Curveball: A podcast about possibility

What happens when life rips away the identities you thought were permanent? For Amy Jo Esser, the hits came fast: losing her brother way too soon, then losing not one but two jobs she loved. The kind of one-two punch that makes you stare at your life like… wait, who am I now? She could’ve stayed stuck there. Instead, she did something quietly powerful: she built structure where everything else fel...

Sadia Hameed had a plan. A really good one. After 25 years leading in the nonprofit and philanthropic world – building a globally respected organization from the ground up – she walked away with a vision for something bigger, more aligned, and deeply needed. There was just one problem. No one bought it. What followed wasn’t just a business pivot. It was a full-body, soul-level collapse that forced...

On paper, Jon Rosenberg had it all. Big roles. Big companies. Big funding rounds. The kind of career that makes people nod approvingly and say, “Wow, you’ve really made it.” And then one day… he came home from a “successful” business trip, completely wiped, sat down on the floor to play Legos with his kids – and had a realization that stopped him cold: He had built a life he wasn’t sure he even wa...

This one doesn’t start with a gentle nudge. It starts with everything… disappearing. In a matter of hours. DeAnna Crawford went from stable, hopeful, and building a life for her kids to broke, in debt, and wondering how she was going to put food on the table. Not because she made a reckless decision – but because trust was broken in the worst possible way. And if that wasn’t enough? Add in single...

She did everything right. Climbed the ladder. Put in the years. Landed the title. The paycheck. The “you made it” moment. And then… realized she hated it. In this episode, Molly Smith shares what happens when the version of success you worked 15 years for suddenly feels completely misaligned – and what it takes to walk away from it on purpose. We get into the quiet burnout that builds over time, t...

Danielle Blum sat down to write a thriller. What she didn’t plan on? Interviewing over 100 people with dissociative identity disorder (DID), scrapping the story she thought she was telling, and becoming an advocate for mental health and misunderstood diagnoses in the process. In this Curveball episode, Danie shares how a novel idea turned into something much deeper  –  a calling. We talk about her...

If resilience had a face, it might look a lot like David Jarvis. After more than two decades of service in the British Army, David was abruptly and medically discharged – navigating permanent injury, PTSD, and the jarring loss of identity that comes with removing the uniform for the last time.  And just when he was about to compete in the Invictus Games for Team UK, life handed him one more curveb...

If your business has become a 24/7 hustle factory run by your inner control freak, take a breath. This episode might just change everything. Most entrepreneurs are not built for burnout  –  but we’re really good at walking straight into it with open arms. In this episode, Enel Soeson (co-founder of Denk B2B) serves up a truth sandwich about why most solo entrepreneurs are overworked, underpaid, an...

No investors. No perfect English. Just a notebook, a deep faith, and a flavor-packed wing recipe. This is how Lizzie Balthazar Soria started building her dream from the kitchen table  –  one leap of faith at a time. What if the best thing you ever did… started with a notebook in your kitchen and a quiet whisper from God? That’s how Lizzie Balthazar Soria launched her first business  –  a food truc...

Five life-shattering curveballs. One giant truth: you can’t outrun overwhelm, but you can outsmart it. When you’re a solo mom commuting four hours a day to run a male-dominated family business in Brooklyn  –  while navigating miscarriage, divorce, abuse, and suicide loss  –  something’s gotta give. For Corrie LoGiudice (a.k.a. Cory L.), what gave was her entire identity. In this episode, Corrie br...

What do you do when your world falls apart one heartbreak at a time? For Katie Jordan, the hits just kept coming  –  a miscarriage, the loss of her grandmother, father, sister, and then, her marriage. All in just a few years. She was grieving while working full-time, parenting a toddler, and trying to remember who she was before life turned upside down. In this soul-baring conversation, Katie shar...

What do a rotten egg, two scoops of Raisin Bran, and a Radisson Inn with a chlorine stench have in common?  According to Laura Belgray – everything you need to write your guts out and turn it into gold. This episode is a love letter to the misfits, the late bloomers, and the writers who still cringe at “authenticity.” Laura Belgray (yes, that Laura Belgray – copy queen, Talking Shrimp founder, and...

She’s built businesses from Google searches, walked away from law school with zero regrets, and could roof your house tomorrow if she had to. (Seriously.) Taylor Bradford doesn’t follow straight lines. She doesn’t need to. From law school to oil and gas to running her own event rental company – Taylor’s journey is one big entrepreneurial improv show, powered by grit, gumption, and a lifelong crush...

