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Michelle Cain joins host Ron Aaron and co-host Carol Zernial to talk about reluctant caregiving on this edition of Caregiver SOS. About Michelle Michelle Cain is a writer who brings to life the extraordinary within the ordinary through her candid and often humorous style. Her debut book, Did Mom Drop Acid?, emerged from the unscripted, raw events of life. With a Journalism degree from Chico State, Michelle’s path has spanned high-tech PR, real estate, and counseling, where her passion for people’s stories deepened. Michelle enjoys life as an empty nester with her husband, two “crazy" terriers, and the “terrier boss” Nigel, an outspoken African Gray parrot. Now based in Georgetown, TX, Michelle can be found writing in one of the coffee shops that line ‘The most beautiful town square in Texas’. Hosts Ron Aaron and Carol Zernial, and their guests talk about Caregiving and how to best cope with the stresses associated with it. Learn about "Caregiver SOS" and the "Teleconnection Hotline" programs. Listen every week for deep, inspiring, and helpful caregiving content on Caregiver SOS!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

My guest and conversation partner for this episode is Anna Pereira. Anna grew up in New Jersey. She tells us about growing up in a home where she was discouraged by her father from going to college. She tells us that while her mom typically exceeded to the wishes of her dad, Mom did insist that Anna should be able to go to college if she wished. And so Anna did, but only stuck it out for three semesters.   Anna then joined the workforce holding a variety of jobs and becoming successful at most of them.   In 2009 she met and married her husband. That story is one I leave for Anna to tell, but suffice it to say Anna's story is an inspirational and fascinating one you should hear from her. Anna's husband is a sports expert as you will learn. A few years after marrying Anna and her husband moved to Portugal for a job and have been spreading their time between New Jersey and Portugal ever since. In fact, not just travels to Portugal but also to other countries around the world.   The Wellness Universe concept was created by Anna to help bring wellness to leaders and others. Through The Wellness Universe, and now Wellness Universe Corporate Anna has reached thousands of people. Her programs are in large part membership-based endeavors that help promote well being and a more positive outlook on life.   Our conversation is not only informative and inspirational, but it also is quite animated in a positive way that I believe will keep you engaged. Please enjoy your time with Anna and reach out to her afterward at www.thewellnessuniverse.com. I think you will see why Anna believes she is truly changing the world.       About the Guest:   Anna Pereira is the CEO of The Wellness Universe, and Wellness Universe Corporate, creator of wellness events, projects, community, programs, author of 4 best selling books, and founder of Wellness for All, donation based wellness programming and leads a woman-owned business, where they believe happy, healthy, healed humans lead to peace globally. She's an inspirational leader, mentor, and connector for business owners who help humans to live and lead their best life. Anna has worked with thousands of wellness business owners bringing their transformational resources to those seeking wellbeing and now taking those people to help transform organizations through the lens of company culture and well-being. Her contribution and impact are well documented through those she has worked with, evident in over 150 written recommendations in her Linkedin profile.  Anna resides between Portugal and her birthplace, New Jersey, USA, with her husband, sports expert, Hugo Varela. The couple has adopted pets (one dog and two cats) and cares for strays and their African Gray is a quite conversationalist speaking two languages. Her relationship with her loved ones and others is top priority. Anna finds balance in being creative, in nature, and at the beach.  She's dedicated to serving her calling and leaving her legacy as a ‘conduit for change' by bringing more health, happiness, and wellbeing to the world with a collaborative spirit and intentional action.   Ways to connect with Anna:   https://www.linkedin.com/in/annapereira1/  https://www.thewellnessuniverse.com/world-changers/annapereira https://www.facebook.com/CirclesOfInspiration IG - @annapereiraofficial Books - https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08VFFJPN9       About the Host:   Michael Hingson is a New York Times best-selling author, international lecturer, and Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe. Michael, blind since birth, survived the 9/11 attacks with the help of his guide dog Roselle. This story is the subject of his best-selling book, Thunder Dog.   Michael gives over 100 presentations around the world each year speaking to influential groups such as Exxon Mobile, AT&T, Federal Express, Scripps College, Rutgers University, Children's Hospital, and the American Red Cross just to name a few. He is Ambassador for the National Braille Literacy Campaign for the National Federation of the Blind and also serves as Ambassador for the American Humane Association's 2012 Hero Dog Awards.   https://michaelhingson.com https://www.facebook.com/michael.hingson.author.speaker/ https://twitter.com/mhingson https://www.youtube.com/user/mhingson https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelhingson/   accessiBe Links https://accessibe.com/ https://www.youtube.com/c/accessiBe https://www.linkedin.com/company/accessibe/mycompany/   https://www.facebook.com/accessibe/       Thanks for listening!   Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page. Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!   Subscribe to the podcast   If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher. You can subscribe in your favorite podcast app. You can also support our podcast through our tip jar https://tips.pinecast.com/jar/unstoppable-mindset .   Leave us an Apple Podcasts review   Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you have a minute, please leave an honest review on Apple Podcasts.       Transcription Notes:   Michael Hingson ** 00:00 Access Cast and accessiBe Initiative presents Unstoppable Mindset. The podcast where inclusion, diversity and the unexpected meet. Hi, I'm Michael Hingson, Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe and the author of the number one New York Times bestselling book, Thunder dog, the story of a blind man, his guide dog and the triumph of trust. Thanks for joining me on my podcast as we explore our own blinding fears of inclusion unacceptance and our resistance to change. We will discover the idea that no matter the situation, or the people we encounter, our own fears, and prejudices often are our strongest barriers to moving forward. The unstoppable mindset podcast is sponsored by accessiBe, that's a c c e s s i capital B e. Visit www.accessibe.com to learn how you can make your website accessible for persons with disabilities. And to help make the internet fully inclusive by the year 2025. Glad you dropped by we're happy to meet you and to have you here with us.   Michael Hingson ** 01:21 Well, hi everyone, and welcome to another edition of unstoppable mindset. Today we get to chat with Anna Pereira. And Anna is the founder of the wellness universe, the wellness universe and other things that we're going to talk about. She's written several books, and she has been a very active and engaging person. We've had fun catching up even before we started doing this podcast, because Anna spends her time between Portugal and her home in New Jersey, and where she lived in New Jersey was like just a few miles from where I and my wife Karen lived in Westfield New Jersey for six years, so we hadn't talked about that before. Shame on us, but now we have, and we got caught up. Anna, welcome to unstoppable mindset. We're glad you're here. Oh   Anna Pereira ** 02:14 Michael, thank you so much. I am delighted to be here. Thank you for having me. Well,   Michael Hingson ** 02:18 I'm really glad that we're getting a chance to do this. So tell us a little bit about kind of the early Anna growing up and all that stuff. Might as well start with that,   02:31 such a big question. Well,   Michael Hingson ** 02:33 if we take the hour to talk about that, then we know that there were some interesting events.   Anna Pereira ** 02:39 All right. Well, great. Well, you know, it's so funny, like you said, we were talking about growing up in in very close proximity to each other, probably around those same years, and had no idea that here we are, later again and and it was our wonderful friend Sharon Carn, that actually put us together here. Yeah. So I grew up in New Jersey, and I had a pretty, pretty average childhood, except for the fact that I feel, and I think that with a lot of first generation immigrants, people that came in from a very strict background, my my culture, my background is Portuguese. My parents raised me in a pretty strict household, but I was not a very compliant individual, growing up with a very free spirit and very creative spirit. So with that, I was always very independent. Wanted to do my own thing, and at the same time, there wasn't, like, a lot of, I want to say nurturing or good parenting from the from the angle of, there wasn't a lot of I love using the house, or there wasn't a lot of encouraging me to pursue a more of an academic route in life. When I expressed that I wanted to further my education, I was met with the minds with my father's fear mindset around money, saying, you know, no, you're not going to college. We can't afford it. Instead of saying, let's explore options here, let's get our child who is interested in furthering her, you know, her, her education, the resources that she needs in order for her to pursue her dreams. So everything was kind of met with that. So where was your mom and all that? My mom was there, and she was just basically subserving to my father. Okay, the and it's a great segue to the the conclusion of that my mom was the one who said, no, no, we're going to go enroll you in college. That's what I was wondering. Yes, thank you. So I went to the wonderful UCC over here in in Cranford. So. I went to for a few years of Union County College, and it still wasn't for me. So I never really finished with any degree, as with many union, I'm sorry, county college students and I joined the workforce. But growing up was a mixed bag. I was very artistic, and I was very well championed and respected, and my peers and even teachers and people around me really knew me for my artistic talent. They and I was very much celebrated and encouraged in that area, but there was a lot of areas that I felt were lacking. I was bullied when I was growing up, and again, the lack of nurturing, and if something happened, well, it had to be my fault. And if it was my fault, then there was the shame and the blame and all that put there. So in growing up with all of these stigmas and traumas, only as I became an adult, did I understand what what I went through and how to become more aware of the situations and circumstances which kind of led me to where I am today. But all through that time, it was interesting, because I don't know where the inspiration came from to have adult conversations as a teen with my teachers, my guidance counselor, which with other adults, and they would ask me for my advice or my perspective on things that I I don't know where I came up with things, but that was kind of like the the seeding of where I am now,   Michael Hingson ** 06:46 interesting. You know, one of the things that that comes to mind when you when you say that last bit, is that I've learned, if nothing else in the world, our subconscious minds, our heart, if you will, observes everything that goes on around us, and oftentimes, will tell us things if we learn to listen. So in a sense, I'm not really surprised that maybe you were able to carry on adult conversations because they picked up on that, but clearly you had been observant enough to be able to gather the knowledge to be able to go off and deal with some of those things, and it's so often that people don't do that today. My favorite example of that is playing Trivial Pursuit. When somebody asks a question and you immediately think of an answer, and then you go, Oh, no, that can't be the right answer. It came too quick, and then you give some other answer, but the original answer was the right answer. And we just don't follow our instincts and our heart nearly as much as we probably ought to.   Anna Pereira ** 07:44 I love that you use the word instinct, Michael, I like to use the word intuition.   Michael Hingson ** 07:49 Same concept, yeah, for what I'm talking about here. Yes, it's there, and we just, we don't use it. We, we seem to be taught by others that that's not the way to do things, and it's a problem.   Anna Pereira ** 08:08 I'm laughing so hard right now, authentically, laughing at what you're saying honestly, and people are now. And then you learn. You go through life, and then you learn like I should have listened to my gut. I should have listened to what I was being told, you know? And if we, if we do, listen more into that, and we lean into that space, which is what, literally, I'm all about right now, and the people I surround myself, it's like listening to that, tuning into your heart, tuning into your gut, and quieting the mind, because the mind is really great after you've come to some sort of decision to help you balance that decision. But if you go to your strictly to your mind, well, that just that just gets all up in the way.   Michael Hingson ** 08:54 Of course, it's really going to part of your mind, because the other part of your mind is really your gut that we don't tend to listen to nearly as much as we should agree. How long ago did you leave college? When did you leave?   Anna Pereira ** 09:06 Oh, my goodness, it was, it was quick. It was basically, I went to county college. So I went for like, three semesters or something. I was probably around, like, 19 or 20.   Michael Hingson ** 09:18 Okay, well, I was wondering how, like, how long, so, how long have you been in the workforce? Then,   Anna Pereira ** 09:23 oh, I've been in the workforce since I was 12 years old, if you want to talk about workforce, okay, no, I got it. I got a part time job after school, and then I was working three jobs when I was 19, so I can get my own apartment. So I joined the workforce like early on, and had always worked, and even when I was in college, I was working two jobs along with being in college. So it just kind of my ethic. And honestly, again, from the immigrant perspective, you work hard, you stay out of trouble, and then. You know you'll have an okay life. And so   Michael Hingson ** 10:03 often, even on this podcast, I hear people who talk about being immigrants directly, or first generation with parents who were immigrants, who say that very same thing and who follow that work ethic, and it serves them so well.   