Why Gifts Matter

Join Leslie McDaniel from Hello Personality! as she talks with Bruce Anderson from the Core Gift Institute about the origin of the Core Gift process, why it works, how it has grown over time, and fleshes out some of traditional and non-traditional edges of understanding gifts. Find out more about the Core Gift Institute by visiting our website, www.coregift.org

The Australian Core Gift Alliance is off and running… Filippa Araki and Diane Hewat are founding members of the Australian Core Gift Alliance, a collaborative that has come together to spread the word of gifts by being certified to teach the Core Gift Master Facilitator and other gift-related courses in Australia. Diane is a seasoned Executive coach with a host of certifications for working with a...

Elena Cobez is following the kaleidoscope of her calling. On the surface, Elena’s path could appear to be an odd set of learnings and consultancies. Aromatherapy, sensory analyst for the wine industry, Jungian analysis, professional coaching work within the theme of creativity, teaching olfactory education at a University, creating formulas for cosmetics, and teaching artistic processes. And more....

Kate McDermott is the creator of Art of the Pie. She champions the time-honored craft of artisan pie making, having taught thousands to make homemade pie in her popular and sold-out workshops across the U.S.A., Europe, and in her virtual workshops. Using her Core Gift of helping to guide others, she compares the rules of pie making to the rules of life. It is a constant delight listening as she bl...

Joana Arcangel is a mother, writer, and disability rights advocate. She moved from the Philippines to the United States at the age of eight and is a trauma survivor. She is a powerful example of a person who, one step at a time, has turned her story of difficulty into a wise and encouraging recipe for serving others. Over the years, in both her recovery and career, she has witnessed the transforma...

Jennifer has used Core Gift assessments for approximately 20 years with a wide variety of folks coming from very different cultural and socioeconomic backgrounds. She has used the Core Gift assessments in as many ways as there are gifts: from supporting an adopted child in finding their role within a new family, to helping a firefighter transition into retirement, reducing suicidal ideation in sev...

MICHELLE HOLLIDAY is a visionary author, facilitator, consultant and researcher. For the past two decades, her work has centered around “thrivability” — a set of perspectives and practices based on an understanding of organizations as dynamic living systems. On this foundation, she accompanies organizations through change, designs and hosts strategic events, and delivers talks and workshops. In th...

Uzma Asghar is a Coach with 20 years' experience. Being a lifelong entrepreneur herself, she now specifically works with spiritually centered, mission driven Muslim women changemakers & entrepreneurs curious about elevating their impact & income potential from their businesses without sacrificing their standards or their sanity. She loves helping them activate and integrate more of their innate fe...

David Mayovsky is a native of Western Washington and is a Roman Catholic Priest. He completed his seminary studies at St. Meinrad School of Theology in Southern Indiana and was ordained for the Archdiocese of Seattle in 1997. For the past 24 years he has pastored Catholic Communities across Western Washington. He is currently pastor of St. John Vianney Catholic Church on Vashon Island. A deeply “g...

Your first draft is not your first draft! Jacq Burns has a gift for helping writers say what they really want to say. And say it in a way that will reveal the depths of who they are and why what they’re writing about matters to them. What starts as a book often turns into something much more for the author. Her first summer job at 12 was stacking books and sharpening pencils. But it wasn’t till sh...

Kathryn is a portrait photographer who is fascinated in the therapeutic power of photography. She specialises in deeply connected, soulful portraiture to help improve her clients mental health and wellbeing. Kathryn’s portraits, devised from her own journey with depression and anxiety, challenge self-belief and offer her clients a different perspective on themselves - one of self-compassion, accep...

Like all of us, Katie has a backstory that has led her to this point in her life. In her particular story, she has landed on the doorstep of gifts. Captured by the idea, she has taken the time to learn the craft of Core Gift interviewing, and also think deeply about the connections between gifts and life difficulty, and the promise that gifts hold for healing and having a firm place in the world t...

