Andrew Petty is Dying

What does it take to live a life you'll be outrageously proud of when you die?  That's really the question at the heart of this podcast, and this episode is part two of a two-part series aimed at providing a trustworthy answer to that question. Through my own life experience, conversations with guests on this show, 1-1 coaching partnerships, and The Graveyard Group, I've identified six essential i...

What does it take to live a life you'll be outrageously proud of when you die?    That's really the question at the heart of this podcast. Together, we're cultivating the mindset and acquiring the means to answer this question. The Mortality Mindset breaks us free of the Status Quo's gravitational pull and motivates us to give the things that matter most the attention they deserve now, before it's...

Legacy. What is it, and why does it matter? As a 28-year veteran in the field of Otorhinolaryngology, clinical nurse specialist Maggie Gannon first encountered the transformational impact of legacy in the crucible of caring for desperately ill head and neck cancer patients. Then, cancer hit close to home. That ordeal galvanized her resolve to bring the power of legacy to everyone.   Today, Maggie...

Unless you're completely deluded or hiding under a rock, you know that life is hard. On the whole, it's a series of challenges, crises, and steep learning curves punctuated by brief periods of relative peace and ease. That's why all of us need to hear the very simple, highly-underrated, and completely unsexy message I'm offering you today. Unglamorous though it may be, it's a key to living a life...

On Mother's Day 2020, with COVID beginning its inexorable march around the globe, Alison Zimmerman got the news that her dad was being rushed into emergency brain surgery after an ER visit for a headache took a dramatic turn. Her dad survived the surgery to wake up to no peripheral vision, short-term memory loss, disorientation in time and space, and a terminal glioblastoma diagnosis.  Alison swun...

What new things do you have in mind for this new year? Maybe you want to tackle a new professional challenge. Maybe you want to pay more attention to your health. Maybe you want to dial back your intensity at work to make more time for family and friends.  Whatever your new things are this year, how will you make them a reality? At the very least, how will you ensure that you'll be able to say tha...

In episode 070, Forward, Pioneer!: Why the "Frontier" is the Best Place to Be , I asserted that we humans are made for the Frontier and the Frontier is made for us. To shrink back from it is to do ourselves and everyone around us much more harm than good. It's a short solo episode, and if you haven't listened to it yet, hit pause on this one and cue up that one. It's a perfect appetizer for today'...

"...So fire cremation, we really think, okay, somebody dies and, poof, they're ash. But what happens is the body gets put in an oven, which is known as a retort. There's an open flame that's at about 1800 degrees. It's got a five-inch pipe that feeds the fuel into the fire. So it has a very high carbon footprint. It uses as much gas as a cross country road trip. And the body's tissues are burned a...

What comes to mind when you hear the word "frontier?" Covered wagons? Lewis and Clark? Space–the "final frontier," for all you Trekkies out there? Danger, uncertainty, a place to avoid? Or how about excitement, discovery, a place to seek?  In this modern age, the Frontier is neither an idea nor a reality with much apparent relevance or appeal. Most of us tread well-worn paths that lead to familiar...

A year or so ago, I became captivated by the idea of creating rites of passage experiences for our boys when each of them turned 13--an age that to me represents the transition from childhood to young manhood. I don't remember what first turned me on to the idea. But once it took root in my heart and mind, it didn't let go. I explored the idea further through my own reading about traditional rites...

Just three years ago, in the dark of night on a battlefield in a foreign land, Army Ranger Sergeant First Class Ryan Davis was hanging on to life by the very slimmest of threads.  The tale of heroism, selfless love and courage, and perseverance in the midst of profound physical, emotional, and psychological suffering that unfolded on and after that battlefield incident is nothing short of mindblow...

Serendipity. According to the Oxford Languages Dictionary, "serendipity" is " the occurrence and development of events by chance in a happy or beneficial way."  What if it was possible to harness the power of serendipity rather than leave it all up to chance?    Finding Serendipity in Our Own Story If we're honest, many of the most pivotal moments of our lives are unscripted, unplanned, and unfore...