Anna Pereira ** 10:22 There's, there's lots of great things to take away from that. I will say, like when I'm dedicated, I'm committed. You know, there's a lot to be said for a lot of the benefits, as they have seen, have benefited them. But I also see how it creates a lot of shortcomings in your life, and I'm trying to reverse some of that, those patterns and that thinking and those beliefs, those false beliefs, as I've gotten older, because that they really don't serve. Not, not every single thing from that point of view, serves   Michael Hingson ** 11:02 no but it lays a foundation. And then the question is, how you work with and how you evolve? Yes, yeah, which, which really makes a lot of sense. But so you had, what kind of jobs did you have after you left college? Then,   Anna Pereira ** 11:17 oh goodness, well, I've done everything from retail to undercover security, to office, to head of a $15 million division for a pet products company. I've had my own businesses. I've had my own clothing lines, I've had jewelry collections. I I've been an entrepreneur, and I still am, and so it's kind of a hodgepodge, and I've taken away from every single experience, a very big learning experience, from the people that I worked with to the jobs that I've held to you know, even when I talk now, I know, for example, when I design product for a pet products company, I know that there's a certain footprint that a department store or a spec or a store, you have to stay within that footprint when you're designing the packaging, because if you design the packaging outside of that footprint, they're not going to bring the product in it. The profit margin is not there to that makes sense to occupy that footprint, right? So there's, there's so many things that I've learned along the way that I bring into my now. But, yeah, I've hold, I've held, like, various, various job. Telemarketer, like, you name it, almost, I've done it. I've done it. Michael, well,   Michael Hingson ** 12:34 let's, let's get real. You live in New Jersey. Bada, bing, bada, boom. Did you ever work with Tony Soprano? Just checking.   Anna Pereira ** 12:42 I did not, you know, just yesterday, where we headed out to Connecticut, and one of the one of the rest stops are named James Gandolfini, rest stops.   12:50 Oh,   Anna Pereira ** 12:51 I was like, That's so nice, yeah. Well,   Michael Hingson ** 12:52 what? I actually have a funny story when we were building our house. Well, we built our house, and the builder was a gentleman and his sons, Joe scalzidonna, and his partner was the financier for the for the group, and his name was Joe Pinto. And they Joe, especially Pinto, I guess, made his money ready. Here it comes in the garbage business. And it means all that that implies. But, you know, they were very nice to us. All of them were, were really great to us and helped us a lot. They they were very concerned about making sure everything that could be done to make the house accessible for Karen was done. And did some some really great things, and had some really creative contributions over the things that we included in the design. So it was wonderful to work with all of them. But, you know, it's an interesting it's, I like New Jersey. We had a lot of fun there. We would go into New York many weekends and go to the theater or just walk around, and so it was a lot of fun. But Karen was a native Californian and always wanted to get back to California. So after September 11, we did move back here, but it's always good to keep in touch.   Anna Pereira ** 14:14 Yeah, I do love it here. I couldn't give up my home when I married my husband back in 2009 um, it was we were here. But then my husband had to leave and go out of the country, back to Portugal to for an opportunity that he had, that he couldn't, that he couldn't refuse,   Michael Hingson ** 14:33 couldn't refuse one of those, huh?   Anna Pereira ** 14:37 But in a good way. And you know, then there was the, this is where it led to me living between two two countries. But I literally, there was no way I could go in my home in New Jersey. I'm sorry. I am a Jersey girl at heart.   Michael Hingson ** 14:49 There you go. Do you guys ever commute back to Portugal now?   Anna Pereira ** 14:53 Oh, yeah, we live between the two and also our global citizens. Like I just got back from San Paolo on I. Friday morning? Yeah, we, I've traveled this so this year, so far, we've been to San Paolo three times, Rio to London to Dubai to Oh, Argentina is   Michael Hingson ** 15:14 all of that for work?   Anna Pereira ** 15:16 Yes, well, both, because both of us are both business owners, entrepreneurs, networking is a big part of our success. So it's work related, not you know more, more with networking and showing up for different things. I came actually here from Portugal to attend an event as a as a facilitator of a master class for wellness. So I was actually in Portugal when I got called back here to come back to New Jersey, so and so. There is no rhyme or reason or where we go, or what when we go, unless it is provoked by a business opportunity or meeting.   Michael Hingson ** 15:58 What kind of work does he do? So   Anna Pereira ** 16:01 my husband is a very interesting person. He is actually a specialist in the sports world. He had played, yeah, he had played professional football in Portugal, which we call soccer. We call soccer Yes. And from that, it kind of ushered him into this amazing career. He used to be a professional goalie. He went from that to sports agent to advisor to sports team owners restructuring teams, to overseeing the whole workings of teams and helping helping an owner to being part of a fund and being owner of teams, as well as intermediate intermediating different deals and negotiations between partners and just all kinds of things he is. He is a sports expert. He's actually been asked last week to be part of a book that has nothing to do with sports. It's about, I think it's a mathematician or an economist that is a professor over at the college in Portugal has asked him to contribute to the book based on his expertise of sports management. So he's kind of like I want to say, and you and I will understand the terminology. He's a businessman in the sports world so   Michael Hingson ** 17:26 well, that's pretty cool. So does he own a team? Yes.   Anna Pereira ** 17:30 So we are in and out of ownership, depending on when you speak with us. Their their group buys and sells teams. They go in, they restructure, they make sure that the team becomes, you know, better than they were, and they create a great investment out of the the team that they're invested in based on, you know, recruiting great, great talent, selling those, selling the players for transfers much more than what they paid, things like that. So right now, we're in between, but something is coming very soon, and I'll let you know when that happens. When it happens. Keeps   Michael Hingson ** 18:06 you busy. Has he ever thought of or ever explored? This is an off the wall question. But what the heck creating any kind of level of accessibility in soccer, either for like people in wheelchairs or people who are blind, because there are people. I don't know about soccer, but I know that, for example, there are blind people who are well, there are blind golfers. I know a couple of blind people who is children in high school actually played baseball, and they have a clever way to do it. And it was and it was competitive. They were parts of regular teams, and of course, there's, you know, other things like basketball. But I'm just wondering, has he ever considered that, or has that ever come up? I   Anna Pereira ** 18:49 love that you brought this up. First of all, Michael, because this was actually just part of a larger conversation of the conference that I came back for. So my husband's wheelhouse is not in that area. However, you can imagine the amount of detail that goes into the inner workings or structure of an organization for the employees and the structure of a sports organization, down to the individual athletes and then to all of the experiences for everyone who's engaged, every stakeholder, every fan, and so I don't know how much he's ever been involved in those particular conversations before, but I will tell you what was so interesting last week, the organization Sega Sports integrity, global alliance is the organization that is addressing this. And last week we had the master class, sorry, a week and a half ago, there was the master class that I was part of, and the next day were panels, and one of the panels really addressed diversity and inclusion. And the the whole event was, was. Focused on female leadership in sport to bring in more women into the leadership. Their goal is to have 30% of the leadership to be women in sport, professional sport, all of it. So they their big focus, because their founder was part of the soccer world, Emmanuel, but they focus on all the other areas of sport, and so they had offensive champion on the panel. They had someone representing golf, someone there representing chess. They had someone representing all of these different areas, basketball, volleyball, from all these different areas of sport and the the Special Olympics and the Olympics were discussed, and there was a speaker there in a wheelchair, and we, they actually addressed this at this conference specifically. So it is a big conversation. It is a big topic. But to answer your question specifically about my my husband, my husband, I don't know how much he's been into that conversation, specifically.   Michael Hingson ** 21:06 Well, it's interesting. I remember this year when the LA Marathon was run, the first winner was the person from well, the wheelchair category. And I learned last year or the year before, in talking to somebody on the podcast that in reality, oftentimes people in chairs will actually complete a marathon course significantly faster than regular runners because they they get those chairs moving. But of course, it does mean that they have the athletic prowess to do it. And equating competitiveness is, of course, a different story. I suppose that ought to be explored. But the fact of the matter is that oftentimes, wheelchairs will will go through the whole 26.3 miles, or whatever, faster than a person just running with their legs. Now, at the same time, I know a woman who is blind who was an international rower. So rowing is not something that requires any real mate, well, any adaptations to work. But she could never be on an Olympic team. She could only be on a Special Olympic team because she was blind, even though what she did and what rowers did certainly could be done whether you're blind or sighted. So you know my my opinion is what we really should do is require that all sports be played totally in the dark, without any lights, and then we'll see who wins.   Anna Pereira ** 22:49 That is, that's an interesting approach. That's an interesting approach.   Michael Hingson ** 22:52 I worked for a company once, and when my wife also worked for the company, and she was in charge of Doc document control for the company. And one of the things I said is, if you really want to have true document control, because some of the people in the company, including the President, would oftentimes go in and steal the gold copy or the master copy of something, and send it out, rather than making a duplicate, which is a no no. But they did it anyway. And I said, well, then to have doc control, just put everything in Braille and then see what they do. But, you know, good doc control. But so it was just an interesting question, and it is a topic that is more and more part of the discussion, the whole issue of having some level of access for people who are who have other disabilities. And I say that because my opinion is, of course, that every person has a disability. Yours is your light dependent. You know, if the lights go out, you're in a world of hurt, although I'm not. And you know, Thomas Edison and the invention of the electric light bulb mainly fixed that it covers up the disability, but it's still there, but it's but it is true that we are at least discussing it more than we used to. And if we take that discussion further and make something happen with it, that will be a good thing, but it is a an interesting thing that we we end up having to face from time to time.   Anna Pereira ** 24:23 Well, I'll tell you what the individual that I was just speaking about that was part of that panel would probably be interesting for you to have a conversation with. If this is something that you're passionate, have a conversation with Michael. Her name is Karen Korb, K, A, R, I N, K, O, R, B and she she was the one that was speaking on that panel, specifically, and and she was in a wheelchair, so that is really something that she would love to dive into. I'd   Michael Hingson ** 24:50 love to chat with her. If you have a way to help us get an introduction, that would be cool. We'd love to have her on the podcast.   Anna Pereira ** 24:56 Absolutely, she's a divine in. Visual. And   Michael Hingson ** 25:01 of course, as I as I tell people often on this podcast, anyone who has an idea for a guest, we're always looking for, for more people to have so love to meet folks. It's fun.   25:12 Absolutely well, so   Michael Hingson ** 25:14 you wrote a book, 25 tools for happiness, one of four, I believe. And you talk in there about the fact that you manifested your husband. That's an interesting topic. Tell me about that, if you would.   Anna Pereira ** 25:27 Yes. Oh, Michael, this is one of my favorite stories. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for the opportunity. Any chance, any chance I get. To number one, talk about my husband. Number two, encourage hope in someone who is of, you know, a middle age and still single. Is, is just, it's just a joy for me so and just, I just wanted to correct that. I didn't write the book. I authored book because I had, and this is why I want to, I want to really make note of this. I had 24 other 25 amazing authors contribute to this book. The diversity of stories in that that particular book is really, really, really amazing. So, God, where do I start? And it happened here, in the hat, in the home in union, New Jersey. And a lot of going back to what we were talking about earlier, about what structured my belief system about myself from my childhood and growing up, and how it manifested through my life, and the type of self love, self awareness, belief system I had from growing up really impacted my general happiness. So one of the things that at this point in my life, I just really wanted to settle down with someone that that I was going to build a life with. And in that introduction to the 25 tool this, it's the wellness universe guide to complete self care. 25 tools for happiness. Book my introduction specifically shares my secret sauce of how my life has literally turned into well, I mean, nobody has a fairy tale. Even a fairy tale has its challenges, right? But of as much of a fairy tale as possible, humanly possible on this earth, one day for no reason at all, and I this is why I believe that we all are connected to the Divine and have this channel, this guidance. I wish I just I was at the second floor of my house. I was at the top of my stairs, and it just hit me like because I had just gone through some really traumatizing experiences with somebody that I was getting involved in business with, and she was it just, was just terrible, terrible experience, one of the worst in my life taught me a lot of things. And for some reason, just that day, I was like, and I was raised Catholic. I don't really go to church. I don't like, I don't believe in strict religious rules, but I believe in my spirituality and who exists on the other side watching over me. I think that they are so I was at the top of my stairs, and I was like, Dear God, universe. You know Mary, Jesus, you know Joseph, Saint Rita, whoever's watching over me, I'm like, please just let me, allow me to release judgment of myself, judgment on others, and what I believed others are going to judge me on. And please just bring me someone that's going to allow me to live my happiness and make beautiful babies with and that's what I asked for. And all of a sudden, just by voicing that out, I release so much off of myself, but hearing myself say those words allowed me to have hope and believe in this and hang on to it and cling on to it. And I did. And nine months later, on october 26 I went out on my first date with with my now husband, but I didn't know it at a time. So october 26 was our first date. And on December 23 2009 we were married, and we've now been married 14 years. If, if I met, my math is correct and and that is, I believe, how I manifested, you know, my husband, because of making sure I voiced it, I committed to that I owned it. And then i i Every day, I reminded myself of what I really wanted, and because for me, happiness, it's not it's not what you're experiencing now, you don't really even know what happiness is until you're experiencing so I can't say I want this for the rest of my life, because you don't know if that's exactly what you will want tomorrow, it can make you very miserable tomorrow. Or whatever's making you happy today, like I might not want to go on a roller coaster tomorrow. You know what I mean, and I liked it when I was 14 or 15, so leaving it open to please just allow me to live my happiness was a very strong statement and resonated with me because I was aware enough to know that there was so much undiscovered territory in the world that I would not know what happiness was until I was there and and now here I am living around the world, experiencing all of these new experiences globally, traveling everywhere that I would have never known existed if I had boxed myself into one scenario or one expectation, or what I thought I would be happy, happiness for me, at least at that time, having the wherewithal to say, just allow me to live my happiness and make beautiful babies with and then beautiful babies was just more of a metaphor of Like, bring me someone who's attractive, who I'll be attracted to, who's and that we can create things together that would be beautiful. And I believe that we're doing that through his work, through my work, and through what we're doing on this earth, and our relationships with our friends and family. I think we're creating beautiful things.   