Find Your Spark

In honor of Alzheimer's and Brain Awareness month, Brooke speaks with a very special guest, Brianne Grebil. Brianne was not only a caregiver for her mother the past 5 years, she also recently released a book about her experience,  Love Doesn’t Care if You Forget . In this episode, Brianne shares what her experience has taught her about life, relationships, and being human with other humans (on and...

In this episode of the Find Your SPARK Podcast, Nicole Wilson and SPARKING Change Intern, Jayda Reece, speak about how they navigate through anxiety. Jayda shares her experience as being a young teen with anxiety and now understanding how the mind works has helped her overcome many obstacles that used to limit her. Nicole shares about how we get so used to saying “I AM Anxious” or “I AM Depressed,...

In this episode of the Find Your SPARK Podcast, Ashley and Stephanie share why they are still flying high after the Boost conference last week. The Boost Collaborative provides high quality professional development opportunities for after-school providers and we are honored to be their partner. In addition to presenting at the conference, they had the pleasure of experiencing many of the wonderful...

In this episode of the Find Your SPARK Podcast, in honor of PTSD Awareness month, Brooke Wheeldon-Reece and Nicole Wilson talk about how “PTS,”  Post Traumatic Stress , is our body’s natural way to react to a past traumatic experience. They share how when understanding how the mind works, PTSD doesn’t look as scary and helpless when aware of what is happening in the moment. As they share their own...

In this episode of the Find Your SPARK Podcast, Nicole Wilson and SPARKING Change Intern, Carys Mullins join together and talk about the importance of understanding how the mind works in honor of May Mental Health Month! Carys shares what she has seen for herself to be true when learning about the mind and how it has impacted her. She shares how being you is all you need, and there’s no need to re...

In this episode of the Find Your SPARK Podcast, Nicole Wilson and Stephanie Fox talk about May - Mental Health Awareness Month! Nicole and Stephanie discuss the importance of how SPARK approaches mental health in a way that pulls the health (SPARK) out of everyone, instead of putting bandages on peoples mental illnesses. We find it extremely helpful for those suffering with mental illnesses such a...

In this episode of the Find Your SPARK Podcast, Nicole Wilson and one of our SPARKING Change Interns, Emily Johnson, talk about Emily's experience since being in the internship program. She shares her passion to be a judge and what she noticed shadowing in the juvenile detention center to push herself even more towards creating the change she wants to see in the justice system. Emily also brings u...

In this episode of the Find Your SPARK Podcast, Nicole Wilson and Jena Travise talk with 3 of our SPARKING Change Interns about their experience shadowing at the Juvenile Detention Center. Brandon, Macy and Sadie share what they enjoyed the most and why they think it's important for the group of teen boys to understand how their mind works.

In this episode of the Find Your SPARK Podcast, Stephanie and Ashley talk about the “quarantine 15”. You know, the 15 lbs. give or take that many people added on their body during quarantine?! Stephanie shares that she added some “plump” to herself and then shares how she recently caught herself believing the thought “I can’t do XYZ with this weight.” Ashley and Stephanie then share the insights t...

In this special edition episode of the Find Your SPARK Podcast, we share with you an episode from another podcast called The Entrepreneur Playground that Brooke and Ashley were a guest on. Martin Dara, who is the host of this fun and unique podcast, recently asked Brooke and Ashley to be a guest and they couldn't wait to have a conversation together. In this episode, you will get to hear the conve...

In this episode of the Find Your SPARK Podcast, we ask... Have you ever had one of those days when even the smallest task seemed too hard? When showering was just too much to ask? Tune in to hear Stephanie’s experience of her “funk” yesterday and how she dealt with it. Using the metaphor of making soup, she describes how noticing her internal “ingredients” is super helpful in managing this funk. S...

In this episode of the Find Your SPARK Podcast, Nicole Wilson talks with one of our SPARKING Change Youth Interns, Brandon Evans. Brandon shares why he wanted to take part in this internship with The SPARK Initiative and what he has taken away from it so far. He explains how his passion and SPARK’s mission align and why it’s a perfect fit for the change he wants to create in our community. Brandon...