What do you need to let go of?  It's an easy question to ask, but it can be an awfully tough one to answer. In this episode, I'll share how an answer to this question revealed itself to me recently and the impact it's had. I hope my experience will inspire you to begin seeking answers to this question, too.     Stopped in My Tracks "I submit."  The words startled me. They were my words, but they h...

Pam Blackburn loves to climb mountains.  Pam is also dying.  In this episode, Pam shares what the view is like from her lonely mountaintop of terminal illness. This is her final word to the world, prepared courageously and graciously to serve all of us who don't have access to the same view.  There are things we need to hear and things we need to know that only those, like Pam, inhabiting the sacr...

Do you have a plan for when you die? Do you have a plan for when your loved ones die?  In 2001, Michelle Mathai was just two years into her first foreign service post as vice consul in Auckland, NZ. She and her parents were on a farewell trip around the island in anticipation of Michelle's imminent departure for a new post in El Salvador. In the blink of an eye, the trip turned tragic when their c...

What do you need to let go of? In her teens, alcohol became Carrie Chown's refuge from emotional pain. By her early college years, she was firmly in the grips of alcoholism. Carrie worked hard to keep everything looking shiny on the outside, but inside she wanted to die. Then, she was diagnosed with pulmonary hypertension as a college junior and was told she had two years to live. Ironically, it f...

"What do you do?" We're all familiar with that question. It comes up naturally when we meet someone for the first time in a social setting. Its usual purpose is to learn what someone does for a living to keep food on the table and a roof over their heads.  In this episode, however, we'll REpurpose this old question in a new way to help you know yourself better and discern even more clearly the pat...

This episode is a wake-up call, a call to get back in the driver's seat of your life, a call to become the boss of your most precious nonrenewable resource: Time.  Because if you don't have time, Time will ultimately have you. And you won't like the results.    Guilty as Charged How many times have we heard someone say, "I don't have time," or "If only I had more time," or said something like that...

What place do rites of passage have in your life?  In this episode, my special guest is MY coach Amy Musson, and we explore why rites of passage matter and the surprisingly harmful consequences of neglecting them. It turns out that there's more at stake than you might have thought--if you've ever given rites of passage much thought at all.  If you haven't given them much thought, then you're not a...

"If I've learned anything in the last three years, it's that life and death are so much bigger than us. You embraced life and love with all your amazing energy, which still reverberates. You are still with us on walks in the forest, on windy ridges, in a sunlit moment after the rain, in the love, laughter, and music of your friends and family. You are there in dreams that seem more real than wakin...

How do we make the most of today? This episode is short and sweet, banged out somewhat hastily during the current season of curveballs I mentioned in the previous episode–but banged out with love and goodwill toward you, my fellow traveler along life's winding path, you who are waking up to the reality of your Mortality and courageously embracing it to live with guts, gusto, and abandon.  So today...

What do we do when life throws us a curveball?  On this podcast, we're equipping ourselves with the mindset and the means to live with guts, gusto, and abandon. Growing in our ability to respond to life's inevitable curveballs requires both evolving our mindset and upgrading our means. And as we get better at responding to life's curveballs, we increase our capacity to live with even more guts, gu...

What is your relationship with Death?  It may seem like an odd question, but your answer to it has everything to do with your quality of life. My guest on this episode shares actionable insight into this relationship so that we can optimize our quality of life.    Introducing Dr. Frederic Tate Dr. Frederic Tate is a fascinating human with a perspective on Life and Death forged in the crucible of e...

What do you want?  It's a simple enough question at face value, but it can be far from easy to answer. Many of us have never truly tried to answer it. Many of us have never been aware that it was important to do so. And many of us are a lot better at knowing what we DON'T want.  Failing to answer this question can lead to surprisingly harmful consequences--but answering it can put us on a path to...

It's one thing to encounter Mortality unexpectedly. It's quite another thing to voluntarily put yourself in situations where encounters with Mortality are around every corner. Yet that's what my guest on this episode does often--and with jaw-dropping results. What he's learned in his years of exploring the edges of human ability will inspire you to live with more guts, gusto, and abandon than ever...