Michael Hingson ** 31:18 So do you have children? No, we   Anna Pereira ** 31:21 have not had children and when the window is closed, but we do, we do talk about adoption when things get a little bit more settled, things are a little crazy with all the travel and the work. But no, we ended up not have being able to have children, not because of, you know, physiological reasons, but because of just timing and travel and time passed. I was 36 when, when we met. So,   Michael Hingson ** 31:48 yeah, well, and so, you know the for us when I met Karen, it was in January of 1982 and so I was basically 32 and she was almost 33 and we I always thought there had to be somebody who would be right for me, and I would know it when we met and when I met Karen, and it was a friend who introduced us, we started talking, and when we hit it off. So it was just great conversations. Great great interacting together. And over six months, we we talked some, and then, well, actually, seven months, and then at the end of July of 1982 we were in a car in Santa Ana, and I asked her to marry me, and she said yes, and we have said ever since we were old enough and mature enough to know what we wanted in a person who we would spend the rest of our life with and as I said, it is we. We were together 40 years, and I'm sure that she's still up there monitoring me, so I will behave but, but you know, it, it was just something that took it was the right thing to do, and she was definitely the right person. We had conversations about children and decided she was in a chair and didn't want to really go through a lot of the physical things, because she said if she had to be pregnant, she'd probably be bedridden for a lot of it, and she didn't want to do that. So we made the decision together that we would spoil nieces and nephews, because the advantage of that is that we could kick him out at the end of the day and shoot him home and do and did. So it worked out pretty well. But I know exactly what you're saying, and you know it when the right person comes along, if you really look at it and think about it, and again, it's like most things, all too often, we don't think about the right kinds of things, or we don't think about stuff enough, and that can be a challenge. Or in our case, it wasn't because we thought about it enough and it worked.   Anna Pereira ** 34:15 I love that. Thank you for sharing that.   Michael Hingson ** 34:18 So it is that's cool. And you know, you you guys will will figure out what you're going to do. And adopting. There's a podcast episode that we did with someone now, almost two years ago, and he and his wife adopted two daughters from China when they were over 40, because she wanted to adopt a child from China. And there were stories behind it, but they adopted, and now the children are, I think, like 22 and 25 or 23 and 25 or so, and he's written a book about their adopted. Option journey. But again, the the issue is that you never know where life's going to take you. And they never thought about adopting a Chinese girl, or he didn't his wife did for for various reasons, but they both became part of the journey, and it was, and it still is, a great adventure for them.   Anna Pereira ** 35:21 That's wonderful. So gives us hope.   Michael Hingson ** 35:24 Yeah, a lot of a lot of kids need adopting too. Yeah, so you went to Portugal and for the first time, and by the way, have you learned Portuguese? Let   Anna Pereira ** 35:40 me just put it this way, my Portuguese is as good as my singing. You don't want me to hear you want to hear me do either unless I am. It's absolutely necessary so,   Michael Hingson ** 35:55 and I assuming people in Portugal have probably affirmed that in some way, so I won't dig any deeper. Yes, but you, while you were there or somehow involving Portugal, you decided to form this thing called the wellness universe. Tell us about that.   Anna Pereira ** 36:15 Oh, thanks. Yeah. So I was over in Portugal, and I really didn't have much to do. I started a jewelry collection and a Facebook page to kind of get, you know, get the word out about the jewelry collection, but much more my my approach was to just share who I was and inspirational messages, because that's kind of what lent to the jewelry collection. They were called circles of inspiration, and they had, you know, words of inspiration and colors that attracted certain things to you. And so my facebook page actually really became the outlet for my inspirational memes and quotes and things like that, just where I shared and I grew a great community organically. You know, I started in 2011 and I kind of quickly grew to about 300,000 Facebook followers. And from there, I was very much networked with a lot of inspirational people, whether they were life coaches or spiritual coaches or counselors or speakers or authors or therapists, they all had something to do with being inspiring or motivating in some way shape or form a group of my followers And so we were networking and sharing each other's inspirational posts, you know, the memes, things like that. And then I was sitting at my kitchen table again, when you're hit with these moments of inspiration, when you go quiet and you listen, you know, it's amazing what messages you receive. And I was sitting on my kitchen table in Portugal in 2013 September 2013 and something told me, you know, there needs to be a place where people who are changing the world need to come as a community, and you're the one to build it. And I was like, Okay, not too big of an ask. I'm like, All right, so I kind of held to myself for a couple of months, and then I went out to one of my friends, Teresa. She ran this, this page called on the road to me, I believe it was, and I told her first, and I got her input, because she was very wise and she was a good friend, and she's like, Oh my gosh, it sounds like such a great idea. And I said, okay, so Well, since that was the cat was let out of the bag, I'm gonna move forward with this. I went to my husband, I said, Look at this, what I'm thinking of doing. Are you behind me on this? Because basically, when I moved to Portugal, he was like, you don't have to work. You don't have to do anything. You just, you know, you just hang out and you do what you want to do. And I was like, Okay, well, I can't not work. I mean, I have an entrepreneurial spirit. I cannot not work. So aside from the the the jewelry collection, which was slow, I mean, the the it was a slow business, so the inspirational side of me really took over. And this building, the wellness universe, was the next project on my agenda. And through 2014 we started growing a Facebook group of practitioners and people who and hobbyist as well. And then in 2015 we launched the first version of the platform, and it was, you know, self funded, membership supported. And so from 2015 january 2015 we've been growing the wellness universe every year. And now it's a basically, it's a directory of practitioners, wellness practitioners, and people who are making the work. A better place. So anyone go and find them through the wellness universe.com but we also have amazing classes and courses. The practitioners who are part of membership are able to host their classes and courses on our platform, the lounge, the wellness universe lounge. But also we work in partnership with those that we know, love and trust to help them also amplify their message through a program, what we call wellness for all and wellness for all programs on the platform are all free to join in donations supported by people who are seeking those courses and classes. And we have a blog, and like you mentioned, we have the books, the four books that we've published with over 65 people that we've created into best selling authors, because some of them have repeated through some of the books. So that's why it's not 100 authors, 25 chapters per book with 25 different authors. And now we've launched wellness universe corporate, and so we are actually delivering wellness solutions through a company culture lens of analyzing, going in and assessing an organization on what their needs are and their culture, through their culture, and then bringing in wellness components to shore up those gaps, while we have the buy in from the leadership, letting everyone know, hey, based on, you know, the assessment the organization, this is what you need, and we're bringing this in. So that's kind of like the very condensed version of the wellness universe, and wellness universe corporate division. And I'm really, really honored and blessed to have worked with some of the most transformational people in the world, like our friend Sharon, and bringing wellness to to places that it may have not been before, and bringing the conversation to stages and and rooms and boardrooms and classrooms and retreats and things like that that may not have experienced it before, which is really, that really, I find is the most fun when I when I bring something to someone and they never heard of it before, like EFT or muscle testing or, you know, you know, you know, you know, trauma informed, you know, sessions, stress management sessions, you Know, Like, what like that really has been so rewarding when people at the end of the day are like, you know, I learned from you last week, or what I read or whatever, or the person that you brought to me or to my organization, and it truly has transformed my life. I found, I found. I just got a story the other day from a woman who read our books, and from reading the stress relief book, she's like, you know, after reading this book, I had, I found the self love to go and get a surgery on my foot that I've been putting off because I feel I was worth the investment of the surgery to relieve myself of this pain. But then I did it after reading your book, and I was like, I literally was in tears. And of course, Michael, as you know, as an author, how often do we actually hear those stories that are so rewarding from the people you know? How do you feel about that? By the way, let me ask you questions. I know that. I know that you're interviewing me, but   Michael Hingson ** 43:20 how it's a conversation. It's fair.   Anna Pereira ** 43:23 Thank you. How great is it when somebody comes back to you and says, Your story has changed my life?   Michael Hingson ** 43:33 Well, let me tell you one of my stories. So the answer is great, of course, but I also know that I can't let that kind of thing go to my head. But let me tell you one of my favorite stories. I've talked about it a couple times here. In 2003 I was asked to go to New Zealand, so as basically a year, and it was about 1516, months, no, 14 months after September 11, and 16 months, I guess. And anyway, I was asked to go and help to raise some funds for the Royal New Zealand foundation of the blind by speaking. And they paid me to come over. And before I had had come over in, actually, early 2002 a gentleman from New Zealand called he said his name was Paul Holmes, and he wanted to interview me. Well, he came, what I learned was to to do an equivalent sort of thing. He is, what you would say would be the Larry King of New Zealand, so very famous and all that. Well, anyway, he came and we chatted and all that. And he said, If you ever get to New Zealand, I want to interview you first before you go anywhere else and talk to anybody else. And I said, Okay, had no idea that anything was going to happen about going to New Zealand. But then the next year. Early in 2003 I was invited, and we set up the trip to go over in early May. So needless to say, being a loyal kind of guy, I emailed Paul Holmes and said, hey, guess what, we're coming over. So we got there on a Wednesday, and he had arranged for the interview to be done that night, New Zealand time at seven o'clock. So we went and did the interview, and the Royal New Zealand Foundation had me traveling all over New Zealand for basically 16 or 17 days. We did 21 different stops, both by flying and by car and all that, in 16 or 17 days. But anyway, so we did the interview and a week and a half later. So it was the second Sunday I was in New Zealand. Now we were on the South Island. We had landed originally on the North Island. Now we're on the South Island. And I was speaking to a group of blind people, and I they wanted to know all about the World Trade Center and all that. And I told them, and then one of them said, we have to tell you a story. And his story went on something like this yesterday. That would have been a Saturday. We took a river rafting trip, and the foundation set it up. These are all clients from the foundation, and said they set it up, and the guy who was in charge of the trip took us out, and we all had a great time. It was wonderful. But at the end, he said, I have to be honest with you guys, I was about to cancel this trip. And I said, why? Or No, I didn't say, I mean, they said, why? And he said, well, because he said I didn't think that blind people could do this. He said I was just all afraid that the next thing that was going to happen by the end of the trip is at least one person was going to fall overboard and drown. But he said, I happened to be watching the telly the other night, and I saw Paul Holmes interview this blind bloke from the United States who was in the World Trade Center. And he said, if he could get out of the World Trade Center, the least I could do was have an open mind about you guys going on this trip. And he said, it has been the best trip I have ever had. Wow. So, you know, I, of course, there was a lot of pride. I love the story, and I know I've taken a fair amount of time to tell the story, but the point is, you never know what seeds you're going to plant. And the bottom line is that my goal in speaking has always been if I can help even one person learn something and inspire one person. I've already done my job. And more important, I've decided a long time ago, if I could help people move on from September 11, and I've done my job, but what a what a great story. And yeah, it has inspired me a lot, and it's one of the stories that continues to propel me forward, knowing that if I can help people and get them to understand about being blind a little bit more and and accepting of people who are different than they then, then it's working out really well. Michael,   Anna Pereira ** 48:22 I am so glad that you shared that story with me, and that is really that speaks the truth and the power of showing up and sharing who you are and impacting someone where they impact the many. Wow. Can you imagine if that guide had called off that trip and didn't give the opportunity, sure people, I'm sure, I'm sure, probably many was their first time. I don't even think river rafting. Oh my gosh, that's great. Thank you for sharing that.   