100th EPISODE! - A Moment Of Gratitude, Honesty and Leveling Up

100 episodes. What a milestone!

In this solo episode, I open up about the highs and lows of reaching this point with the Headliner Mindset Podcast. I share honestly about the self-doubt that crept in, the voice that told me to quit, and the support that reminded me why I started. From stepping on stage recently with Bella Renee to hearing encouragement from past clients, this episode is about the importance of having people in your corner.

We dive into:

• Why consistency is everything (and what happens when you lose it)
• How to navigate the “inner gremlin” of self-doubt
• The role of community and accountability in staying inspired
• A special announcement about the new Headliner Mastermind launching October 6

If you’re an artist who’s ready to stop spinning your wheels and lock in for the rest of 2025, this episode is for you.

Transcript

0:00

What up Nick? I'm here at the airport. I'm heading back from Denver. I've just played two of, like the biggest shows that I've ever done. I opened for Ellis Dream and Cloy. He was insane, dude. Before the show I was just thinking about you and, uh, the impact that you had on my music. And I just wanna say thank you for being a part of my musical growth hey Nick, just wanted to say. Thank you for the human You are. Everything you do for the industry, the the energy you bring, just wanted to jump on here and just show you some gratitude I'm not sure how often you hear that, but you're an amazing person. congrats on a hundred episodes. Love you man. jumping in here today to celebrate and to be grateful because I am just flowing. I'm on that high vibrational vibe and you put me on that vibe and I'm happy because living like this is fucking amazing I love you. You're the best, and I hope everything is going well with you.