Alex Banfield had to make a decision—was he going to keep pursuing a traditional college degree or find something else to do that felt more satisfying. In this podcast, he talks about wanting to simplify his life and work with his hands. “There’s so many things going on in the world, you have to decide what you want to make into beauty.” With the help of Trek Epic’s Andrew Bryan, he got into the H...

Rachel Taylor is an emerging force in the world of eco-activism She is co-founder of Joyality, an international organization providing practical strategies for individuals to build resilience, develop leadership, and take action related to the intersecting crisis of climate, economic and social injustice, and feelings of anxiety and despair many of us have about the state of the world and our futu...

Bailey Smith wants to understand you! She’s an eager learner, both in a traditional way with schooling, but also has a deep fascination for people and what makes them tick. She’s in her late twenty’s, and full of questions, laughter, and a genuine sense of kindness and goodwill towards others. Listen in to our conversation and find out how her gift of communication has traveled with her in her wor...

On Explosions and Blankets: A conversation between innovators. Mark Ragins, Campus Psychiatrist in the California State College system, has been at the leading edge of promoting radical change in traditional mental health systems for more than thirty years. Wendy Carpenter is the Chief Executive Officer of Penny Lane Centers, one of the largest foster-care agencies in the Los Angeles area. Known f...

Michelle is a physiotherapist and health coach specializing in women’s health. She works in direct clinical service and also leads her “Choose to Thrive” workshops for women. She describes her earlier years as following the traditional definitions of success in schooling and jobs, but also having a deep sense there was something “more” she could tap into. Her all-inclusive description of gift-givi...

In this episode of Why Gifts Matter, Bruce Anderson talks with Michael MacKenzie, who currently works at Montage Support Services in Toronto helping people who experience disabilities find meaningful career paths through a program he designed called Making Work Work. Having experienced an unusual number of career twists and turns himself, he’s very adept and helping people to see the path they are...

Over the course of his career and in his personal life, Dan has followed one simple rule: Do it different. Whether it’s working in the edges of community helping people’s voices be heard, raising Llama’s, coaching leaders, or studying guitar riffs from the masters, he is always looking for a unique approach. Never one to back down from a challenge, he’s found himself in a unique position to develo...

In this episode of Why Gifts Matter, we’re talking with Monica Adair, founding Partner of Acre Architects. In the midst of growing the firm she and her husband, Steven, started, The Acres has already garnered a long list of prestigious attention and awards. Twice named one of the top design firms in Canada, their innovative practice, Storied Architecture, believes that every design idea springs fr...

In this episode, Bruce Anderson from the Core Gift Institute talks with Nicky Wilks, co-founder with Alex Craighead, of the Journeyman Institute. Journeymen has a variety of programs that help young people to discover and claim their natural identity, as well as engage older people in opportunities to learn mentoring and how to create the conditions for young people to thrive. A hungry learner, Ni...

This episode features special guest host Nick Maisey in conversation with Dr Trish Quinlivan, an experienced general practitioner who blends psychological medicine with spiritual wellbeing. After many years working in a busy GP setting, Trish’s insomnia and anxiety reached a peak in 2011, prompting her to listen more deeply to her mind and body and forge a new path. She has specialized in psycholo...

In this episode, Bruce Anderson from the Core Gift Institute talks with Mary Mojica and Jessica Alvarez from Project Return Peer Support Network in Los Angeles, California. Project Return is the largest organized mental health peer support network in the Los Angeles area, providing a wide variety of recovery, learning and social groups with names like Path Finders, Financial Strategies for Success...

In this episode, Bruce Anderson from the Core Gift Institute talks with John McKnight and Peter Block, authors of The Abundant Community. Peter and John started from different roots in their pursuit of community-building. Peter began his work as one of the pioneers in organizational development, helping organizations create clarity around vision and move forward together. John began his work with...

In this episode, Bruce Anderson from the Core Gift Institute talks with Debbie Everley, the Executive Director of the Kenora Association for Community Living in western Ontario, Canada which provides supports to people with disabilities and, more recently, young First Nations people trying to find their place in the community. A thought leader amongst her peers, she is working alongside her employ...