Michael Hingson ** 48:55 It was great. I haven't either. I've been on boats, I've been on cruises, but I haven't gone river rafting, so it's something to do someday. Yeah, well, let me ask you this. You know you talked earlier, especially about your husband and in relationships and networking and so on, networking is certainly a very important thing. So relationships are really essential to having success. Tell me what you think about the whole idea and the intersection of having a relationship and building relationships, especially authentic relationships and success.   Anna Pereira ** 49:37 Michael, I've been talking a lot about this lately. To be honest with you. We were even talking about this last night, the new company that we're forming, we're actually putting together a very strategic team on the back side, and some of those people are new in my world. And one of the people happened to be this gentleman that was introduced to me by my partner. And. Founder of the wellness universe Corp. And his name is Jack, and I've met him online, virtually, you know, on Zoom calls, over several calls, I'm very confident, very comfortable with him. And I really, I really admire him and the work he's done in his life and what he's achieved. So he's already proven that he has been able to create successful businesses, manage successful businesses, exit successful businesses, and things of this nature. So none of that was was was why I wanted to meet with him, but I found out that he was because he lives kind of in the middle of the middle of the country, lives in Milwaukee, so he was coming out to New York and to Connecticut, actually, to for his current company that he's at, to be a part of a conference. And so with that, I'm like, Oh, you're coming out here, Hugo and I are going to be home. I want to come out. I want to meet with you. And what's interesting is he disclosed to me last night that I'm not going to use the words he says, But he said, like when I asked him to meet up in person, you know, he gets off the call with me, and he turns his wave. He's like, you know, what is Anna? Want to bleep and beat me for? And it was so funny to hear him say that last night, because for me, it's about making that authentic connection and meeting someone in person, if I have the opportunity to which I do and investing, knowing that you're investing in a bigger, a bigger project, building a company together, you know, it's, it's not transactional, it's about, it's about a bigger thing and and so I couldn't understand why he felt that when he when he said this To me last night. But then he said, I understand now, like, and I get it like, I get that. I get who you are, and I see who you are, and I see that you just wanted to just meet up, just to see who you know who I am, and for me to see who you are. I said, That's it, Jack. Because his immediate response, as you know, a man who's white in the business world. He felt that probably I was Troy. I wanted to kind of, quote, unquote, interview him in person after all of these months of working with him, you know, remotely, with alongside with him, on through us, building this new team together. But for me, it was all about beginning the foundation to nurturing a relationship that we've had many meetings, many strategy sessions, many of the do, do do phone calls and the what's what phone calls. But I wanted to sit down with this gentleman and have a break bread with him, see what he's about, him to see what I'm about, what my husband's about, and I truly believe, and I say this over and over and over again, and quite unfortunately, because of my position as the founder of the wellness universe, people see the wellness universe as a bright, shiny object. They see me as somebody in a place of power that I can just give stuff out or help them, give them a hand up, but it's it's not always that. It's still the same thing. Relationships need to be nurtured. I need to get to know someone if they're going to represent the brand of the wellness universe and work with us through wellness universe corporate, for example, or they're going to be a member, I have to see who they are in action that's helping me to nurture the relationship so I can work with them and bring opportunity to them, as well as you saw, Michael, as soon as I am completely networking relationship minded, I am all about giving opportunity and sharing the spotlight and giving the microphone over to people who are talented, just as you said before. It reminded me of Karen Korb, you know, I would love to introduce you to her, for her to be a guest because of a specific topic that was struck up while we were having conversation. This is just who I am. I do believe that networking has a bad name. And if you believe in the networking, like from the early days, and it's just about exchanging business cards, which of course, nobody even has anymore, but I mean, you know what I mean, I have one too, by the way. But if you just think it's about showing up and shaking as many hands as possible, and then, like just vomiting all over somebody what you do and how great you are at it, you're never going to get far in business these days, it's about building, nurturing those relationships and sharing and listening to what someone needs and sharing with them whether you're a resource for that need or not, and chances are 99% of the time, you're really not. But by giving them something that they need, they're going to remember you, and you've just created yourself as a value in their life. So by creating yourself as a value in their. Life, you're still nurturing the relationship. It may not have created a business transaction in the moment, but guess what? You're starting to nurture a relationship that will lead to business growth, that will lead to personal growth. I like to approach things that like you said before, if you don't, it was, well, you didn't say this, but it was part of the conversation, in a way, I think was before we started. You know, if I don't like the person, why would I want to do business with them? And I look at every, every person that I come into contact with, like, do I like this human? Am I trying to show up as my best self for them to like me as a human? And then we'll see where the chips fall around that, yeah, and that. That's kind of my whole philosophy around networking and building relationships.   Michael Hingson ** 55:44 Well, you know, one of the things that I encounter a lot when I'm talking to people about coming on the podcast is, well, I don't, I don't see why I would be an interesting guest. Why do you want me to have Why do you want to have me as a guest on the podcast? I don't have anything in the way of a famous story or anything to tell. And I, I love to tell people, Look, everyone has stories to tell. And the fact is that if you're willing to come on and talk about things and and as you know, I really want to cover the topics that you as a as a person, coming on as a guest, want to talk about, but we do have a conversation, and I do like to encourage everyone to come and tell stories, because I've yet to find people who don't have a story to tell, and I believe everyone does. Everyone's adventures in life is a little bit different than everyone else's, which makes the telling of the story worthwhile.   Anna Pereira ** 56:47 Agreed? Oh, agreed.   Michael Hingson ** 56:51 So with the wellness universe, Corp and so on. Tell me a little bit more, if you would, about wellness and how that plays into company culture,   Anna Pereira ** 57:05 absolutely well. I want to thank you for that. I mean, a few years ago, somebody else was because I was in the throes of my initial co founder, exiting the company and pivoting in some great way, and I didn't know really what was going to be. And at the same time, someone approached me, they wanted to create, you know, corporate wellness solution with me, and that started and fizzled out. And then I brought on somebody else that was going to do that with me. And then that started up and fizzled out. So over the past several years, I've been looking for the proper strategic partner that created a holistic approach to the well being of an organization so we can really create impact. Because all of these years, I've been building the community. I quite honestly, have had 1000s of members come through the wellness universe. Right now, we have a little over 100 and something, enrolled members, active members, people who have a membership and pay a membership and have a public platform through the wellness universe that we work with. But there's been 1000s that have come through. And I really wanted to find a way to work with the people I know trust and love, because they have something, something so great to offer the world. And it wasn't just about creating a wellness app or just the wellness component. There had to be something else that we can sink our teeth into. And also allowed an organization to really get behind because what happens is they bring in a wellness app because it's nice to have, and I'm doing air quotes right now, it's nice to have a wellness app, and then the truth behind it is, for a wellness app, the success rate is to have, you know, 4% is the highest engagement on with a wellness app, and that's their success rate. So nobody really uses that. They the wellness apps, and nor do I find it like a sustainable or something that's part of the person to go to through, through their you know, through their work. But if you go into an organization and you do an assessment around what's going on in the company, and you have that buy in from leadership, because they can see exactly where the breakdowns are and where the successes are. And then you bring in the solutions to reinforce the successes and also shore up where they have the challenges, and then you bring in wellness as a component for for the retention of the employee, for the happiness and health of the employees as individuals, then you have an ecosystem that creates success for the entire organization. And. Coming back down to the individual. So it's really important to find this way to holistically serve and it's a delicate balance, because sometimes it's going to create disruption and the changes that need to be implemented, but you have to have buy in from the leadership, and you have to show them this is exactly why you need it, and that's why the company culture, and addressing that through the assessment that we have is really essential to bringing in the different solutions we have, from the corporate trainings and things like that, to the wellness experience, the wellness experiences and stress management type of classes and courses and things. So for me, it was an evolution and a learning curve over the last four years. I think it took for me to find the proper partner, Alex Bowdoin and people first is her company, and that's where she comes from as a HR consultant, expert, and coming together with the wellness universe, and knowing what I know in the people experience, along with the evaluating the practitioners for what they do and how they serve to give a great experience to a wellness seeker, and then merging the two worlds together with the technology and the platforms and the solutions that we bring so then, that way, it's a really in depth, and I want to say all encompassing solution for an organization, for everyone to walk away, go home and feel good at the end of the day, and come back to work more and be more productive and happy in what they do, and know that they are, that they're supported by their organization, for an organization to be proud to bring these solutions to their employees, knowing that they're bringing something that they actually will use,   Michael Hingson ** 1:01:55 and that's really all anyone can ask For. They will do that and make it work. And think about it, they'll be more successful by any standard in the world. I would think   1:02:10 we would hope Yes. So if people want   Michael Hingson ** 1:02:12 to reach out to you and learn more about wellness universe and maybe contact you and become a part of it, how do they do that? Sure, so   Anna Pereira ** 1:02:21 my email is so simple. It's Anna a n, n, a at the Wellness universe, typical spellings, the wellness universe.com, they can reach out to me there, or they can go right to the wellness universe, which is the wellness universe.com, and connect with me there, or on any of my social platforms. I spend a lot of time on LinkedIn. I'm very excited to be a top voice in leadership on the platform, and they can connect on LinkedIn as well by searching. Anna Pereira, you'll see me come up. But I think those are probably the best ways to connect with me. There's, you know, there's Facebook and Instagram and things like that, but if you really want to reach me, I check these platforms, my email, and I check my LinkedIn and my wellness universe. Well,   Michael Hingson ** 1:03:12 there you go. Well, I hope people will reach out. This has been fun. It's been exciting, and what a great conversation. I'm glad that we did it and we finally got connected. And thanks, Sharon. Thanks, Sharon, for me, and I hope all of you have enjoyed this as well. So love to hear from you. Love to hear your thoughts. Please feel free to email me. I'm easy to reach. It's Michael M, I, C, H, A, E, L, H, I at accessibe, A, C, C, E, S, S, I, B, e.com, or you can go to our podcast page, www, dot Michael hingson.com/podcast, and Michael Hinkson is m, I, C, H, A, E, L, H, I, N, G, s, o, n, so as I said earlier, love it. If you have any ideas for guests, we really appreciate and value any introductions that you can make. And Anna, we didn't mention it and much, but that's okay. I do. I'm really ramping up speaking again. So if anybody knows of anyone that needs a speaker, love to explore that and and we'll always be glad to talk to people about coming and speaking. If you would please give us a five star rating wherever you're listening to us today, we really value your ratings and your thoughts, and of course, I want to hear your opinion, so please let us know. So thank you once again, everyone for listening. And Anna, specifically for you, thanks again for being here and for being on the podcast. Thank   Anna Pereira ** 1:04:34 you, Michael. I really appreciate the time with you.   Michael Hingson ** 1:04:41 You have been listening to the Unstoppable Mindset podcast. Thanks for dropping by. I hope that you'll join us again next week, and in future weeks for upcoming episodes. To subscribe to our podcast and to learn about upcoming episodes, please visit www dot Michael hingson.com slash podcast. Michael Hingson is spelled m i c h a e l h i n g s o n. While you're on the site., please use the form there to recommend people who we ought to interview in upcoming editions of the show. And also, we ask you and urge you to invite your friends to join us in the future. If you know of any one or any organization needing a speaker for an event, please email me at speaker at Michael hingson.com. I appreciate it very much. To learn more about the concept of blinded by fear, please visit www dot Michael hingson.com forward slash blinded by fear and while you're there, feel free to pick up a copy of my free eBook entitled blinded by fear. The unstoppable mindset podcast is provided by access cast an initiative of accessiBe and is sponsored by accessiBe. Please visit www.accessibe.com . AccessiBe is spelled a c c e s s i b e. There you can learn all about how you can make your website inclusive for all persons with disabilities and how you can help make the internet fully inclusive by 2025. Thanks again for Listening. Please come back and visit us again next week.

