What's the value?

Vi uncovered her life’s purpose after spending years working towards an engineering career and a US green card, only to realize that life wasn't actually right for her. She decided to start over in Canada as an immigrant (from Vietnam), where she embarked on a nomadic, van-life to see more of the world. Vi wrote a book (Living Through Alchemy - a transformational journey to freedom) about these ex...

On paper, Vijay would seem to be an interesting guest because he is the founder and Artistic Director of Street Symphony, a community of musicians creating spaces of connection for people in reentry from homelessness, addiction and incarceration in Los Angeles. Or because Vijay is a famous speaker, who has a TED Talk (Music is Medicine, Music is Sanity) with millions of views and has spoken at pla...

Will is the CEO of XPogo, a company bound together by a love for Extreme Pogo (yes pogo, like pogo sticks) and a desire to spread the sport across the world. I could probably stop there and you would get the sense that this is a unique and interesting conversation. But if you are like me, you might be curious to learn more about this person and want to to understand their values, how they see the...

I thoroughly enjoyed this conversation with Peter, both because I got to learn more about the interesting life he has lived and because we had some good, hearty debates about important philosophical and social topics. As way of background, Peter lived much of his life in Africa, most notably perhaps, in Zimbabwe in 2002 as a large commercial farm owner. At that time due to political changes/strife...

Akash is a fitness enthusiast, aspiring writer, and creator of "The Modern Z" a podcast where he invites students and Generation Z individuals to share ideas, stories and experiences. Akash's value was "true self-awareness" and through the first part of the conversation he explained how various books and the ancient Greek philosophy of stoicism shaped his approach to life. He believed true self-aw...

Brian is a retired police lieutenant with 33 years experience, a long-time police trainer, and an author with a passion for "defending police officers against dangerous false narratives being perpetrated against them." These are the conversations that I get most excited and nervous about. This topic is so important and so emotionally charged, that I feel a burden to do it justice. My whole intent...

Michelle is an author, speaker, psychic medium, and teacher and whose goal is to guide others through their spiritual growth. With the knowledge she obtained through her life-long work with children, she became passionate about helping intuitive children embrace their gifts, most notably with her new book, Spiritual Nurturing for Intuitive Children: Training Parents to Enhance Their Psychic Child'...

Gramps Jeffrey has 4 kids and 6 grandchildren and believes baby boomers have a unique role to play in raising their grand kids. To deliver on this, he wrote a children's book, “I Don’t Want to Turn 3”,  to explore the interaction that is happening between families in just about every household in the world.  I found this conversation really intriguing as I tried to better understand Gramp's value....

Keith is a certified Crisis Specialist, marriage counselor, award-winning author, and educator who listens and helps address emotional problems through Person-Centered Counseling. This conversation was packed with so many interesting insights, philosophical debates, and reflections on human nature, that it is hard to sum them all up. Keith is someone who clearly has spent a lot of time trying to u...

John's documentary "Leaving God", explores a shift that appears to be happening in America away from God and religion (recent Pew Research reports about 30% of Americans are now religiously unaffiliated). In John's film he explores this trend through the eyes of his own personal journey with God. John grew up Catholic in the 60's, a time when questioning the church was not something you did. Throu...

Sometimes I just love having an all out philosophical conversation where we explore the seemingly unanswerable questions of the universe to see what we can learn. My conversation with Jeevan was very much that. He started off the conversation by saying "optimism" is the key value to hold because it can act as a protective bubble against the hardships of the world and give you the best chance to ac...

Zach is the host of DIY Wealth, a podcasting platform focused on helping people merge financial freedom with a life well lived. He wants to use his experiences to help others engineer a life where they can have enough money to do the things they care about. That seems so simple and so obvious. That is what we should all be working towards, living a life that actually makes us happy. Yet somehow mo...

Janine is an internationally recognized speaker, author, and expert on DE&I, conscious leadership, organizational development, psychological safety in the workplace, emotional intelligence, neurobiology, and what it takes to attract and retain world-class talent. She has had a life time of experience trying to fight the battle for equity and inclusion, starting as a community activist in Brook...

