The Best Podcast

Today’s podcast is a recording of my latest Substack post, titled “The False Pendulum” (https://mbest.substack.com/p/the-false-pendulum). I discuss my experiences maneuvering between confidence and humility and the important realization about that maneuvering that I came to over time. I hope you find value in this lesson of life. Thanks for listening. As always, Much Love ❤️ and please take care.

Over the last few weeks, I’ve been working on a new personal project. I’ve reflected on my experiences in an effort to document my life to date. I’ve written down what I remember from my birth up through high school so far, and that process has left me with some meaningful lessons. I share some early takeaways with you here, in the hopes that you find them useful and insightful. As always, thanks...

Today’s podcast is a reflection on adulthood. As I’ve grown and interacted more with adults who are older than me, I’ve seen just how much age is not a proxy for maturity and rising up the self-actualization ladder. Of course, I hold quite high standards, and perhaps those standards are “unrealistic” to most, and yet that fact doesn’t relieve this inner conflict. Perhaps you will resonate with wha...

Over the weekend, I got to spend some quality time checking in on a lot of friends I haven’t been in touch with in a while. In doing so, a lot came to mind, both through the exercise itself and in the responses I received from my friends. There was a lot to make sense of, so I’m sharing what I learned with you here, as I think it may serve you well. Thanks for listening. As always, Much Love ❤️ an...

Today’s podcast is a recording of my latest Substack post, titled Competence, which you can see here: https://mbest.substack.com/p/competence . I dig into what it means to be competent and how it is a fantastic antidote to worry and the psychological effects of uncertainty. I hope you find value in what I share here. Thanks for listening. As always, Much Love ❤️ and please take care.

Today’s podcast digs into a concept I’ve taken from a new book I’m reading called The Art of Gathering by Priya Parker. I’ve found her ideas to be really refreshing, as they resonate with a lot of my instincts and principles about how we should come together as people. Her ideas connect to an experience I’ve had here in Brazil since moving here, which I take some time to share with you here. I am...

Today’s podcast is a little more niche than usual, which oddly ends up being a message that I think all of us would benefit from hearing in one way or another. AI use is becoming more and more common in our lives, and it affects our brains in was that we need to be thoughtful about. I describe that process here and send a message to younger people about the implications our use of AI has in our li...

Today’s podcast is a reading of my Quarter One review, which I also wrote up and published on Substack. You can read it here: https://open.substack.com/pub/mbest/p/quarter-one-2025-review?r=2c9gzu&utm_medium=ios . I dig into a lot of learnings, from personal experiences in my relationships to politics to the deepest parts of our existence, which I hope you find useful. Thanks for listening. As alw...

Today’s podcast is about a part of me that others might consider to be insufferable. I can’t seem to watch a Netflix show or a movie without perceiving a high opportunity cost. I always find myself thinking about how else I could be spending my time, and then when I look back afterwards, I notice how far behind spending my time that way brought me. It’s far from what most people are used to, which...

Today’s podcast is a recording of both my latest Substack post (https://mbest.substack.com/p/day-1564) and my latest journal entry. I’m now running on 1564 days in a row of daily writing, so this episode will give you a good look at what this looks like for me now and how I’m thinking about it. This is a meaningful inflection point for me, so I hope you find some value in my thoughts. Thanks for l...

Last time, I spent some time sharing my discontent with where the world is and where it’s going. While I still uphold what I said, I think it’s only one piece of the puzzle. Today, I share another piece, which I think should carry much more weight in where we place our attention, particularly when times are tough. I hope you enjoy it and find it to be a useful reset. Thanks for listening. As alway...

Today, I wanted to take some time to document my thoughts on the current moment. With the new tariffs released, there are big implications for what this means for the world, the US, and for what the US represents. I share my perspective on it from where I sit and what I think lies ahead for us, as unfortunate as that projection may be. Anyways, I hope you find some value in hearing my reflections....