Raven is going on vacation but he has to leave his pups behind! Anna and Raven hate leaving their furry friends and it seems like their dogs hate it too… Anna stumbled over Timothée Chalamet's name yesterday and the entire office told her about her mispronunciation… But is she actually wrong? Chinese Hacker's are at it again, but if they were listening to Anna, Raven and Producer Jon's phone calls over the last 24 hours, what would they hear?  Some things during Halloween are normal…and some that are just nope. Anna and Raven rank different Halloween traditions, some of them are just plain weird! Candy Autopsy (and Anna's witch voice) is here for the week! Anna reads the ingredients of a popular Halloween candy and if Linda can identify the game, she wins a $50 Home Depot gift card! Raven promised to get on the treadmill three times a week for two weeks and would send Anna a video every time. But how many times did he actually go on the treadmill? Studies show that 18% of Americans say they've seen a ghost! These stories will keep Anna and Raven up for the rest of 2024! Are you up to date on this week's biggest news stories? Anna and Raven will get you caught up on the entertaining performances at The World Series and Tom Brady's love triangle! Addison's mother is moving into a retirement community and has asked Addison and her husband, Gary, to take her birds. She currently has an African Gray, a few canaries, and a pair of parakeets. Addison has spent her entire life with birds because her mom was such an avid bird lover. She feels like it's her responsibility to take the animals. Gary can't stand them. He says they're loud, dirty, and that African Gray will live forever! Addison's mom is adamant that no stranger should take her babies and Addison doesn't want to disappoint her mother. It's already a huge adjustment for her. What would you do?  Brandon has a chance at $1200! All he has to do is beat Raven in pop culture trivia!