Nik Cherwink: 1:01

What's up everybody? Welcome to the 100th episode of the Headliner Mindset Podcast. I am so fucking pumped. This is such an awesome moment. What a milestone. I really, first off, wanna thank all of you that have been listening, all of you that have been a part of this journey. Everyone that has shared the podcast, I have left comments that has shared my content, especially the ones that have sent dms. You know those dms. Really keep me going and, uh, I just appreciate each and every one of you. Thank you for subscribing. Thank you for following. Like, this would not exist without you. And even more so I really gotta thank all of the guests that have come on that have dedicated their time, their energy, their wisdom that has shared so much. I mean years and years and years of experience and knowledge that has been shared on the last a hundred episodes of this. So thank you from the bottom of my heart to each and every one of you that have been a part of this, from my guests to the listeners. What a fucking cool moment, and I'm just excited to share this episode with you, to share this milestone with you. Uh, you know, this is gonna be a solo episode today, and for those of you that have been listening regularly, you guys know that normally I put these out every Monday. I've been pretty damn consistent with it, uh, for most of these a hundred episodes. Uh, up until the last, I dunno, it's been like six or seven weeks or so that I really have been procrastinating on putting out this episode. And a big part of that is I just wanted to make it special. I wanted to make it something big and, and, you know, just really, uh, impactful and I kind of just didn't know what to do. Then in that time, in that space, I also, just to be honest, to be vulnerable, to be real. I also had a lot of, I dunno, self-doubt start to creep in. When I was really questioning like, do I wanna keep doing this? To be honest, it's a lot of time. It's a lot of work, it's a lot of energy. First and foremost, I'm, I'm a coach. I'm not a podcaster. This is not like, my day job over here. So I had this thought coming in. I was like, yo, maybe I'm, maybe I'm gonna end it. Maybe I'm just gonna cap it at a hundred and move on. But you know, fortunately That's right. I'm not fucking leaving because we still have a lot more awesome artists to interview. In fact, I've got big gigantic San Holo Allison Wonderland all coming up over next few weeks. So if you guys are not subscribed yet, make sure you're subscribed. Now, if you're an artist that's pursuing the dream of being a headlining and touring artist, or maybe you already are you know, that self-doubt is going to creep in, right? Those thoughts that say, Hey, maybe you should throw in the towel. You've been trying this for so long. It's not happening, or it's too competitive, whatever the story is, whatever that little gremlin voice is that pops into your head, it is a real thing and it's so normal and so much of the work that I do as a coach is helping master that inner voice to become the master of it rather than the slave to it. Right. Call it the ego, call it the saboteur. I call it the inner gremlin. you know, Learning how to have awareness around that voice, recognize it, but not let it take over. And to be honest, I'd kind of let it take over for a while. You know, I really fell off with the podcast and um, thank God that I have people in my corner that have encouraged me to keep going, that have, you know, reminded me about how valuable this is, uh, including some of those messages that you heard in the beginning of the episode. Those are video messages that I received from my clients. And shout out to Riley specifically. He just randomly hit me up one day and he was just like, Hey, man, like. Mean I haven't talked to you in a long time. We worked together like, I dunno, over a year ago. And he's just like, I just wanna say, you know, what's up? I love you. Like, congrats on a hundred episodes. And I hadn't, I hadn't even done the episode yet, obviously. But it just really breathed life back into me and, you know, it just made me realize the importance of having people in your corner because that little gremlin voice is going to pop up. And so we need other voices. You know, I recently had another example of that happen where my friend Bella Renee, shout out to Bella, an incredible singer, vocalist, producer, she just played Lost Lands this last weekend. Um, she invited me to come out to play guitar at one of her shows. She was playing in Dallas, and she's like, Nick, you gotta come out and you gotta play guitar with me. You know, she's seen me in my corner. Just kind of, you know, tinkering around, put. My little riffs here and there. I don't consider myself an artist in that sense. I'm not pursuing anything like that professionally. But she really saw me and she's like, no. Like, you get to fucking come out of the closet, come out of your room and fucking get on stage with me. And so originally I'm like, yeah, I'm so down. That sounds so fun. But then like two nights before I called her and I was like, Hey, like are, are you sure? Like you really want me to come out? You know, I had the, the voice, the gremlin was creeping in, being like, yo, you're not ready. You didn't prepare. You didn't really know what you're doing. And I started having that self-doubt creep in and I called her and, you know, thank God she totally just got me pumped up and excited and it was like, no, we're gonna go out there, we're gonna have fun. And, uh, really turned my mindset around, you know, and so got up there, played my first show ever playing the guitar. I played drums when I was like way younger. But man, that was a really awesome experience. So first off, again, shout out Bella. I fucking love you. You're amazing and I'm gonna get you on the podcast soon. But it was just an a, a really. Another great example of why we need support. We have to have people in our corner, and especially as artists, especially as music producers I should say, or bedroom music producers where we spend so much time alone in the room, you know, by yourself staring at your computer, just, uh, isolated. Right, and isolation is one of the, you know, just biggest ways to fall into those spirals of self-doubt, So it's so important that we have people in our corner. We are not meant to do this alone. And also the other thing that's become really clear to me recently is that we need to be consistent, right? Like I have had so much success with the podcast because I have shown up every single week, every Monday, putting out an episode, and then definitely saw the. What happens, when you stop being consistent, right? I took a little bit of a break, which, you know, of course it's okay to take a break sometimes. We gotta take our foot off the gas. We gotta take care of ourselves and, and, and that's all good. But also realistically, when we do, there are gonna be consequences to that, right? We're going to start seeing our business slow down. We're gonna start seeing our fan base dwindle. We're gonna start seeing less momentum. And I definitely saw that right? Once I took my foot off the gas with the podcast, everything in my business slowed down. Just, you know, any sort of. social Media algorithm, any kind of, just