the pandemic, I’ve found that I prefer to be in my own little world, away from everyone. It also makes me think that I’m starring in my own movie!
Listening to music could also achieve the same effect, but I’d argue there’s something different about actually listening to someone talk. It’s like, you have no idea what I’m listening to, but boy if you knew! Whew! (Especially true when I happen to listen to an episode of ‘My Dad Wrote A Porno! How has it taken me this long to listen to it, honestly?! It’s BRILLIANT!!!)
Listening to podcasts with my headphones really helps me to switch off and almost take myself out of a potentially anxiety inducing situation. I’m not saying I suffer immensely from any kind of anxiety, but I’ve found more and more that I really dislike people! I just want to be in my own world, away from everyone and only concentrate on myself and the activity I’m doing in the moment.
There’s really no need for me to have to interact with anyone unless I’m buying something and even then I can usually just turn down the volume on my podcasts until the short interaction is over. If I could avoid all this human interaction completely then I would, but alas, our world isn’t built that way yet.
The Future of Podcasts
As of April 25th 2018 there are over 525,000 active shows and over 18.5 million episodes and an article by Variety back in 2018 said that Apple podcasts features more than 500,000 active podcasts, including content in more than 100 languages.
At the moment there are currently over two million active podcasts and more than 48 million podcast episodes. (Podcast Insights 2021). 65% of podcast listeners tune in using portable devices such as smartphones and tablets. (Edison Research 2019).
Nearly three out of every four podcast listeners in the US say they tune in to learn new things. Which I can definitely get on board with, as like I said before, there are some podcasts I listen to, where I come away having learnt something new.
Statistics show that 35% of people who don’t listen to podcasts (despite being aware of them) say it’s because they don’t know how to locate a podcast. Other top reasons include being unsure of how to listen to a podcast, not knowing where to start amid the plethora of choices, and not really understanding what a podcast is.
I’ll admit that at first I didn’t really understand what a podcast was or how to listen to them as it appeared (possibly wrongly) that the majority of them were on Apple podcasts which I couldn’t access or didn’t believe I could access.
But then I found the majority of them on Spotify which made me very happy indeed because that’s my platform of choice on my Android phone!
90% of podcast listeners, in the US, listen to podcasts form the comfort of their own home (Edison Research 2019) which surprises me because when I’m at home I DON’T listen to podcasts because I’m usually watching TV, either Netflix, Youtube or a show on Sky which I’ve previously recorded! But everyone’s different I guess.
82.4% of podcast listeners spend more than seven hours a week listening to podcasts (Discover Pods 2019) which I can definitely agree with because I work an average of 25 hours a week and the majority of those are evening shifts which mean I’m listening to podcasts 3-4 days a week.
On a long shift, I can get through at least 4 podcast episodes as most of them are under an hour long so I can usually get in a few on a night.
So it seems like podcasts are on the up, with more and more people finding them, listening to them, downloading them and spending their spare time consuming their content.
I’m so pleased I found podcasts because they really offer me an escape from the real world, a chance to learn something new and perhaps discover a new podcast to listen to!
Final Thoughts
So as you might have gathered, I’m a big fan of podcasts now and almost can’t believe I dismissed them for so long! But on the other hand, I’m happy that I’ve found them now as I have a wealth of episodes to catch up on learn from.
They really help me when I’m feeling anxious and want to avoid human interaction, they help me when I’m wandering around town and I feel lost without someone in my ear talking about one thing or another!
So, I hope you’ve found this post useful, I didn’t want it to be the usual ‘oh these are my favourite podcasts and here’s why’ kind of post. I hope you’ve gained an insight into why I listen to podcasts and perhaps a little bit more into me as well!
Let me know which ones are your favourites too and perhaps we can all find new podcasts to listen to!
Sarah
xoxoxo
