The You Project

John Cantor is an adventurer, thrill-seeker and explorer of human limits, who achieved his long-held dream of traversing the Brooks Range solo; a 1,600 km expedition across Arctic Alaska, considered to be one of the toughest solo expeditions on earth. Almost completely devoid of human presence, this environment is full of grizzly bears, wolves and countless other animals. With no previous experien...

Ken Mogi is a Japanese neuroscientist, senior researcher at the Sony Computer Science Laboratories and a visiting professor at the Tokyo Institute of Technology. He has written more than a hundred books (what!) on a range of topics, including brain science, philosophy, history, art, education and linguistics and I loved chatting with him. Apart from being an accomplished academic, author, speaker...

This is a conversation with Tommy about your past. And mine. And his. We talk about the relationship we have (in the present) with the events, outcomes and experiences of our past. We consider the impact (good and bad) of our historical events. The lessons and insights. The blessings and the damage done. The resultant anxiety and over-thinking. The resilience, awareness and skill gained. We talk a...

Every hundred shows (or so), Melissa, Tiff and I get together to chat about everything and nothing. This episode was part staff meeting, part planning session, part informal catch-up, part human-behaviour workshop and part counselling session. Enjoy. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Lisa Saygun is one of Australia’s best female bodybuilders and last weekend she won her ‘Pro Card’, in her 51st (!) competition at forty-one years of age. Of course, women’s bodybuilding is not everyone’s ‘cup of tea’ (as Mary would say) but at the very least, this conversation is interesting, eye-opening, educating, funny and towards the end, very inspiri...

Lisa Saygun is one of Australia’s best female bodybuilders and last weekend she won her ‘Pro Card’, in her 51st (!) competition at forty-one years of age. Of course, women’s bodybuilding is not everyone’s ‘cup of tea’ (as Mary would say) but at the very least, this conversation is interesting, eye-opening, educating, funny and towards the end, very inspiri...

David Gillespie and I had planned to chat about a particular topic. It didn’t happen. Instead, I ended up opening the David Gillespie door (it needed a little verbal WD-40) to get an insight into what drives and inspires the renowned Author, Lawyer, Researcher and Tech Guy (I just discovered that) to do what he does. Among many fascinating things, I discovered he started a not-for-profit onl...

How lucky am I that I get to chat with people like Tony Wheeler who, along with his wife Maureen, created the Lonely Planet guidebook company and spent decades exploring countries, cultures and cuisines. Apart from realising how boring my life is, I loved chatting with this much-loved and world-renowned travel writer. Enjoy.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is a chat about curiosity, solving problems, adaptation, self-discovery, learning-by-doing, exploring limits, developing skills, resilience, overcoming fears, creating experiences and questioning everything. BIO: Paula Constant spent three years walking over 12,000 km through eight countries, including two years walking through the Sahara with her own camel train. She walked without vehicular...

Nutritionist, Researcher and all-round Good Bloke Matty Lansdown is back and it’s fair to say, this was a conversational smorgasbord. We chatted about the (fun) sociopath test I’ve developed, dodgy marketing tactics, emotional eating, understanding past behaviour, self-regulation around food, the ‘non-plan’, creating opportunities (vs. waiting for them), stepping out of &ls...

Dr. Lisa Harvey-Smith was born in Essex, England, left school at 11 and taught herself at home, where she developed a great passion for astronomy. The home schooling paid off because she went on to earn a Master’s degree in Physics with Honours in Astronomy and Astrophysics and a Ph. D. in Radio Astronomy, before embarking on a professional career as an Astrophysicist, Astronomer and Educato...

Another deep-dive with TYP favourite Paul Taylor and this time we talk about the psychological, medical and physical benefits of sauna (they are numerous), heat shock proteins (whatever the F they are), death by comfort (the title of Paul’s upcoming book), political correctness gone mad, epigenetic programming, Paul’s approach to Covid (he had it when we recorded), exercise as medicine...

Another deep-dive with TYP favourite Paul Taylor and this time we talk about the psychological, medical and physical benefits of sauna (they are numerous), heat shock proteins (whatever the F they are), death by comfort (the title of Paul’s upcoming book), political correctness gone mad, epigenetic programming, Paul’s approach to Covid (he had it when we recorded), exercise as medicine...

