A Colorful Life with Keiko Roy-Carey

This is a special episode from a virtual symposium I hosted this summer on Creating Radical Community . As someone dedicated to innovative and transformative community building, I wanted to invite my friends in this space to join in on a curated conversation. Our guest of honor is my dear friend and community organiser, Denzil Dean (had to spell organizer with a “s” to respect the British!!). He i...

In this episode, I chat with my friend Sophia aka Little Fuji. She shares how her Buddhist faith has guided her as she navigates the ups and downs of life. There was point where she felt she hit rock bottom and took action to "change in her inner transformation." She shares how her deepest desire is to become as solid as Mount Fuji, to see things more clearly with an unshakable spirit. S...

This is an episode with my cousin and New Yorker, Jared Cameron. Jared and I discuss our propensity to dream, his continuous journey to unearth all of his creative gifts and discovering ways he can use them to serve others. A model, actor, gamer, director, tech entrepreneur, life coach, and author; Jared is the epitome of reinventing yourself and following your curiosities and interests, while rem...

I'm baaaaaaaack! Welcome to Season 2! I couldn't imagine a better conversation to share as the first episode. I sat down with my friend, Gabriela, whom I met in university. Gabriela shares her beautiful heart with us and the journey she traveled on to build a life she imagined for herself. She talks about growing up in Mexico, serendipitously studying abroad in the States and moving to Eur...

Twenty conversations later and a life made more colorful, I hope. My British friend Mario, is the perfect bookend to this season. It seems we've come full circle as her and I share mutual friends in Jieun and Abdellah (both featured in this season). Mario is a powerhouse of a human who has been creating the life she desires since her adolescence. You'll hear her recount her journey into falling-in...

In this episode with my friend, Athena Ramsey, we reminisce on the early days of our friendship and the community that brought us together. She shares how her abuela, mother and a family she met while in university, impacted her life and inspired her to pay it forward to generations after her. Athena opens up about her journey into parenthood through adoption, and then healing her body from early...

This is a conversation with my friend Ish, who was diagnosed with kidney failure during his senior year in university. In this episode, he walks us through what that experience was like and how he didn't allow it to get in the way of graduating and pursuing the life he imagined for himself. Ish shares how his family, friends and faculty at App State supported him so that he could put his heal...

In this episode, Samantha shares her story of immigrating from the Philippines to the U.S. and being tossed between two cultures with their own expectations placed on her. She reflects on the intentional way her parents surrounded her with Filipino culture to make sure she could experience that part of her heritage. Sam retells her journey of building community for Asian students at Appalachian St...

This is an episode with a super fan, and my dear friend, Orlando. He shares his passion for rural communities and how they've shaped him into the human he is today. Orlando brings an informed perspective on small towns that sheds light on the beauty and magic these communities possess. He dives into why he's felt drawn to them most of his life, even during his travels abroad, as well as the lesson...

This is a master class on creating friendship and being a friend, making life an adventure, accessible ways to reduce waste and how to ask the hard questions early on in a romantic relationship. Kelsey shares how she's grown into confidence in herself and the life choices she's made. I met Kelsey in university and here we retell our kindred travels through Europe and how those months together in f...

In this episode with my friend Tobi, he shares his experience immigrating from Nigeria to the States at the age of 10. He even plays the talking drum for us as he explains its relation to the Yoruba language. Tobi opens up about his journey to find his place in a new culture and some of the moments he came head-to-head with the nuisances of what it means to be Black in America. This conversation i...

In this episode with my university friend, Blakeley, we discuss all things existential. Blakeley shares his experience of being forced to spend three months in silence due to breaking his jaw during a rugby game. He opens up about his journey of figuring out how to live a life of meaning and one where he continuously asks the question, "how can I be useful?" This exploration led him into teaching...

This is a conversation with my Kiwi (New Zealander) friend, Jenny. I met Jenny in 2014 while she was on a three-year solo trip around the world. We found ourselves as roommates for a week volunteering in an English language immersion program in Poland, where we formed a deep connection which has carried our long-distance friendship all of these years. Jenny shares her heart with us as she recounts...

