Be the Change

What stops us from doing the right thing by ourselves and our planet? On this episode of Be the Change, I speak with Maggie Saunders, a women’s coach and certified hypnotherapist and also my own business coach. She specializes in helping women uncover why they hide who they are (consciously or unconsciously) and today she helps us understand why we humans are so slow to make the important changes...

I met Addisyn Mayer on Instagram and we became fast friends. From doing beach cleanups in her neighborhood, to marching for children's educational, health and safety rights, she inspires me daily to continue to be the change. Did I mention she is just 10 years old? For BTC's 7th Season and 50th episode - I cannot think of a better guest to have on. Addisyn is joined by her Mom Jenn, and we will he...

With a career in film spanning 40 years, Louie Schwartzberg has opened our hearts with his work - inviting us to sit in awe of this remarkable thing we call life.  He is renowned and revered for his work in time lapse cinematography, most notably with his Moving Art series on Netflix and of course the film Fantastic Funghi . I am honored (and grateful) to welcome Louie to Be The Change to dis...

Numerous studies, including those conducted by our own governments show it is not just important, but imperative our children have consistent exposure to nature. The positive effects of nature include improved cognitive functioning, including increased concentration, greater attention capacities, and higher academic performance. Yet millions of city kids have no access to anything more than a ceme...

This October 22nd will be 10 years since much of NYC was devastated by Hurricane Sandy.  With millions of dollars in federal funding, it wasn’t until this past year that NYC started to take action on making downtown neighborhoods more resilient to ever increasing storms. The plans approved and forced on to residents by former Mayor De Blasio, with the support of our city council and curr...

In NYC we are currently facing major green washing resiliency projects that are taking away our public green spaces and old grow vegetation and being replaced with cement mounds and more development. Is it possible to have resiliency and also nature? The answer is a resounding yes. Not only do we need to work with it, we need to partner with it. In this BTC conversation we will hear from Eric "T"...

We all want climate resiliency to protect our homes and neighborhoods – but what do we do when our city officials use resiliency to develop our public green spaces for their profit? In NYC we are currently seeing our public parks being turned into cement, all in the name climate resiliency, except that it isn’t. Science shows that we need the trees and vegetation to soak up the heavy rain fal...

Real change comes from regular conversations over coffee or at the dinner table – not from the Boardroom. When conversation turns to collaboration – that’s when the real magic happens. In 2015 Lindsey McCoy had reached a pivotal point in her own part in contributing to plastic pollution. Living on the island of the Bahamas for 10 years, she saw first hand how plastic really has no graveyard and th...

Today I am speaking with Matt Hill. Founder and Chief Environmental Evangelist at the reforestation nonprofit, One Tree Planted.   After 15 years as an educator, business leader, and eco-adventurer, he wanted a simple way to help individuals and businesses make real progress towards a more sustainable planet. He started One Tree Planted when he realized that planting trees is one of the...

What if you could put on a cape, grab your shield and go save the world? What would you do? Who would you save? What if I told you that you could live out your super-hero dreams right now? Jan Lucanus is a Transmedia producer and Founder of ReelWurld – the world’s first social film studio.  His recent project –Justice for Hire – is a platform not just for cosplay, but for findi...

Neale Donald Walsch has written 39 books on contemporary spirituality and its practical application in everyday life, including the 9-book Conversations with God series. His titles have been translated into 37 languages. His latest book is  The God Solution , published in December, 2020, which invites humanity to embrace a new global ethic based on a refined and clarified definition of God. T...

Just a few years ago, when we were deep in the Trump Presidency, it felt like every day was a new attack on the environment. From releasing protected park lands to the gas and mining industries, and the gulf waters for drilling – every day with Trump felt like a monstrous machine ripping up our trees and spewing sewage into our waters. For most of us it was devastating. The election of Joe Bi...

Just over 3 years ago retired Minnesota correctional officer Antonio Espinosa had to make a decision – the kind of decision one may only make once in a lifetime. His beloved best friend and partner had just been murdered by an inmate at the prison they both worked at. Antonio was faced with choosing hope or hate. He chose hope and Art. With nothing but the drive to be the change and help othe...

