The Hard Way With Joe De Sena

You excel in ANY situation. Director of Counseling and Psychological Services at Cornell University Dr. Greg Eells explains how. In this interview describes how Viktor Frankl created meaning out of senseless and horrific circumstances. Frankl was imprisoned in a Nazi concentration camp and not only maintained his wits but retained the wherewithal to help the other prisoners. This shows the vital r...

His doctor forbade world champion power lifter Robert Herbst to lift anything when he was a child with scoliosis. Eighteen world championships and twenty one consecutive national championships later, what compelled him to rebel? Herbst believes in managing risk but errs on the side of throwing caution to the wind. It's paid off spectacularly. His MO in all his successes, including his Clark Kentia...

Demali Elliott mentors young women in challenging situations through creative and introspective activities to redirect their stories onto a positive trajectory with her program Petals-N-Belles. It is a rigorous program designed to help those ready to receive that help, sixty- eight young women at last count. The organization, largely staffed by volunteers, utilizes physical and mental challenges l...

Musical prodigy Ray Ushikubo emulated what he saw on television and, contrary to what you might fear, discovered his passion. At five years old and with the help of supportive parents he his calling. Are there days he doesn't want to practice? Or course. But he practices without fail and is fast approaching the theoretical 10,000 hours of study to reach virtuosity. Ushikubo is already well on his...

Marcello (an author and physics professor at Dartmouth College) and Kari (with a Ph. D focussed on trauma and PTSD,)decided to build an obstacle course in their backyard. What's the connection? Marcelo, the physicist, sees OCR and physics as a way to go beyond the known boundaries. Kari, the psychologist, sees it as a way to get out of our heads and connect with the physical, a vital way to get pa...

Son of pioneering Hawaiian surfer "Buffalo" and a living legend in his own right, Brian Keaulana had two mentors. The first was his father who taught him to share the ocean's bounty. The second was the ocean itself which served as a playground, school and church. Before he and his siblings could walk their father would toss them into the surf. Keaulana, who calls himself a "Waterman," uses this wi...

Starting Health Warrior, a business borne out of a passion for health and fitness, moved Daniel Gluck away from Wall Street. He seized the opportunity to fill a niche in a food industry dominated by overly processed and high sugar offerings with healthful chia based alternatives. He was inspired by the legendary Tarahumara Indians who, fueled with chia seeds, are the ultra endurance runners descri...

Battling addiction late in the Vietnam era, the US Army's Deputy Chief of Chaplains Brigadier General Thomas Solhjem found redemption through his faith and other's mentorship. As he realizes now, isolation, though a common strategy, is the worst way to deal with adversity. Reaching out to others and sharing your experiences is an admission of strength. He has spent an extremely long time in the mi...

Running across the Sahara, all 4600 miles, 50 miles a day for 111 consecutive days. That's what Ultrarunner Charlie Engle did to raise 6 million dollars for H20 Africa (now Water.org). In doing so he took his passion and did good with it. Engle overcame addiction and an unexpected jail sentence, but instead of running away from adversity, he embraced it.  He started running marathons which turned...

Behavioral scientist & expert on adventure, Jon Levy knows what makes Spartans tick. He wrote a book about it, The 2AM Principle: Discover the Science of Adventure.  A big reason why people undertake challenges outside their comfort zone is to reach flow state, a zen like sense of timelessness, total absorption in an activity, and sense of mastery. The IKEA effect, loving an activity according to...

Not wanting to spend his life on the sidelines, blind athlete Pete Cossaboon started participating in Spartan events.  He sought out and found a way to achieve this seemingly impossible goal. Nelson Diaz has dedicated himself to facilitating the implausible achievements of adaptive athletes through compassion and action. The events only have meaning and purpose to the degree that they can be appli...

Trauma care is a creative process for Dr, Jeffrey Upperman. He mentors young surgeons by throwing them in a room together with very little to work with  and let their ingenuity and communication skills come to the fore to solve a problem under duress. He points out that these skills are becoming a lost art in the age of texting and tweeting but they are no less vital in forming a successful person...

