Alden Schaub shared their story and experiences with us recently and you can find our conversation below.
Hi Alden, thank you so much for taking time out of your busy day to share your story, experiences and insights with our readers. Let’s jump right in with an interesting one: Would YOU hire you? Why or why not?
I would certainly hire myself. I have been able to produce multiple high quality long running live trivia and comedy shows for local Austin venues. These shows now have multi-year track records of profitability. I have been able to turn a slow night into years of decent nights. Bars and restaurants have a lot of fixed costs, my job is to ensure those slow nights make money and now they do.
Plus its fun. People really look forward to these shows each week and so do I. A couple hours a week with friends is really valuable when everyone is so busy. It’s a good excuse to get together.
Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
My name is Alden Schaub. I’m a professional entertainer. I wear a lot of hats but my main focus is live entertainment.
I now call my company Unknown Events. This encompasses weekly live trivia shows, stand-up comedy showcases and private corporate events.
One thing that really sets my trivia shows apart is that I write all my own questions. I also write all the questions for my other hosts. I always start with the idea of “is this interesting” to me personally. Anyone can ask things like “What’s the capital of Iowa”? That isn’t a fun or interesting question. Something like “Are there saltwater ducks?” is much better. That is easy to understand and something people may not have considered before. Now you’re sparking debate among the players, now its getting interesting. Writing the questions is more art than science. It’s really the most challenging part of my job and I have not been able to hire anyone who can do it for me.
I also do a lot of writing as a stand up comedian. I have written professionally for a few other comedians which is fun. I think I have an original style that mostly revolves around finding topics that are uninteresting to most people and analyzing them to the point of absurdity. I find a lot of humor in the mundane. Sometimes I perform clean comedy so that style fits well with those types of shows. Very self deprecating. I feel that our lives at their core are meaningless therefore everything we do is absurd and ripe for comedy.
Thanks for sharing that. Would love to go back in time and hear about how your past might have impacted who you are today. What did you believe about yourself as a child that you no longer believe?
I used to see people doing interesting things and think they were special. That I was a normal person so those types of pursuits were not going to be available to me. I should just get a traditional education and them look for some type of career because that is what normal people do.
I went to business school to study economics which was very interesting but I began to realize I had no interest in working for a large corporation or the government as my fellow students were planning to do.
Somewhere along the line it dawned on me that most people can do pretty much anything they want if they simply decide to do it. So even I as a non-special person could just start doing something like live entertainment. It’s not like anyone wanted to stop me, I just never decided I could pursue it. Getting started was the hardest part because it required a paradigm shift in my thinking but once I got started it was easy to just keep doing it until I could finally make enough money to become a full time entertainer.
Now I get up everyday and think I’m really doing it. This is great.
What did suffering teach you that success never could?
Failure is really important. It’s a better teacher than success. Every time you attempt and fail you make adjustments. When you succeed it feels good but it rarely helps you improve.
I had so many different jobs in my 20’s and early 30’s where I thought, this is fine but it’s not ideal. I spent a lot of time going though the motions seeking more meaningful work. Each time I would get a new job the real motivation was simply to try something new. I spent a many years spinning my wheels with no direction. That can be painful. A constant nagging feeling that you should be doing something else with your life.
Finally when I started working towards entertainment it felt like a weight had been lifted. I no longer felt so much uncertainty. The more I did it, the better I felt so I just kept going. I’m so much happier now but it took a long time to reach this point where now I can spend my time doing personally fulfilling work.
So a lot of these questions go deep, but if you are open to it, we’ve got a few more questions that we’d love to get your take on. What important truth do very few people agree with you on?
The most important thing a person can do is to find their work. Work that is meaningful to you. That is completely subjective. I used to think paradise was living on the beach with no worries. I tried that and it’s fun for about a week. For whatever reason people need work to do. It can give our lives purpose and meaning. I think most unhappiness is due to feelings of purposelessness. Of uselessness.
Everyday I have things to do. That is very precious to me and was not always the case. People want to be rewarded for their work but they have it backwards. If you do it correctly, the work is the reward.
Okay, we’ve made it essentially to the end. One last question before you go. What are you doing today that won’t pay off for 7–10 years?
Stand up comedy is a long process. They say it takes 10+ years to make a stand up comedian. I’m currently in year 6. I’ve invested a lot of time and energy honing my craft. In the end there is no guarantee that it will work out financially. I could end up doing stand up comedy the rest of my life in obscurity and it was still worth it. To me the payoff is I’ll be able to say I did it because I wanted to. Anything beyond that will be a nice bonus.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://lnk.bio/Ivv3
- Instagram: @themobschaub @unknowntrivia
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@BoredomBusters