A story about an African gray parrot. © 2024 Samuel Suk. All rights reserved. ℗ 2024 Samuel Suk. All rights reserved. For license and usage contact: animalstoriesforkids@gmail.com Updated show related content: patreon.com/AnimalStoriesforKids Creator's page: samuelsuk.com Buy my Everyday Cats Journals/Notebooks. 6x9" size - 4 different themes: Apartment - https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09HQBHCY3 Bookstore Cafe - https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09HQBDLX9 Medieval Fair - https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09KN81JTN Japanese Garden - https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09MBP63DX --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/animalstoriesforkids/support

MLB introduces new uniforms with see-through pants. A zoo in the UK is having problems with their African Gray parrots using foul language.

MLB introduces new uniforms with see-through pants. A zoo in the UK is having problems with their African Gray parrots using foul language.

If somebody is insulting you online, should you engage? Anna usually never does, but one troll crossed the line in the comment section! (:30) What do you do when someone blatantly flirts with your significant other? Producer Jon was on a date when he suddenly noticed a man across the bar who had a staring problem… (4:35) Gambling is risky enough as it is, but if you risk bad karma by not tipping the dealer, that's all I need to know about you! (8:35) What should you do when your child throws up? It happened to Producer Jon's son the other day and he handled it nicely, so now Anna wants to hear all the WRONG ways to deal with a sick child! (12:00) Every Friday, Raven's wife Alicia calls in to the show to give Raven a grade on how he did as a husband that week. This week, Alicia and Raven celebrated their puppy's birthday! (15:46) What are your predictions for football Sunday? Anna doesn't know what she's talking about, but 10 year old Luke might know a thing or two! (19:28) Have you ever made “Halloween Pizza”? Anna decided to have the entire show make their own version and she invited The Food Network's Chef Plum on to give all their creations a taste! (22:22) It's time for Mommy's Margarita Friday!  Moms (and Dads) share all the crazy things that their kids have put them through this week that have definitely earned them a margarita! (30:15) Addison's mother is moving into a retirement community and has asked Addison and her husband, Gary, to take her birds. She currently has an African Gray, a few canaries, and a pair of parakeets. Addison has spent her entire life with birds because her mom was such an avid bird lover. She feels like it's her responsibility to take the animals. Gary can't stand them. He says they're loud, dirty, and that African Gray will live forever! Addison's mom is adamant that no stranger should take her babies and Addison doesn't want to disappoint her mother. It's already a huge adjustment for her. What would you do? (33:54) Ashley has got a shot at $900! All she has to do is beat Raven in pop culture trivia! (42:25)

Today, the Safari heads to Schnecksville, PA, to visit the Lehigh Valley Zoo.  Natalie Hildebrand, the Lead Education Specialist at the zoo, talks all about the amazing ambassador animals there, and shares a message of why it is important to leave wild animals in the wild.  You'll meet some awesome animals including an awesome African Gray parrot named Douglas and a tarantula with the totally normal name of Sgt. Butterscotch.  EPISODE LINKS: @lvzoo on Instagram and Facebook lvzoo.org online ROSSIFARI LINKS: @rossifari on Insta and Facebook @rossifaripod on TikTok rossifari.com patreon.com/rossifari to support the pod rossifari.redbubble.com for merch