Every once in a while, the dots connect in a beautiful and coherent manner when I stand in front of the microphone to record another episode of this podcast. If I were a betting man, I would wager that this episode will be one of the times when that was the case looking back. Hopefully you’ll feel mutually after listening. Thanks for your time. As always, Much Love ❤️ and please take care.

Today’s podcast is a reading of my latest Substack post, which you can see at https://mbest.substack.com/p/conflict . I start by digging into the history of conflict, both for humans and the animals before us in our evolutionary tree, which then leads me to a discussion of conflict in modern times. I end with what I think the implications are for us and how we should manage conflict in our lives....

Today’s podcast comes on the other side of some intense and very present days in my life. Attending an all-day workshop two days in a row with dinners immediately after meant long days, but they also meant the opportunity to build meaningful relationships and do meaningful work. I reflect on these two aspects of life in particular, and why it’s so important to invest into them. I hope it proves an...

Today’s podcast reviews a topic of conversation that came up last night with some colleagues in the behavioral science field. The question of how to get people on board to apply newer ideas like ours can be challenging, so I shared what I’ve learned as a useful frame for doing so. Curiously enough, the approach I share is quite generalizable across a number of situations, so I take some time to ar...

So much is going on right now. US Politics is rocking the country and the world around it. Major economic changes are reaching a cusp. AI continues to evolve and progress. And then all of us continue to try to work and live day to day as it unfolds. It’s a complicated time with a lot of processing we would benefit from doing, but without the time to do it, it would appear. I share my thoughts on w...

Today’s podcast is a reading of my latest Substack post, which you can find at https://mbest.substack.com/the-substance . I review the movie The Substance and share my five main takeaways. It was a very thought provoking experience, so I wanted to invest some time into reflecting on what I think it means for us. I hope you find it insightful. Thanks for listening. As always, Much Love ❤️ and pleas...

Today’s podcast is a follow-up to my most recent episode. The first week of March was an eventful one, both for me and Rio de Janeiro. Carnaval brings a special air to the city, along with over a million extra tourists from around the world who drink in the experience. I share what that experience was like for me this year and my observations, which I hope you enjoy listening to here. Thanks for y...

After spending an amazing week with close friends from the US here in Rio, I wanted to take a few moments to reflect on that time with them and what it meant to me. Friendship is such a special thing, and I value it so highly in my life. This time with them rejuvenated me and left me with feelings of deep gratitude and joy. I share a bit about why in today’s episode, which I hope you enjoy. Thanks...

Today’s podcast is a reading of my latest article on Substack, titled “The Shadow”, which you can see here: https://open.substack.com/pub/mbest/p/the-shadow . I dive into the concept of the shadow and how engaging with it can help us better understand who we are and become more integrated versions of ourselves. I hope you find it to be an insightful piece. Thanks for listening. As always, Much Lov...

Today’s podcast reflects on what I used to be super fired up about, lost a bit along the way, and am now finding again as I start the year, but this time with more depth and nuance. These cycles in life are quite beautiful, in my view, which I hope you can perceive in this episode. Life truly offers so much to us. Thanks for listening. As always, Much Love ❤️ and please take care.

Today’s podcast is a recording of my latest Substack post, Run, which you can see here: mbest.substack.com/p/run. I’m the article, I talk through my journey to running and what the keys for me were to become a runner. In my post-read reflection, I share some of my thoughts on the way meditation has combined with running for me and the beauty of observing the mind with the body in motion. I hope yo...

Today’s podcast is a reflection from Gabi and me on our wedding as we officially pass the two-year mark. We talk about what we remember from the day after our wedding, the wedding itself, and how we have changed since then. The conversation then turns to our views on personality growth and how malleable we are, meditation and its power, and Gabi’s “nervous legs” which turned out to be new for me....

Today’s podcast is a 2-part episode. I start with a little review of the weekend and the good stuff I got out of it, which then peels into a little monologue about the games we play socially and our lack of intimacy. We often perceive significant costs to being intimate with others, which I challenge here, given there are many unseen costs to avoiding intimacy. I hope you find some value in the me...