Life Done Different

As I’m planning for this holiday season, I realized we’re living in incredible times. I can go online and order just about anything imaginable and have it delivered to my door in two days. It’s like magic.    But I know that there a lot of wheels in motion behind the scenes that make the magic possible and this week, I got interested in 18 of them in particular.    What I’m talking about is trucking. It’s an industry that I knew little about, and it turns out that its more than just an industry, it’s a lifestyle.    I’m joined today by Salena Lettera (@SalenaLettera). Salena and her fiancee, Ed, have been living that lifestyle together for over 10 years and today Salena shares what it’s like to live life on the road.    We cover just about everything imaginable from her favorite things to haul, to the colorful vocabulary, pet peeves of other drives and pay scale.    So i invite you to come along for the ride and enjoy this look into the trucking lifestyle with Salena Lettera. 

When it comes to dream jobs, I’m pretty sure that I’m not alone in saying that I’d love to be Anthony Bourdain. Think about it. He travels the world, experiences cultures through food and shares it with us. What’s not to love?    But rather than dream about the job, our guest this week made it a reality. I’m joined by Matt Goulding (@mdgoulding). He’s half of the founding team behind roadsandkingdoms.com, an award winning travel journalism site and the publishing partner behind Explore Parts Unknown, the digital home for Bourdain’s hit CNN TV Show.    Matt is a traveler, a food-lover and one of my favorite authors on both topics. We sat down today to talk about Matt's winding path, from cooking aboard boats in Patagonia to landing a job as food editor at Men’s Health and penning the prolific Eat This, Not That book series, to ultimately where he is today, turning travel, eating, drinking and writing into a living.    Given the popularity of travel and food writing these days, I wanted to ask Matt what it is that sets Roads and Kingdoms apart and if in fact it is possible to still make money in publishing, an industry that on paper, seems to be struggling.    This hour flew by and left me hungry for more. I think you’ll feel the same. Please enjoy this conversation with Matt Goulding. 

Becoming a parent may be one of the largest decisions we can make in our lives. But how do you approach that decision if you know the child isn't going to be yours?    To help us answer this question, we’re joined by Corinne Ostrich. She’s a mother of two and she’s also a surrogate mother. In fact she’s about to embark on the surrogacy journey for the third time.    Today, Corinne shares her insight into this complex topic and answers questions like, is this a profession, how do you explain being a surrogate to your own children, do you experience postpartum depression and what does your relationship with the intended family look like after the child’s birth?   So let’s dive in to hear Corinne’s answers to these questions and more, as she talks about her experience as a surrogate. 

We're taking this week off from publishing a full episode in order to celebrate Thanksgiving. In the spirit of the holiday, I wanted to say that I'm incredibly thankful for all of you who are Life Done Different listeners. Sharing this podcast with you all is one of the biggest highlights of my year.  I also want to say a special thank you to everyone who has left a review in iTunes or a comment on the website, including:  - Uberwhouberwho - seeyousunish - adyates - Charlie and gang - Sarah-beau-beara - EmpressBreezy - Spacey_KC - Katy - Karen Ellis - Dr. Alexander

From fancy tuxedos, to beautiful assistants, vanishing coins and teleporting cards - I’ve always been mesmerized by magic.    But beyond the illusions, one of the things that I find most mysterious about the world of magic, is how polarized it seems. On one side of the spectrum you’ve got magicians working birthday parties, who are often just a few years older than the crowd they’re performing for. Then on the other, you have internationally recognized superstars like David Blaine. But what happened to everyone in the middle? Is this the magic worlds greatest disappearing act, or am I just missing something here?    To help me understand what’s going on behind the scenes in the magic world, I talked with Henok Negash. He’s been a magician for over a decade and while he didn’t divulge any trade secrets, he was very forthcoming in what the life of a working magician is like. We talked about the different types of magic, how much practice goes in to perfecting an illusion, different career opportunities available to magicians and why it is that magic doesn’t get you girls.    So pull up a chair and enjoy this close up show on magic with Henok Negash. 