I have known Dom for 3 or 4 years, since we both started training Brazilian Jiu Jitsu together at about the same time. Even though I didn't know him that well, I noticed some things about him over the years; like he has a deep love for competing in jiu jitsu, a killer work ethic, and a tolerance for fear that most people don't have. He is the type of person who will take on any fight, any time; an...

"It's like the universe was trying to understand itself, but in that process couldn't figure out what the hell was going on and that is why we are here." Statements like that are why I love philosophy and talking to people about the deep questions of life. This conversation was full of insights and discussions like that. Nicole was super interesting too because her background gave her so many uniq...

Dominion is a Nigerian immigrant who was born not breathing and was physically abused throughout his childhood, both in school and at home. As you'll hear him describe it, he entered this world just trying to survive and viewed much of his early life as living in hell. Through faith in God and a lot of hard work though, he was able to change his mindset and change his life. He is now a college gra...

Sylvia is a certified TRE Provider (Trauma Releasing Exercises) that truly believes stress really is the root of all evil and can be addressed through TRE treatment. I will be honest, part of the reason I was excited to talk to Sylvia is because I didn't really know much about TRE and what I did know sounded a little fuzzy to me. I was curious to understand more, not just about the treatment, but...

Evolution would be the word that comes to mind most after this conversation with Scott. I had the opportunity to work as an intern a while back at Madison Square Garden Sports (NY Knicks, Rangers, etc.) when Scott was running the organization. I didn't know him that well, but my view of him was similar to most people who had only heard of him through the news and other public info. He was super su...

At the age of 16, Riya founded FutureOfUs, an online platform that empowers youth to learn about the future through literary means. They have over 300 volunteers writing about their opinions on politics, the environment, fashion, and much more. Now 18 years old, Riya has spoken at a TEDx event and other tech conferences and is writing her own book. It should come as no surprise then that Riya's va...

Shane is a good friend of mine and someone with an approach to life that I admire. He has been successful in the traditional sense; did well in school, is an executive at a fortune 500 company, has a beautiful family, etc. But the thing I really admire about him is his confidence and authenticity. I should say the confidence he has in his authenticity. As someone who spent most of my life as a peo...

Imagine a scenario where a white person is riding in a cab and notices the driver has brown skin and seems to be from a country in Asia or the Middle East. So the passenger thinks "I like to be friendly, I am going to ask this person where they are from. Maybe they are from Pakistan or India and they like cricket. I love cricket so it would be fun to talk to them about that." For some people that...

The tag line on Jertaker's profile read, "I’m an American Musician, Entrepreneur, Content Creator, Wrestler and Student Nurse from Buffalo NY." That was intriguing right away and as I looked into him more I realized he was a Youtube content creator, who did crazy things on video (getting pepper sprayed, tasered, etc.), made his own music videos, and wrestled in an independent wrestling league. I l...

This was another "friend" episode, where I talked to Todd, a friend I have known since middle school. Todd's a dad, a husband, an assistant principal, and someone who believes working hard is the most important value. I have to be honest, even having known Todd for over 30 years it wouldn't have been the first thing I would have guessed for his value, but as he explained it, it made a lot of sense...

Will is a youth and equality Activist, Solution-Focused practitioner, a Speaker, and LGBTQ+. As Will put it, "with my lived experience as a queer and genderqueer individual, I believe I bring a nuanced take on issues affecting Young People, particularly those from marginalized backgrounds." I was very excited to talk to Will because I wanted to learn. I wanted to learn directly from someone who co...

Sometimes when I do these shows I worry if there is any value being generated. When I finish recording and I am processing what we spoke about, I worry it is redundant and not helpful to keep talking to people about these types of topics (e.g., meaning of life, how do we improve, what makes life so challenging, etc.). I worry it is all going to sound like the same conversations recycled. But then...