Written in 2005, this book is an oldie, but pack-filled with so much wisdom from an expert on animal welfare. Improve your own animals' lives by starting with yourself, with big ideas such as Keep Moving and Letting the Bad Become the New Normal. Check out ZooFit's Zoo-notable Blog: https://www.zoofit.net/zoo-notable-animals-in-translation/ Learn more about Temple Grandin: https://www.templegrandin.com/ Learn more about Dr. Irene Pepperberg's research with Alex and African Gray parrots- https://alexfoundation.org/about/dr-irene-pepperberg/ Support ZooFit! Join the ZooFit Tribe on Patreon for bonus material, special offers, and exclusive deals: https://www.patreon.com/zoofit --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app

This week Pat has special guest star, Hannibal, on the podcast and then discusses how to properly introduce your dog to a new animal or baby. And of course, lots of Sicilian chatter along the way.Follow Me On:Instagram: @packmantotherescue (https://www.instagram.com/packmantotherescue/)Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/packmantotherescue/Website: https://www.packmantotherescue.com/And Make Sure To Check Out Our Podcast "Barking For Balance" On:Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/barking-for-balance/id1546676541Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5Io7Kwac7gUSKkBVZlkVleAmazon: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/df5f569f-efec-4f01-abb6-8d3249be771e/Barking-For-BalanceGoogle: https://www.google.com/podcasts?feed=aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5yZWRjaXJjbGUuY29tL2E4OTQ2ZDY2LWUxNjUtNGVlMy1iYjM5LTIwNzQ4MTcwZTkwMA%3D%3D#dogtraining #dogbehavior #dogpsychology #patbuttitta #packman #packmantotherescue

The Big Cat Is Back Actress and Animal Activist Tippi Hedren (The Birds - Shambala) returns to Animal Radio to talk about life living with Lions, Tigers and Ligers, oh my. She rescues tigers that were purchased as pets and out-grew their home. She's also forged legislation that outlaws exotic animals as pets. Animal Radio will hook you up with her autobiography, Tippi. Listen Now Turtle Doves Drives Up Cost The slow recovery of the U.S. economy may be responsible for the increasing costs of the 12 Days of Christmas. The price of two turtle-doves has jumped from $290 last year to $375. But, the partridge in the pear tree, which has actually become cheaper, has offset the total cost. Listen Now Signs of Holiday Stress in Dogs The holidays can be stressful for everyone, both humans and our pets. While some dogs enjoy the increase in activity and new experiences that come with holidays, there are lots of others who are not fans of change and all the chaos that can come with it. Lori Brooks will help you recognize signs of stress in your pet, so you can remove them from dangerous situations and help them relax. Listen Now Rising Pet Health Care Costs Pet owners may shell out as much, or more, money for their pet's health care as they do for their own health care, and it's mostly because of pricey new technologies and more advanced treatment options. Healthy Paws Pet Insurance most expensive insurance claim was for a 3-year-old female French Bulldog diagnosed with inter-vertebral disc disease with a final bill of $44,296. Listen Now Parrot Only Witness In Murder Case Court proceedings are underway in Newaygo County, Michigan, where a preliminary hearing has been held for a woman accused of murdering her husband and their parrot is the only apparent witness. The couple's pet, an African Gray parrot, apparently witnessed the shooting and began repeating words from the victim just moments before his death. The parrot has been recorded as saying, "Don’t F*#&ing shoot." Listen Now Read more about this week's show.

We kick off this episode with a question for the audience. WHICH ONE OF US SOUNDS LIKE HOWARD STERN? Honch takes us on a lesson on 'what makes a man'. Apparently, no man buns, no skinny jeans, and no makeup are allowed to qualify. As for attitudes, any guy who is afraid to make a decision is not a man - or if all he does is make excuses. Gordy takes us down the story of 'James'. James goes into the military, and is having relationship trouble. It started off light with a few escorts, gets injured, and then tries to transition back to his normal routine. After returning home, James seeks out his local friendly neighborhood hooker. He picks up a cougar on a dating website, and there are no photos. He finds a woman and it ends up being HIS BEST FRIEND'S MOM. Bubba becomes an instant expert on his story coming out of the United Kingdom. At a local zoo, 5 African Gray parrots were put into isolation after they taught eachother how to swear at patrons in the zoo. They are going to replace the toilet on the International Space Station...tune in so you can find out how much we paid for it. And by the way, it wasn't howard from Big Bang Theory putting it in. Listen and Subscribe On:Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/dont-tell-our-wives-warm-beer-and-cheap-comedy-and-news-ish/id1355526064Amazon Music: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/e381a44d-6804-4e4c-8a66-3f2bb8c95ea7/Dont-Tell-Our-Wives-Warm-Beer-Cheap-Comedy-and-NewsSpotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2PKE9J2XIDd13xsCzvu5EVGoogle Play: https://podcasts.google.com/?feed=aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5idXp6c3Byb3V0LmNvbS8xNjAwODIucnNziHeartRadio: https://www.iheart.com/podcast/31084705Pocket Cast: http://pca.st/itunes/1355526064Stitcher: https://www.stitcher.com/s?fid=436282&refid=stprCastro: https://castro.fm/itunes/1355526064Castbox: http://castbox.fm/vic/1355526064?ref=buzzsproutRSS Feed: https://feeds.buzzsprout.com/160082.rss

Mike Harmon and LaVar Arrington, in for Jason Smith, break down the stages of the Clippers collapse in the bubble. The guys preview the NBA Finals. Plus, an African Gray parrot lets loose! Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com

Mike Harmon and LaVar Arrington, in for Jason Smith, break down the stages of the Clippers collapse in the bubble, leading to Doc Rivers being dismissed. FOX Sports MLB Insider Jon Paul Morosi joins the guys to discuss the first day of the expanded MLB postseason. The guys preview the NBA Finals. Plus, an African Gray parrott lets loose! Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com

The android hosts in the series Westworld are programmed to emulate consciousness using a 'bicameral' model: the left side of their brain processes voices generated in the right half, voices that instruct and admonish them. The show writers reference a book (The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind) that proposes that earlier people operated similarly, at least up until the Late Bronze Age collapse when the current, more integrated sense of self was adopted via cultural evolution. The unusual theory is totally at odds with both the thinking in biology, which assumes that human consciousness is simply the gradually evolved outcome of primate cognition on steroids, and in psychoanalysis, which conceptualizes consciousness as layered. In this episode, evolutionary biologist Dr Rutger Vos and psychoanalyst Dr Noga Ariel-Galor discuss representations of consciousness in science and pop culture. How did the Homeric heroes think? And the antiheroes of Woody Allen? The prophets of the Bible? Featuring guest appearances of The Byrds, Noam Chomsky, Anna and Elza, Donald Rumsfeld, Debussy, Josh Wink, and Petra the African Gray. Visit our website: https://www.ourpodacademy.com To become a friend of the show: https://patreon.com/podacademy For a one-time donation: https://www.paypal.me/gotacademy Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/OurPodAcademy Send us an Email to: us@podacademy.com  

Aja Hammerly and Brian Dorsey are here this week to start off a new year of podcasts! In an interview with Google Developer Advocate Katie McLaughlin, we talk about the advantages of Python 3 and why version 2 has been retired, as well as the cool things you can do with Django. Later, Katie discusses the complexities of deployment and how she makes it work smoothly with GCP, and we have some fun with emojis! Katie McLaughlin Katie has worn many different hats over the years. She is currently a Developer Advocate at Google Cloud, and a Director of the Python Software Foundation. When she’s not changing the world, she enjoys making tapestries, cooking, and seeing just how well various application stacks handle emoji. Cool things of the week Running workloads on dedicated hardware just got better blog Container security summit is going on as we record this site Easily upgrade Windows Server 2008 R2 while migrating to Google Cloud blog Launch of the BigQuery Weekly Data Challenge! site New data engineering learning path site Interview Python Software Foundation site PyCascades site Django Demo site Emojipedia site App Engine site Compute Engine site Cloud Run site Cloud Build site Secrets Manager site Kakapo Mountain Parrot site The Power ⚡️ and Responsibility 😓 of Unicode Adoption ✨ video Question of the week I need to run something later, but Cron isn’t a good fit. What do I do? Where can you find us next? We’ll be at Cloud Next in San Francisco in April! Katie will also be at PyCon US in April! Sound Effects Attribution “African Gray” by Jmagiera of Freesound.org

African gray is beautiful.

I read from afore to African gray. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argumentum_a_fortiori https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ifrit dictionarypod@gmail.com https://www.facebook.com/thedictionarypod/ https://twitter.com/dictionarypod https://www.patreon.com/spejampar

When most people think of airports and air travel, they typically think of commercial airlines and people traveling for business or leisure. But have you ever thought about how endangered species get transported to zoos across the U.S. to accommodate their species survival plans? The answer: airplanes! In this episode, Zoo Knoxville's President and CEO, Lisa New, discusses how the zoo relies heavily on air cargo to transport animals and its staff across the world. We also hear from Einstein, an African Gray parrot, (yes, you read that right) about his travels across the country. The post Transporting Tigers, and Pandas, and Birds, Oh My! appeared first on From the Runway Up.