Cal Fussman, author as well as a writer for Esquire, went on a ten year worldwide journey with little money to his name. He subsisted on the good will of others, most often on those he met on the bus ride to his next destination. It was the perfect way to satisfy his insatiable curiosity and hone his interviewing skills. In this episode Fussman will talk about how to make everyday an opportunity f...

When your business is in trouble, this is the guy you need. Tim Gentry develops people to motivate his own success. As an Ironman competitor he exemplifies strengthening the body as a way to maintain a powerful mind, something he believes many business people neglect to their detriment. His suggestion: keep it simple and do just one thing every day. Listen for more tried and true methods to persev...

Mortgage officer and part of a Vermont family maple sugaring business, Ray Morvan found extreme multi day racing at random, after a battle with alcohol and opiate addiction. By helping him find community and a way to exert and build mental resilience it's exactly what the doctor ordered . He  went on to compete in nine Peak Death Races which is almost certainly a record. We spoke with him at the S...

Damion Hahn came a hair's breadth away from making the Olympics and advises those not achieving there goals "be mad about it, then turn your attention to tomorrow." He channels that drive training a team that has been  near dynasty for the last quarter century of Ivy League wrestling. They got there by honing raw talent. The best persist, the rest need to find their niche elsewhere. Hahn has seen...

This week's podcast features two Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, Christian Johnson and Chad Grills, disrupting the world of business. Johnson started Fotition a platform to unite brands people and charities to create a positive social outcome. He arrived at this idea by following  his lifelong mantra, "creativity will save the world," which lead him to a vocation that will leave a legacy. Grills, a...

Nini Meyer created Positive Tracks as a way to get kids moving and involved with a cause through athletics. She has witnessed it not only helping the causes, but connecting the youth with each other and teaching them to manage risk, take on challenges and get active. Since not every child enters the program with the same resources, it also teaches them the vital lesson of using what they got at th...

Helping runners move faster and injury free is the mission of Nathan Helming. A former Ironman qualifier, Nathan Helming runs programming for San Francisco Crossfit with a focus on helping runners and triathletes become better rounded athletes. He's taking this passion into a startup called The Run Experience which guides athletes through strength, conditioning and problem solving to reach their g...

The founder of Charity Water, Scott Harrison was a successful nightclub promoter living a life of decadence many might envy. He found himself hobnobbing with the beautiful people on a daily basis, but he had an epiphany on the beaches of Uruguay. Though he didn't lack materially he was morally, spiritually and emotionally bereft.  He sold everything, took up residence in a friend's closet and volu...

With a military career spanning 26 years, retired Col. Fellinger has become a model of resilience and fitness. He asks that you bring him the hardest problems you have because he lives to overcome them. As he explains, it's a process and one that can be practiced but not necessarily mastered. After all, if you're not at least a little off balance, how are you challenging yourself and growing stron...

The "man whisperer" Mammarella-D'Cruz runs men's groups that set them on a course to fulfillment. Clients, even billionaires, find they need help understanding how to achieve happiness. His ability was honed by the dire circumstances of his own childhood. After his family was placed on the death list in Uganda, Mammarella-D'Cruz spent a significant portion of his formative years on the run. This s...

Adaptive athlete Amy Winters, is so resilient she was chosen to help struggling athletes complete the brutal 60+ hour Spartan endurance event Agoge. If you ask her, she won't credit rugged individualism for her perseverance. She relies on the strength of others to buoy her up as she does the same for them. It may be that the wellspring of grit that her loss summoned helped her to recognize and rou...

Coach of the highly successful wrestling program at Cornell, Rob Koll wasn't an overnight success. His virtuosity was years in the making, working hard and surrounding himself with the kind of motivating people that would eventually transform the program into a powerhouse. When asked, Koll denies that his methods involve any mystique. He simply doles out his nose to the grindstone, meat and potato...