Confidently Anxious

In this inspiring episode, we sit down with Pooya Pourak to hear about his incredible journey from being a refugee to becoming the co-founder and CEO of the social impact tech startup, MatchNice. Pooya's story is one of resilience, mindfulness, and profound personal growth. During our conversation, Pooya delves into several key topics, including: The importance of staying loyal to both persona...

Cullen Welch is an explorer and visual storyteller. He goes well beyond exploring the world by also exploring the mind and the heart. In this episode, Cullen shares his growth journey toward becoming a peaceful warrior that empowers positive masculinity and comes from a source of love instead of fear. This includes an insightful journey to South Africa to dive deeper into the plant medicine, Ayahu...

Today we are joined by Andy Chen . What’s cool about Andy’s story is that he broke out of his comfort zone during extended solo travels in Europe. This resulted in him meeting a girl and forming a relationship while spontaneously traveling to different countries. He made a ton of other beautiful connections at hostels and Tomorrowland that would not have been possible unless he broke out of his st...

Today we are joined by Bailey Jorgensen. Bailey is in the midst of growing his coaching business called: Lean In Coaching. As the name implies, the idea here is understanding where each individual client is from a health and fitness standpoint so that they can lean into more positive habits and routines. Step by step, Bailey takes a tailored approach so that his clients truly identify with the pro...

Today we are joined by Andy Chen, who has recently been laid off from his corporate job. Instead of seeing this as a misfortune, Andy is seizing the opportunity to hone in on his entrepreneurial identity and travel the world. Are you someone who struggles in the corporate structure? Are you staying accountable to being on a path that aligns with you long-term? Andy has been in battle with this and...

Are you someone who wrestles with having to know and understand every little detail or piece of fact-based evidence to believe something? Or someone who must see before they believe so to speak? Conner has a high threshold for this. He also has a high threshold for accountably pursuing truth. In this episode, Conner details his journey of personal hardships and relentless investigation toward phil...

Since experiencing a life changing rock-climbing injury, Caleb Timmerman shares his growth journey. Rather than aim to get back to where he was, Caleb decides to embrace the change to become an even stronger self. Throughout his recovery, Caleb leans on the unique level of connectedness and support within the rock-climbing community as he encounters challenges with identity and fear. I truly enjoy...

Coming from a conservative background focused on discipline, logic and definitions, John Wood shares his story of experiencing a young-life crisis of prioritizing spontaneous job experiences in order to establish true meaning and identity in his life. After experiencing a range of adventures from living a fisherman’s life in Alaska, to manual labor on a farm, working in the oilfield, and joining t...

Since deciding to replace drinking and partying with the project of building a van, Edwin has grown from people pleasing to becoming his true self. In this episode, Edwin shares his newfound purpose to equip, encourage, and empower others. This is important because he was able to meaningfully connect with people while living a fulfilling life only after deciding who he wanted to be and gaining the...

The Balance Chat is a foundational group of 5 close friends with an influential bond/thing/social energy/accountability souls that act as a reflective tool to fuel our growth throughout our lives. This episode brings us together to talk about our all-around dynamic and the positive benefits of having friends to openly discuss, challenge, and ultimately be vulnerable with to reinforce life’s meanin...

Cullen Welch is an Explorer with three big ideas in mind: Earth sustainability, interplanetary exploration, and visual storytelling. He began his professional life in the aviation industry, building on a passion for international travel and photography. He has journeyed across 57x countries and put himself through limit-testing adventures since having an intense experience with death. This ranges...

Will Rickard is a creative, light-hearted leader with years of experience building and leading sales teams in the professional services industry. His most recent career endeavor involves he and his wife abruptly leaving their home in Canada to relocate to Europe as Will heads the enterprise sales team for the EMEA region of his current company. In leaving his comfort zone not just from the standpo...

Chris Brown is a close friend, a true brother who serves a purpose of sharing an abundance of valuable knowledge with those he surrounds himself with. Whether it be from numerous readings, or from the habitual way with which Chris lives alongside several different interests such as nutrition, sports, or real estate, he exemplifies great ideas around routines and how to create meaningful value acro...

Patrick Lyons is a fitness influencer, bodybuilder, and coach who runs a fully customized workout program and meal plan called The Lyron Shred. He also created the Online Fitness Coach Academy where fitness coaches can acquire certification spanning across thousands of studies across the current scientific literature. Furthermore, Patrick pursues several different interests such as acting, competi...

Tracey Deen is a classically trained opera singer. She has sung in major opera houses and concert hall in Europe, notably as a singer for Leonard Bernstein in the Vienna Staatsoper. Since living in the states, Tracey was a long-time professional singer, performing with regional opera companies and singing over 30 years as a concert artist. Tracey took her skills to the form of teaching, with stude...

Vlad Gladtskov is a growing House DJ who started pursuing the interest after challenging himself to move to an unfamiliar city- Denver, Colorado. Knowing few people, Vlad exposed himself to a wide variety of EDM shows which naturally helped build a community of people to surround himself with. Whether it be sharing the importance of yoga and overall mindfulness, or the benefits of learning a new s...

Dave Roper is a professional mountain biker, ultra-marathon runner, and all-around athlete who puts himself through extreme physical tasks to reinforce self-direction and grow in light of uncomfortable circumstances. Since graduating from Baylor University, Dave bounced back from being stuck in a rut, tiring out after running just 2 miles, to setting the course record at the Piney Woods Ultra to q...

Andriy Grygorenko is a growing architect who decided to pursue the art on a whim at The University of Texas at Austin School of Architecture. He then took his career into his own hands by becoming one of the youngest licensed architects in the United States. He is also a musician under the stage name “Like the Giant” with which he released an EP titled, “ Lost ” and a number of singles with his mo...