In almost 800 conversations on TYP, this is one of our most interesting (and at times, confronting) episodes. I don’t want to over-share but Julia was told she was stupid from 5, kicked out of school at 14, raped and subsequently pregnant at 14, a mother of three (with twins) at 16, married on her sixteenth birthday, undiagnosed with dyslexia until she was 40, spent much of her life battling...

Maria Lizza Bowen is a Scientist, Researcher and now Author, whose new book ‘REFLECT’, provides an uncommon perspective on addressing life’s trials and tribulations. We had an interesting chat and along the way, explored the mutual fascination we both had as children with adult behaviour, our truth vs. ‘the’ truth, being mentally and emotionally stuck, getting ‘...

Pharmacist Nima Alavi slides back into TYP Central and this time we chat about medical marijuana, appetite suppressants, pre-workout products, anxiety and ageing (is there a link?), the impact of under-sleeping, caffeine-based ‘energy’ drinks, the hormonal consequences of ageing, compounding pharmacies and lots more.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Now before you yoga-folk get excited, this is not an episode about yoga but the conversation does get yoga-ish in places. Our resident Body-ologist (Exercise Physiologist) Unna is back and this time we chat about hunchy backs (kyphosis), crappy posture, over-sitting and under-moving, the lower-back pain epidemic, training in a single plane of movement (and why not to), rehabbing from a C-section,...

This episode was not what I thought it might be and Ollie was not what I imagined going in. And yes, by now I should be better than assuming or expecting. My bad. I don’t want to say too much but his story (in and out of the military) is fascinating, inspiring and at times, confronting. I genuinely loved talking with him. Here’s a snapshot of his bio: Ollie’s military career bega...

I’ve been around Bobby’s mind for decades and even I don’t know what’s likely to emerge. Most of the time, neither does he. Which always makes for an interesting chat. Among other things, we speak about learning styles, the role of emotion in memory, preparing for a speaking gig, fear of success, how to connect with an audience, the anthropomorphisation of shoes (it will ma...

Russ Jarrett is back at TYP Central and after thirty-plus years in the fitness industry, it’s time for a change, the pin has officially been pulled and he is a gym owner no more. In this very casual and meandering conversation, we talk about the changing landscape of how we work (jobs, careers, professions, industry), our career ‘used-by’ date and the shift to on-line everything....

TYP regular David Gillespie is back and this time, we dive into his somewhat cynical outlook (and why he has it), free will (is it real or an illusion?), confirmation bias, his take on intuition (versus evidence), addiction (is there a healthy one?), the psychology of lying, why we’re such a trusting species and lots more. Enjoy.  davidgillespie.org See omnystudio.com/listener for priva...

(PART 3) For this episode of TYP, Tiff picked an assortment of random whiteboard lessons that I’ve written over the years, read them out to me live in the recording and asked me to expand on (explain, dissect) the original message and why I wrote it. Having written thousands of whiteboard posts and not knowing what was coming (as she read them) made for an interesting and organic conversatio...

This is an atypical TYP episode. No Melissa, Tiff or Guest. It’s me (Harps) thinking out loud about the goings-on in my life over the last 24 hours (as I write, Mon. Apr. 11). Let’s just say it’s been a little chaotic, messy and uncertain. But there were lessons, lightbulbs and deep moments of reflection and realisation. Enjoy. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Dr. Adam Fraser is back at TYP Central chatting with us about the human condition. Specifically, we talk about sharing complicated concepts in a listener-friendly way, managing our ‘third space’ (Adam wrote a book on it), finding our ‘performance threshold’, the journey from unaware obsessed businessman to aware loving dad, playing a role when you’re not ‘feelin...

Dr. Denise is a conversational ship without a rudder (which is awesome) and when she’s on TYP, anything can happen. And does. Especially when paired with Captain No-Filter. This chat was simultaneously informative, educational, serious and silly. We spoke about what our world might be like in 2050, our degrading soil, the carnivore diet, the fibre debate, sodium as a supplement, creatine mon...