Alizee Zimmermann has always had a love of water. Born and raised on the islands of the Turks and Caicos, she began diving at the age of 12. Earning a Masters in English Lit at the age of 21, she taught in China and Spain, but it was a trip to Vietnam where she became a dive instructor – logging hundreds of hours in her second home, the sea.  Her home called her back and she began v...

Just when you thought it was safe to go outside…Omicron knocked on our door. In what felt like two weeks, this new Covid variant has reeked havoc on our societal systems and left nearly all of us in a state of confusion. With 1 in 4 New Yorkers contracting the variant –including the triple vaccinated – how do we protect ourselves? Today on Be the Change I am honored to have on Dr. Daniel Grif...

There is so much action and effort to get kids vaccinated and back in to school for their mental health – but who is tending to the mental wounds they suffered from being home the past year and a half? Do parents and guardians even see it? Today I am joined by Seth Kritzman – Adjunct instructor at Fordham GSE and New York City Guidance Counselor for a Public Middle School in Manhattan. H...

As of today – every alternative energy source requires a fossil fuel to make.  Wind Turbines are made primarily of steel – and as of today – steel can only be made by using coal.  Electric cars require electricity – which is generated mainly from coal. Solar panels? They too also require fossil fuels to make.   Today’s podcast may not be what we want to hear, but it may be what...

What do you do when life reroutes your path? Instead of taking a right – it turns the wheel hard to the left.  Your car crashes, literally and figuratively. My next guest says you turn that NO – into a YES. Certified Life and Health coach and Motivational Speaker - Jill Hollander has had more than enough experience in Nos. From the loss of a parent at 15, the diagnosis of heart failure a...

Developed in the 1990s - Neonicotinoids or “Neonics” are the most widely used pesticides used in agriculture around the world today. Thought to be a safer pesticide, we now know they contribute to bee colony collapse, have decimated fish farms, contaminated water and are a known neurotoxin to humans. One seed treated with this pesticide will kill a small bird. If you have eaten anything...

How do we start the change to partner with nature instead of trying to control it? Could it be as simple as how we landscape? My next guest thinks so. Monique Allen is the founder and creative director of the Award-Winning Garden Continuum – a landscape design and gardening company. With a resume that includes not just homes, but commercial landscape, municipal park development and flood...

Today we are going to talk about the word that no one dares mention – menopause. A completely natural phase in a woman’s life that has become so taboo to discuss, it is often whispered. To top it off, Doctors are so uneducated on this process, women are left fearing they have some un-diagnosed illness or are an anomaly. How do I know? I am one of those women.   Today I am speaking with D...

Today I am speaking with bee health expert Noah Wilson-Rich.   A doctor of bees (he holds a Phd in Bee health) and Co- Founder slash Chief Scientific Officer of The Best Bees Company. Noah’s incredible work and research on bees is being used by NASA, MIT, Harvard, and National Geographic. Oh and you may have caught one of his many TED talks that has millions of views. A self proclai...

On January 3, 2020 my Mom became ill with an unknown virus that we now know as Covid. 40 days later she was gone from this earth. In less than two months my Best Friend, safety net and the one person I would go to to get through the trauma had vanished.  A beloved friend suggested I read the book “Signs” by Laura Lynne Jackson – saying it gave her comfort. So I did.  The b...

Today I am joined by Katherine Hamer. She is a certified singing bowl teacher, practitioner and artist who has studied extensively with master teachers around the world in the fields of spiritualism, mysticism, meditation, Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP), psychology, intuitive arts... And of course - sound and energy healing. Katherine and her work with Tibetan Singing bowls have been at the UN...

Have we grown so accustomed to buying things new and cheap that we no longer care to repair? Sandra Goldmark is out to change that. A designer, teacher, and entrepreneur Sandra’s work focuses on circular economy solutions to over consumption and climate change. She is the Director of Sustainability and Climate Action at Barnard College and the Author of Fixation: How to Have Stuff without Breaking...