The phone rings. You pick it up and on the other line you hear a voice that says:   “We have your wife and child. You have 24 hours to get us 5 million dollars or else they die.”    What do you do?    I can’t imagine what getting a call like that would feel like, let alone what to do. But for Chris Voss (@VossNegotiation), this would have been just another day in the office. For 24 years, Chris was an FBI hostage negotiator, during 4 of which, he actually lead the bureau as chief international hostage and kidnapping negotiator.   I struggle to think of a more high stakes, high stress job, so I wanted to talk to Chris about why he chose this route. Naturally, we talked a lot about negotiation but we also talk about the human element of being a hostage negotiator and like how do you deal with the fact that someones life is in your hands and what happens if you fail?    Aside from the heavy stuff, Chris was also kind enough to indulge me in a negotiation role play and suffice it to say that it did not go how I expected, but perhaps that was to    Knowing Chris’ background made him an intimidating guy to talk to - I was nervous the whole time and felt like he could have picked me apart at any moment had he wanted to. Nevertheless, it was super exhilarating and it changed a lot of what I think about when it comes to negotiations so please enjoy this conversation with Chris Voss. 

Happy Halloween everyone! I thought we could start the show today in Planet Money style with two numbers, 4.4 and zero. I’ll give you a second to guess their significance. Alright, ready?    If you said that 4.4 is the average number of pounds that we Americans produce as waste on a daily basis, you’d be correct. Kinda scary isn’t it?    As for zero, that’s the average amount of waste that Kathryn Kellogg (@goingzerowaste) produces annually!   Kathryn is part of something called the Zero Waste Movement. It’s something that, frankly, I didn’t know was possible until very recently.    I was curious to talk with Kathryn about how she’s able to live without producing trash. Does it mean living in a hut somewhere and growing all your own food? It turns out that’s not the case.    Kathryn was able to break it down in a way that I found to be really accessible and applicable. It got me thinking differently about the things that I purchase and consume and I’ve even made some changes, (composting is the big one), that I’m really enjoying.    This conversation really shifted what I thought was possible and left me feeling more empowered as an individual. I hope you enjoy it and if you decide to make any changes of you’re own, I’d love to hear about them!    Let me know on twitter @lifedonediffrnt. 

I hate it when I break things because I only have three options: 1) I can try to repair it myself, which isn’t really an option 2) I can pay for a professional to fix it, which usually costs more than the product itself or 3) I can ditch the old one and buy a new one. And this is the cycle that Peter Skinner is trying to fix.    In 2012, Peter founded the first repair cafe in the United States. Based in Palo Alto, California the repair cafe is a periodic meet up where you can bring in your broken items and have a volunteer fix them for you. Or better yet, you can work alongside the volunteer and you can learn how to fix them together. Hopefully by the time you return home, your item’s working again, and you might have a new since of confidence in your DIY skills.   Today, Peter and I talked about the repair cafe movement, where it came from and where he sees it going. Beyond the meet ups they’re doing some really cool stuff, like partnering with engineering and design students to encourage repairability as part of  product design.   I found it all really inspiring and hope to bring some of my broken items to their next meeting on November 5th. Who knows, maybe I’ll cya there. In the meantime, please enjoy this talk with Peter Skinner. 

It’s 1999. You decide you want to travel the world, but you’re from a small town, you don’t have a lot of connections and you don’t have a ton of cash. What do you do? This was the question that inspired Casey Fenton (@caseyfenton) to create Couchsurfing.com. If you haven’t heard of Couchsurfing before, it’s pretty much how the name sounds. You go onto the site, create a profile and this allows you to meet other members that you can host in your home, or that you can stay with as a guest in theirs. And the unique thing about it is that it’s all free. I’ve known people who have traveled all the way around the world on the platform so I was really looking forward to sitting down with Casey to hear the origins of the company. It turns out that it ties in heavily with his own story. Casey comes from a small town and had limited options growing up. From an early age, he knew he wanted to change that and we talk about how he was able to use experiences as a way to create more possibilities and better choices. It’s become somewhat of a life philosophy and a driving principle around why Couchsurfing exists. We also bounce around a lot and end up traveling to unexpected places, like discussing whether or not we’re living in a simulation, but that’s what made this interview really fun. I hope you think so too. Please enjoy this talk with Casey Fenton.

First things first, this episode is an explicit one, with adult themed content, so if you’re sensitive to that, you may want to skip this one. Alright, for those of you who are sticking around, the topic today is porn. I’m guessing you’re familiar with it, but how familiar are you with what goes on behind the scenes and in the industry at large? I asked myself that question and realized, not that much. Today I got a chance to change that. I sat down with international porn star, Puma Swede (@PumaSwede), to change that and we had a no holds barred conversation about her career. It was fascinating and I got that chance to ask just about every question that I’ve ever wondered about, including what are the inroads to porn, exit routes, what’s the pay scale look like, does she think it’s degrading? It’s a great conversation and I want to get you right to it, so please enjoy this talk with Puma Swede.