In this episode of the Find Your SPARK Podcast, Nicole Wilson talks with Sadie Moore, one of our SPARKING Change Youth Leadership Interns, about her perspective on what she took away from the SPARK Facilitator training. This was our interns first opportunity to dive into our SPARK mentoring programs and gain insights for themselves. Sadie shares about her favorite activities, what she found helpfu...

In this episode of the Find Your SPARK Podcast, Nicole Wilson interviews Macy Hembd, one of our SPARKING Change Youth Interns. Macy talks about her experience participating in the February SPARK Facilitator training. The SPARK Facilitator training gave our 10 interns a great opportunity to get hands on experience in our mentoring program lessons and to learn a lot about how the mind works. They go...

In this episode of the Find Your SPARK Podcast, Brooke and Stephanie share why they are excited to be participating in #SELday with millions of others throughout the world. They discuss why they believe social and emotional learning is foundational to all learning and life, and the uniqueness of SPARK in this field. Everyone is invited to learn more about and participate in #SELday on March 26th,...

In this episode of the Find Your SPARK Podcast, Stephanie talks about how after months of suffering, she is finally no longer living in a state of fear due to her thinking about the mouse who used to live in her house. She reflects on what life was like when she was in that state and the huge difference in quality of life now that she is no longer in it. In this more relaxed state, Stephanie wonde...

In this episode of the Find Your SPARK Podcast, Brooke and Ashley talk about the constant dichotomy people seem to be up against between following your inspirations (your SPARK) and following your responsibilities. They explore their own insights around how easy it is to be tricked by the thought that we have to choose when in reality if we just learned to trust our SPARK, the rest would be taken...

In this episode of the Find your SPARK Podcast, Ashley Hunt and Jena Travise talk about their habits and how they see them in a different way. Listen as Ashley shares what she has learned about habits from Dr. Amy Johnson and how it has helped her to see that habits are just your brains best way of trying to help you out. When you understand how something works, it just makes it easier to navigate...

In this episode of the Find Your SPARK podcast, Ashley and Brooke reflect on week 1 of 2021...and why they still have hope. Listen as they share how they navigate the uncertainty of the world and make the case for innate resilience rather than an uphill battle to rebuild it. This is a conversation worth a reflection.

In this podcast, Ashley and Brooke are joined by Brooke's teenage daughter Jayda. They all came together days prior to 2021 and discussed what each of their hopes and dreams would be for 2021. Listen as they reflect on what they have learned from 2020, and what they hope comes from 2021.

Disclaimer: If you have not watched Soul, this podcast episode contains SPOILERS, you have been warned! In this episode, Brooke and Ashley are joined by Brooke's daughter Jayda. They all recently watched the Pixar movie Soul, and couldn't wait to come together and talk about it! On a recent Disney trip, Ashley first learned of this movie when she saw a shirt at Disney that read "Find Your SPARK"....

In this episode of the Find your SPARK Podcast, Brooke, Ashley and Jena reflect on all the growing pains, learning curves and growth spurts of 2020. They share about all of the unknowns that Covid-19 brought and how it forced them to be more in the moment without even realizing it. They talk about how some pretty amazing things came from not knowing and how life just has a way of taking care of us...

In this episode of the Find your SPARK Podcast, poor Stephanie is really feeling the fear of mice. She dreads the evening when they become active, is sleeping upright with the lights on to ensure they don’t break through the crack in the bottom of her bedroom door and is considering all options to rid her of this fear, including moving. Her son Alexander, on the other hand, is quite delighted by t...

In this episode of the Find your SPARK Podcast, Ashley Hunt and Nicole Wilson talk about how their mentoring classes have been going post quarantine. As you may know, SPARK is normally in a handful of local schools at this time facilitating SPARK Mentoring Programs. Since quarantine has ended and schools are open in their community, they have found it challenging to get into schools because of the...

In this episode of the Find your SPARK Podcast, tune in to Stephanie interviewing one of our newest partners - Lashica Johnson. Lashica is a mentor and Youth Development Professional with the Boys and Girls Club in Garden Grove, CA. Stephanie and Lashica chat about the recent training, how it was different from previous trainings that Lashica has done, and why she is excited about bringing the Spa...