Mastering Mediocrity

Starting 4th October, Stephanie Herft is taking you through Sri Lanka's most gruesome true crime stories exploring serial killings, the occult, romance that went wrong, and the paranormal. From high-profile cases to popular mysteries you've probably heard from your folks. Unfiltered. Bone-chilling. Murders that will have you screaming. Truth is stranger than fiction. 'Murder, She Cried' is an original podcast from Paradeim. New episodes Tuesday for free, on all popular podcast platforms. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Sri Lankan cricket team has always been driven by sheer talent but in this day and age is talent solely enough? Drawing comparison with the likes of India's Cricket team and their performance so far. Gayantha, the founder of Strive - a health and wellness platform, talks about how to maximize performance with nutrition and mindset coaching.

In this episode of Mastering Mediocrity, Zeeshan has a close-to-the-bone conversation with a long time friend, Gayantha De Zoysa - Founder of Strive, a Sri Lankan-based health and wellness platform. This episode rips down the guts and glory of being an entrepreneur, building a product against all the odds and striving in the face of adversity.

Credit Cards are known around Sri Lanka as the worst finance choice you could make. In this episode, Nishan debunks the myths about them and simplifies it to the dot to help you make a better decision

In this mini from episode 14, Nishan De Silva gives out financial advice for all young people who are just at the start of their careers. He speaks up on the importance of investing from an early age and how it could help in the long run.

In this episode of Mastering Mediocrity, Zeeshan and Nishan break the silence on their differences of opinions on books and how to properly read them, uncover the fruits of self-discipline and debunk the myths on personal finance.

In this mini from Episode 13 our guest, Dominique and Zeeshan talk about sadness, the manifestation of sadness, and how to deal with it.

In this episode of Mastering Mediocrity, Zeeshan and Dominique navigate through the ups and downs of moving across the world, give us a sneak peek into the world of cosmetics, and discuss the transition into adulthood. You certainly wouldn't want to miss Dominique's reading on Zeeshan's life!

In this clip from Episode 12 our guest, Tuan Shehan and Zeeshan talk about the greatest form of creator block - laziness.

Our guest this week and the first guest for 2021 on MasteringMediocrity — Tuan Shehan (@tuan_shehan) is an Art Director, Typographer, and Co-Founder of 1831 Studio.

In this clip from Episode 11 our guest, Erich Heinrichs who has  45.7k followers in TikTok decodes what works and what doesn't and how you can make it big on TikTok!

Our guest this week on Mastering Mediocrity is the Content Creator, Musician, and TikTok Superstar Eric Heinrichs. He obviously needs no introduction, but in this episode, we deconstruct the persona and the journey behind the creator.

Here you'll find some of the best clips and moments from the Mastering Mediocrity Podcast. This is a clip from Episode 10 with Fatema Enayath Hussain, she talks about her experience on her delivery which is truly boggling. It truly shows the current state of the state of Sex-Education.

Our next guest for Episode 10 is a Doctor, I'm not even kiddin'. Fatema spreads awareness of health issues and educates the general public through content with her Instagram page @healthywithfatema. This episode is jam-packed with insightful information about current health concerns, misconceptions, and a lot of COVID-19 related information on how Sri Lanka is dealing with it. Every episode is slightly different from the last and ever genre-bending.

This is a clip from Episode 09 with Joanne Kulamannage, we talk about Sri Lankans and their obsession with Islandwear, flip-flops, and tropical shirts in specific. Zeeshan talks about his theory, The-Arubambay-Effect and Joanne talks about what she thinks about hype fashion. If you enjoyed this clip, listen to the full episode listed before this clip.

Former Assistant Designer at Lovi Ceylon, Textile Designer at Urban Island and she showcased her own clothing brand - Revive Act at Colombo Fashion Week 2020. In this episode, Joanne talks about what it takes to start a clothing brand in Sri Lanka right out of design school, the avenues she took, and the lessons she learned along the way. Sprinkling insightful information on the state of the industry, its consumers - where it's going, what it's doing right and wrong, and a lot of banter in between. If you enjoyed this episode leave a rating and a review. It goes a long way!

My guest this week, Nandula Gamage - One of the very few people with whom I share the same frequency of humor. She's really a Jill-of-all-trades, starting off with the importance of trying different things in order to find out what you're really good at, as we sidetrack to various topics from horror films, filmmaking, baking, and instagram faking. It's one of those goofy episodes to wrap up the spooky season and I hope you guys enjoy it.

Here you'll find some of the best clips and moments from the Mastering Mediocrity Podcast.  This is a clip from episode 07 with Rajith Maligaspe, where he talks about how social media as a whole and how it has changed our perception of ourselves and how we interact with everyone, including steps that he takes to live a more meaningful life.

My guest this week, Rajith Maligaspe - a long time friend with whom I've shared a desk and learned a lot, especially sound editing as matter of fact. We reconnected over this episode and spoke about COVID-19 and how it has shaped our lives, the movies we've watched recently, and the constant push towards political correctness and reboot culture, and on to vinyl and album listening culture even got Rajith to play a song. To wrap it all up we delved into digital minimalism. It's my longest episode as of yet and I hope you guys enjoy it.

Going six episodes strong, This week I am in conversation with an exceptional graphic designer, Akila Weerasinghe with whom I find a lot of similarities, both growing up in the middle east and pursuing careers in media and advertising, makes this episode enjoyable and a start of a new friendship.

This episode is more on my reflections on the podcast and I answer some questions from Instagram and Facebook by the fans of the Podcast.  Produced & Mixed by Zeeshan Akram Jabeer.

For our fourth episode and the completion of a month of the weekly podcast, we have Ihshan Iqbal, a long time friend, filmmaker, producer, and assistant director of The Good Karma Hospital.  In this episode, we talk film, the Sri Lankan film scene, Ihshan's experience working with foreign productions, and how they vary vastly from out local productions and since this is our field of expertise this episode is filled our tips, tricks, do's and don'ts for all aspiring filmmakers and content creators.

Former Fashion-Editor of Cosmopolitan Sri Lanka, Sumaiya Mohamed talks about the scrutiny of the fashion and media industry and it's culture that makes it harder for people to work their way from the ground up.

Everyone's favorite influencer, Nabeela Iqbal is our guest for the second episode of Mastering Mediocrity. It's such a pleasure to have such an insightful young woman on the podcast. In this episode, Nabeela educates me on Muslim Law Reforms in Sri Lanka, Faith and Cultural Practices, Gender Inequality and Volunteering among other sidetracked conversations.

In our very first episode and I'm proud to present my first guest on the show; a long time friend, product developer, and sustainability advocate — Rushdi Sattar. Rushdi has always been one of the easiest people I've been able to have a conversation with since we share a lot of our views with movies, society, culture, and life in general.