What if donating to charity meant that you could win the experience of your dreams; like flying around the world to party with your favorite band, a role in a blockbuster movie, or having lunch 1-on-1 with your idol? Would you be more inclined to give to a good cause and would charities raise more money? Matt Pohlson (@mattpohlson) set out to find answers to those questions when he co-founded Omaze.com, an online platform offering donors the chance to win once-in-a-lifetime experiences when they contribute to a charity. After five years, hundreds of campaigns, and millions of dollars raised, the answer is a resounding, “Yes!” I caught up with Matt today and got to hear what the past 5 years have been like and more. We talk about his transition from politics, to Hollywood and then entrepreneurship. We discuss the power of storytelling and the role it’s played throughout Matt’s life. Matt shares his thoughts on when to persevere and when to quit and gives us a look into the sacrifices required when becoming a founder. It’s a solid reality check for anyone considering entrepreneurship. In parting, I ask Matt about his hopes for the future to which he responded beautifully, “That I continue to live without fear and to love…and when it’s all said and done, I can look back and say that I used my gifts to the greatest degree possible.”

Love it or hate it, house music has become one of the most popular genres of our time. But it wasn’t always like that. This music was once deeply underground. Even the name, house music, is a nod to the illegal warehouse parties it was once played at. So how did we go from there to the festivals and multi-billion dollar industry that we see today? I’m joined today by Wyatt Jenkins. Wyatt was not only firsthand witness to the evolution of electronic music, he played a key part - starting as a DJ in 90’s and early 2000’s, and then as a founding member of Beatport.com - the electronic music marketplace that helped propel house music to mainstream status. Wyatt takes us back to what it was like to be a DJ in the early days of EDM. We talk about the relationship between technology and music, what raving culture was like in the 90’s, why following your passion is bad advice, the pitfalls of the party lifestyle and what it feels like to build a successful business only to be fired from the same company. This was a raw and wide ranging conversation, and I learned a ton, so I hope you enjoy this episode with Wyatt Jenkins.

At age 14, Laura Dekker set sail on a solo journey from the Netherlands. A year and a half later, she became the youngest person ever to circumnavigate the globe. Her tale is incredible, but perhaps the most astonishing part is that it almost didn’t happen. Laura originally planned to embark on her trip at age 13, but when Dutch authorities got wind of her plans, the Child Welfare Office stepped in and barred her journey. For nearly a year, Laura and her family were entangled in court battles before Laura finally won the right to make her voyage. In this episode, Laura shares the story of her trip with us, what she learned along the way as well as her thoughts on some of the larger issues such as the rights of individuals vs. the perceptions of society and how to balance experience with safety when it comes to parenting.

There’s a rule in Las Vegas - the house always wins. It turns out that rule can be broken, and Blade shows us how. We talk about Blade's transition to becoming a professional gambler, the preparation that was required, including creating an alternate persona, and the capital necessary for the endeavor. Blade shares the highs and lows - like what it feels like to lose $90,000 in a four hours. We also discuss the viability of gambling as a long term career and his advice for anyone interested in taking up card counting and advantage play.

Jay Shafer (@fourlightshouse) is best known as the pioneer of the tiny house movement. He’s the author of the Small House Book and the founder of Four Lights Tiny House Company. His work has been featured on Oprah, The New York Times, The New Yorker and beyond. Jay and I discuss his early influences, the role art plays in his design, what constitutes good design and how he wouldn’t have started living in tiny houses if it weren’t illegal. This leads us to touch upon the social and political aspects of tiny houses in our communities, as well as Jay’s latest project - Tiny Houses for Humanity.

Cayley Coulbourn (@caylesc) has spent the last ten years of her life at sea. From teaching diving in Thailand, to sailing in the British Virgin Islands, to chartering yachts up the coast of New England, she’s done it all. We talk about how she got her start in the dive industry, how she was able to build her skills and certifications for free by trading work at dive shops, what daily life is like in the dive hot spots of the world, as well as what adjustments one needs to make when living on a boat. Cayley also shares her philosophy for preserving unique experiences by setting defined endpoints so be on the lookout for that around 43:30.

For show notes, links and more info, visit http://www.lifedonedifferent.com