The U.S. is home to more than 427,000 undocumented students, including DACA recipients, enrolled in higher education.* In this conversation with my Pakistani-American friend, Sumera, she opens up about her experience going through university undocumented. University is where we met, yet I had no idea that she was carrying a weight of uncertainty and the anxiety that surrounds many DREAMers. As we...

In this episode, I sit down with my Canadian friend Mark who is currently living in Jeju (제주), South Korea. He shares how he found himself at a crossroads in his career and decided to choose his own happiness over slogging through life. He went from the film industry, to teaching English abroad, to coding, back to teaching English. In this conversation, he'll share his journey and perspective on...

Have you heard of hikikomori? Frequently present in Japan, it's a form of severe social withdrawal. In this episode, I sit down with my Swedish friend, Aske who describes how learning about hikikomori influenced his art. Aske was a CouchSurfer of mine during his travels in South Korea at the age of 19. You'll hear about his journey through Korea, becoming the artist he is today, and what it was li...

In Part 2, Jieun and I retell how we met one summer in Seoul and what caused us to continue nurturing our friendship throughout the years. She then shares how writing down what she refers to as frivolous thoughts, every day for half a year, paved way for her career as a journalist. This career took a striking turn; while she was covering a story about spycam porn culture in South Korea, she found...

Here in part 1 of a 2 part episode with my Korean friend Jieun, you'll hear my candid reaction upon learning she was the social media manager for President Moon Jae-in. Jieun takes us down memory lane as she shares stories of her time living in Spain alone at 19 and how she developed fluency in Spanish. As we all learn, life has it's ups and downs, and Jieun is certainly no stranger to the variety...

This conversation is with my Moroccan friend, Abdellah. I hosted him as a CouchSurfer when he traveled to Seoul in the summer of 2015. In this episode you'll hear Abdellah talk about his life in Morocco, studying in Europe and moving to Hong Kong where he's been living as an expat since 2014. He shares his career journey from engineering to photography and creative directing, as well as how he con...

In this episode I sit down with Gonzalo, a dear friend of mine from Spain. We became friends while he was studying abroad for a semester in 2011 at my university in the Blue Ridge mountains, Appalachian State University. After 11 years of friendship, we finally discuss in depth his journey of becoming a scientist and living his childhood dream. Gonzalo shares how studying abroad impacted the traje...

I met Adrienna in Prague in 2014, years later, as it tends to do, life came full circle as we became colleagues in South Korea teaching ESL. In this episode, Adrienna opens up her world to us as she retells stories of feeling like an outsider in the country she was born in, her friendships that served as a force of nature in her life and her ongoing journey to unearth a life of meaning. You'll hea...

Do you remember Tumblr? 10+ years ago I came across the most enchanted European photo diary, only to soon discover a kindred spirit of mine was living in Austria. In this episode, Vicky talks about university in Austria, discovering new passions and finding meaning inside the pandemic. You’ll hear us talk a lot about falling in love with change and the art of embracing the unknown. I believe this...

In this spicy episode, I chat with my British friend, Denzil Dean. There is a magic in how we met, and in this conversation, for the first time ever, we connect all the dots. Denzil talks about growing up in the countryside, his experience with loneliness and being made to feel insignificant. In this raw conversation, you'll hear about his story, his romantic worldview and his passion for communit...

This conversation is with my Canadian friend, Sinan Leylak, CEO of Spark Rentals Inc. and Ice Cycles, Canada's first ice bike company. Sinan talks about CouchSurfing with 80+ strangers during his solo travels across Europe and Asia, why and how he decided on a life of entrepreneurship post university, as well as how he balances the stress that comes with running multiple businesses. The way he liv...

Welcome to A Colorful Life Podcast with creator, Keiko Roy-Carey. A Colorful Life Retreat | Interest page