connection, really slowed down as well. So as much as I hate to say it, it really is important that when you launch your project and you're out there and you're getting after it, you're putting out music. Like we really do have to stay consistent. And part of staying consistent, of course, is also being inspired, right? It's being accountable. That's what's helped me stay consistent, is I have people that are expecting me to put out an episode every Monday. but What happens when the inspiration dies off? Uh, if I don't have somebody in my corner to inspire me, to keep me motivated, to lean on, to talk to when I need support, then what really what happened with me is like I just kind of became isolated and, you know, missed out on a month and a half of, of what could have been a bunch of new fans. A lot more growth, a lot more opportunity. So I know this brings up a lot of pressure for a lot of artists, right? Like feeling the pressure of like, I have to keep posting every day. I have to keep showing up every day. I have to make content, I have to keep releasing. And you know, there's this interesting dynamic and balance where yes, if it's coming from pressure, then it's gonna be. Really hard. Right. It's going to be a grind. It's always gonna feel like we are, uh, kind of coming from stress and coming from anxiety and that's really, that's no way to operate. And that's where, you know, yeah, it is. Okay. I think to take your foot off the gas, take a break if you need to, but what's. Important is to really get shifted back into inspiration and excitement. Right? This is what I notice for a lot of touring artists that I work with where, you know, they really are dependent on continuing to put out content, continuing to put out music, uh, and basically continuing to stay relevant because if. They're not, they're not getting bookings and if they don't get bookings, they're not making money, and that's their full-time income. So that can kind of create a head fuck. Right? It's a little bit different when you're still coming up. It's, you know, you might be putting that pressure on yourself when you're a full-time artist. The, you know, the pressure is real also. But I think the big mindset shift to step into is moving from, I have to, to, I get to, like, I'm get to do this. I'm blessed to do this would really be the ultimate level, right? Like, damn, I'm so blessed that I get to wake up and I, I get to make music, I get to make content. I get to put out these episodes, I get to connect with artists, right? When I feel like this is a chore that I have to do this, I'm kind of fucked, right? So there's a couple different layers to this, right? It's like I've gotta bring myself into that mindset and into that energy of, wow, I'm blessed to do this every day. I'm blessed to be creative. I'm blessed to put out music. I'm ble blessed to put out episodes, and it also really helps to have some external accountability, right? Knowing that like I, I get to put out an episode every Monday, people are expecting it, and having other people in my corner to really push me, to encourage me and to support me. So I knew I wanted to do something special for the hundredth episode. And I suppose procrastinating on this actually was kind of divinely orchestrated because it really did line up perfectly that we are about to step into the last quarter of the year. We have three more months, October, November, December, and then we're hitting 2026. And I don't know about you guys, but this year has flown by already. And I know for most people, like we usually wait until New Year's. To start, getting excited and to start, you know, coming up with our New Year's resolutions and our goals and, and you know, that whole talk about like, this is gonna be my year, that's when it starts. But what I wanna offer is that we don't wait until 2026 that we come into 2026 on fucking fire, that we have momentum already. We're not starting to get momentum. And so. I really sat down and thought about it. I was like, this is perfect timing to put together what I'm calling the Headliner Mastermind. And I've never done this before. But I'm gonna take on a small group of five or six people and do a very intimate group coaching program between now and the end of the year where we have weekly calls, we have daily accountability, we focus on, of course, the mindset, getting inspired, getting fired up, having accountability, having a group of. Peers in your corner to push you, to challenge you, to hold you accountable, to check in on you, as well as, you know, walking you guys through everything that I coach my clients on, right? So that means getting super clear on your goals, getting super clear on your systems and your processes, really getting your brand dialed in, getting all of your systems dialed in because you are running a business. You need to have, you know, solid systems and not just be guessing at how to grow a fan base. Right. But like having a social media calendar, having a really clear content strategy and people to bounce ideas around with. So we're gonna go super deep into all of that, but I wanna keep it really small and really intimate. So this is different from the Headliner Mindset Group program that I've run in the past. This is going to be a true mastermind, so really only for people that are super serious about like leveling the fuck up over the next three months that are gonna be committed, that really want to go all in. I know a lot of you are probably coming back from Lost Lands right now, being like, damn, how do I get on stage? How do I make that happen for myself? Well, you know, it starts with making. That commitment being incredibly disciplined, being incredibly driven, cutting out the bullshit outta your lives, getting locked the fuck in and straight up for most people, you're not gonna do that by yourself, right? We need to surround ourselves with other people that have that same kind of mindset, to be around people that have that same level of drive, that same level of ambition. And I'm telling you, this is gonna be the place to do it. I'm gonna be super selective about who I take on. Uh, but if this calls to you. Send me a dm. I'm gonna have more information coming out on this over the next couple weeks, but we're gonna start on October 6th. So October, November, December, we are locking the fuck in. We're getting after it. You know, no more spinning your wheels, no more wondering, why is my career not growing? Why are my fans not growing? Like, we're gonna get all that dialed in. We're gonna do it as a group. We're gonna have a high level of standards, a high level of accountability, a high level of drive, commitment, motivation, and also a lot of fucking fun. Anyone that's worked with me, you know, we are always gonna have a good time. We're gonna have fun too. Fun gets it done. So Yeah, you guys, I'm super excited to find the right people that wanna be a part of this with me. Like I said, just send me a DM on Instagram, uh, and I'm super excited for the next a hundred episodes of the Liner Mindset Podcast. We've got some really, really great people on the way. We've got some really great episodes, so thank you for tuning in. Please subscribe if you're not subscribed and stay tuned for a lot of great stuff on the way.