Musings On Wellbeing

Daniel Petre is an insightful no-nonsense conversational partner, so be ready for some frank talk in these musings.  A former Microsoft executive, who worked closely with Bill Gates and later founded several highly successful venture capital funds. Daniel has worked and lived among high-powered, monied individuals. He has been struck by how "old rich, white men" do not want to part with their mone...

Is it possible for life to be both fulfilling and moral? How do we strike a balance between our obligations to others  and living a pleasurable life?  In this conversation, Charlie and Neela Saldana, a fellow board member of The Life You Can Save, muse on how cultural differences, religion, identity, education, wealth, family upbringing, even travel all influence our moral principles. In order to...

From bingo to the Bellagio, Elaine Wynn's life hasn't followed what one might term a "conventional" path.  She and her now-ex-husband Steve Wynn were introduced by their fathers when both were very young. They started their lives together running Steve's father's bingo business; a series of opportunities took them to Las Vegas, where they built some of the most famous resorts in that city. Elaine...

In this episode, guest Professor Joshua Greene and host Charlie Bresler hit upon an important question — and have somewhat different answers. Many of us claim to be pretty "moral" human beings with an admirable set of values. But do we always live up to it? Obviously not, or we likely wouldn't need police or lawyers or jails. The question Josh and Charlie found thornier is the why. Why don't we li...

If you enjoy the introductory music that begins our show, you'll really love this episode — host Charlie Bresler is talking with composer and musician José González, who generously agreed to allow his music to grace Musings on Ourselves and Other Strangers . José has had a fascinating history: his parents fled the dictatorship in their native Argentina in 1976. Because José's parents were at unive...

Musing with Michael (Mike) Schur is a bit like playing chess with Garry Kasparov. No matter what conversational move you make, he has a counter that will likely stun you. No wonder his book is called How to Be Perfect: The Correct Answer to Every Moral Question … In this episode, host Charlie Bresler is musing with Michael Schur. Creator of the critically acclaimed NBC comedy The Good Place , co-c...

Most of us think we know ourselves pretty well. But do we? We all have a moral code we aspire to live by, but sometimes we fall short, and we may not always understand our motivations to act or not to act.  In this podcast, host Charlie Bresler is interviewing some fascinating people in the quest to find out why there can be a pretty big gap between who we think we are and how we behave.