She was teaching autistic kids how to regulate – while quietly unraveling herself. Kassandra Alvarez looked like she had it all together. Board-certified behavior analyst, climbing the ranks, thriving in her field. But behind the scenes? Toxic relationships. Burnout. Addiction. And a brutal realization: she was teaching skills to kids that she wasn’t living herself. That truth cracked her open – a...

She was six when the world told her she was wrong – for coloring outside the lines. So she spent decades getting it all right . Until illness forced everything to stop, and her inner artist finally picked up the brush. What spilled out next? Messy, wild, glorious truth. Deborah Ann Baker was the model of perfection – a PhD in counseling psychology, the gold medals, the mask that never cracked. Unt...

He lost the one identity that had defined him forever. Then he lost the job. And then almost lost his marriage. But this isn't a story about failure. It's about what you do next. Tony Coyne is a former Yale baseball star turned corporate leader, dad, and accidental life philosopher. He wrote the book The Curveball Life – no connection to this podcast, though it's kind of perfect – t...

She spent 15 years becoming a doctor. And then she quit. Dr. Zarya Rubin did what most people only fantasize about: she stepped off the treadmill before it broke her completely. After chasing the dream of medicine all the way to Columbia and beyond, she hit a wall – the kind you don’t bounce back from with a vacation or a green juice. It took a literal wake-up call (a phone call, actually) to snap...

She tried to be the perfect picture of Zen – silent retreat, serene vibes, inner peace, and all that. But it only made her more anxious. Turns out, healing didn’t come from silence. It came from dance floors, karaoke nights, and finally listening to her body. Hannah Talbot was the last person you'd expect to become a meditation teacher. Too loud. Too busy. Too movement-obsessed. But when a tr...

What happens when a “painfully shy” woman loses her job, sells her house, packs up her family (and two dogs), and starts a business from a 300-square-foot RV? Turns out, she finds her voice — and helps hundreds of speakers find theirs, too. Nona Prather used to be the quiet one. The behind-the-scenes girl. The “don’t call on me” kid who hated public speaking and avoided the spotlight like it was c...

What do you do when your body taps out mid-shampoo and leaves you holding the scissors and the pieces of your old life? Ronni Morgan was doing what she loved – building her business behind the chair, running, living life full throttle – when her hip suddenly gave out. Right in the middle of a haircut. What followed was a medical mystery tour that included two hip replacements by 31, a diagnosis of...

What do you do when your TEDx is about to blow up… and a pandemic blows everything up instead? Robbie Samuels had it all lined up. TEDx talk? Check. Big breakout moment? Imminent. Ten years of reputation-building as the go-to networking expert? Locked. And then March 2020 hit. In a matter of days, the world shut down–and Robbie’s in-person speaking career went poof. Most people would’ve panicked....

What do you do when life pitches you nine curveballs… in two years? If you’re Bruce Cryer, you take the hit, heal your heart (literally), and come back tap dancing on titanium hips. Bruce Cryer had it all dialed in. Broadway star turned CEO of HeartMath, globetrotting educator, and champion of heart-brain coherence. Then life went full demolition mode: bladder cancer, four staph infections (one in...

Her husband was diagnosed with cancer. She quit her job. Not the plot of a rom-com – Toby Myles’s real life. And it led her exactly where she was meant to go. Toby Myles had a plan – a dream, really. Leave her corporate job of 15 years, grow her handmade jewelry biz, ride into the sunset with her newly retired husband and a few restored motorcycles. But life had other ideas: incurable blood cancer...

She had the credentials, the clients, the “dream career.” Then her body hit the brakes so hard she ended up in a neurology unit, unable to walk. What Fleur Sclarandis discovered in the aftermath wasn’t just healing – it was a new way to live. At the height of her career as a psychotherapist and certified coach, Fleur Sclarandis was doing everything “right.” She was helping others, hitting mileston...

She failed accounting. Became a top storyboard artist. Got booted by the industry. Painted 40 canvases in 30 days. Sold 11 in an hour. Susan Peppler’s story is what happens when you follow your joy and trust your gut – even when it’s covered in paint. Susan Pepler didn’t set out to become a professional fine artist. She just kept following what felt almost impossible – and then doing it anyway. In...