Bridging the gap between science and spirituality, JJ Armstrong, founder of Transform2Alpha, has created a comprehensive life mastery blueprint with a military style edge. JJ’s career began in the British Army where she was one of the few women who graduated from the Army School of Physical Training to train soldiers. She spent more than eight years in the Royal Army Physical Training Corps training men for combat fitness and performance. Her interest in the mental side of training grew as she progressed in her career. Her self-reliance and the ability to think on her feet led her to spend time serving in Special Forces. Upon leaving the military, JJ started a fast-growing new trend: “personal training” in health clubs and gyms. The first person to offer this service in the UK, she was told by one of the biggest national health club chains, “It will never work!" But trusting your instincts pays off! JJ pursued her dream and built a business that quickly grew to a team of personal trainers 64-members strong. Her company trained thousands of clients and members; everyone from celebrities to housewives throughout a number of gyms and health clubs. Many top athletes and professionals benefited from JJ’s unique brand of training. JJ became interested in personal development from a young age through the Nightingale Conant catalogue of audio courses. She began studying hundreds of experts on everything from personal success to neuro-linguistic programming, hypnosis, mind control, sales, influence etc., adding to her library of tools. These studies led her to synthesize Pareto’s 80-20 principle, mind mapping, speed reading and advanced memory techniques into a unique brand of mental training. She discovered early on that she had the ability and the obsession to cut all “the fat away” and find the quickest, most efficient way to get the job done (INTJ style). One of JJ's private clients used her techniques to secure a license to practice as a physician (medical doctor) and the other used them to secure a license to fly planes (pilot). Always looking to evolve and have new experiences, JJ sold her business in her 30s to become an expat for the first time by studying in the U.S. It's an experience she has now had in three countries. While in the U.S., JJ proceeded to get the type of perma-tan she’d always dreamed about while studying for her master’s degree at the prestigious United States Sports Academy. She used principles of accelerated learning to earn her degree in half the regular time, with a 4.0 GPA. She will also tell other maturepreneurs out there that it is “never too late” to become a student or expat! After earning her degree, JJ took a position at the National Personal Training Institute in New York. She led a team of instructors that developed and certified personal trainers. JJ has also had extensive experience teaching new PTs how to train people of all ages to prevent injuries, including special populations with acute and chronic health considerations. JJ enjoyed her time teaching but felt that at her core she was an entrepreneur, not an employee. Once back in London, JJ formulated her metabolic functional training system into a brand. This brand grew to include a team of trainers in several locations in London – Mill Hill, Camden and Regent‘s Park. The London Women’s Bootcamp became a successful enterprise in a crowded market, due to its personalized service and utmost efficiency. This was a concept that she would later turn into Powerfrau Bootcamp, a German version of the program. After selling her boot camp training system in 2015, JJ decided to take a two-year break to reflect and spend time working on her ‘flagship’ training. During this time, she has been researching, traveling, and subsequently relocating to yet another city to prepare for the launch of her new project, Transform2Alpha. Like a cross between a personal development program and military special ops training, Transform2Alpha sends you on a mission to uncover and morph into the idealized version of yourself. The concept stems from JJ's vision of a self-actualized version of you that exists as a guide whom you can communicate with as you apply scientifically based methods to transform your body, mind and life. Transform2Alpha is the culmination of 30+ years of experience and insights and delivered in the most efficient way possible. Transform2Alpha also offers a “COMBAT AGING” version of the program specifically designed for those in midlife that seek strategies to protect against the accelerated aging effects of hormonal changes (namely, menopause or andropause for males). JJ currently lives with her partner and their 17-year-old African Gray parrot in Vienna, Austria where she trains clients worldwide via live events and online coaching. Like many maturepreneurs, JJ realizes that we don’t have forever to become our full potential selves. Her full potential self, “Alpha self“, is the one giving others the best and most efficient tools to command their lives!

The Big Cat Is Back Actress and Animal Activist Tippi Hedren (The Birds - Shambala) returns to Animal Radio to talk about life living with Lions, Tigers and Ligers, oh my. She rescues tigers that were purchased as pets and out-grew their home. She's also forged legislation that outlaws exotic animals as pets. Animal Radio will hook you up with her new autobiography, Tippi. Turtle Doves Drives Up Cost The slow recovery of the U.S. economy may be responsible for the increasing costs of the 12 Days of Christmas. The price of two turtle-doves has jumped from $290 last year to $375. But, the partridge in the pear tree, which has actually become cheaper, has offset the total cost. Signs of Holiday Stress in Dogs The holidays can be stressful for everyone, both humans and our pets. While some dogs enjoy the increase in activity and new experiences that come with holidays, there are lots of others who are not fans of change and all the chaos that can come with it. Lori Brooks will help you recognize signs of stress in your pet, so you can remove them from dangerous situations and help them relax. Rising Pet Health Care Costs Pet owners may shell out as much, or more, money for their pet's health care as they do for their own health care, and it's mostly because of pricey new technologies and more advanced treatment options. Healthy Paws Pet Insurance most expensive insurance claim was for a 3-year-old female French Bulldog diagnosed with inter-vertebral disc disease with a final bill of $44,296. Parrot Only Witness In Murder Case Court proceedings are underway in Newaygo County, Michigan, where a preliminary hearing has been held for a woman accused of murdering her husband and their parrot is the only apparent witness. The couple's pet, an African Gray parrot, apparently witnessed the shooting and began repeating words from the victim just moments before his death. The parrot has been recorded as saying, "Don’t F*#&ing shoot." Read More about this week's show.

Audio File:  Download MP3Transcript: An Interview with Elizabeth Charnock CEO and founder, Cataphora Date: July 24, 2007 NCWIT Interview with Elizabeth Charnock BIO: Elizabeth Charnock is the CEO and co-founder of Chenope, a bootstrapped startup that creates analytics that predict the future of an organization based on the observable behaviors of its members based on whatever data is available. Prior to that Elizabeth founded Cataphora and led it from concept to profitability, funded entirely by revenues from clients and without any outside investment. The company's genesis was a fundamental insight that Elizabeth had about a revolutionary approach to information retrieval. Starting from that idea, and a kitchen table group of four employees, she has guided the growth of Cataphora to over 100 employees. The company has seen three consecutive years of at least 100% growth in revenue, customers, and employee head count. In 2006, the company moved into a dedicated new headquarters building in Redwood City, California, and opened an office in Washington, DC, two blocks from the White House. 2006 also saw the granting of all claims in Cataphora’s fundamental technology patent, which Elizabeth co-authored. In leading Cataphora’s success, Elizabeth has drawn on her prior experience as an entrepreneur and CEO, and on her extensive knowledge of information retrieval technology and business. Prior to starting Cataphora, Elizabeth was CEO and founder of Troba, an industry leading Customer Relationship Management software company which she sold in 2001. Her previous experience includes management and senior engineering positions at international high tech companies such as Hewlett-Packard and Sun Microsystems. She started her career at Unisys in Plymouth, Michigan, where she ran a human factors laboratory. Elizabeth has lived in both France and Germany and speaks both of those languages. She has been a dedicated jazz dance performer. She enjoys travel, as well as spending time at home with her whippet, Ragnar, and African Gray parrot, Howard. Elizabeth holds a BS in Theoretical Mathematics from the University of Michigan Honors Program, which she entered at the age of sixteen. Lucy Sanders: Hi. This is Lucy Sanders, and I'm the CEO of the National Center for Woman and Information Technology, or NCWIT. With me today, is Larry Nelson, from w3w3.com. Hi, Larry. Welcome. Larry Nelson: Hello. I'm so happy to be here. Lucy: And Lee Kennedy, who's a co‑founder of Tricalyx, a new company here in Boulder. Lee Kennedy: Hi. Lucy: Lee is also an NCWIT director. So, today, we're interviewing Elizabeth Charnock, the CEO and founder of Cataphora. Elizabeth, welcome. Elizabeth Charnock: Thank you. Larry: Boy, I tell you, I'm so excited to be a part of this. It's a great program, and sorely needed out there, which is what really makes it extra special. Lucy: Well, Elizabeth's company is just extremely interesting to me. Elizabeth, I see, from looking online, that you're a patent holder? Elizabeth: That's correct. Lucy: And your company works on email. You must have some pretty sassy algorithms there, trying to figure out the content [laughs] of email. Why don't you give us a bit of information about your company? Elizabeth: Sure, I'd love to. First of all, it's not just about email. In fact, the idea that the company is founded on is that search is really no longer just about content. The search algorithms that are out there now, with the exception of Google's, on the Internet, all have very much to do with classifying documents according to content. And most documents used to have quite a bit of content, making this fairly easy to do. So you can see how many times, for example, the word "chicken" appears in a document or the word "hammer" appears in a document, or how many times the words "hammer" and "chicken" co‑occur in the same sentence or paragraph or so on. But now, in the world we live in, people are so wired‑‑we all have Blackberries; we've got Treos and the equivalent devices; we use IM‑‑with the result that email, and even informal memos, are a whole lot less formal and less long than they used to be. So, what our technology is all about is weaving together these different, smaller items into a searchable object that's meaningful. So, what we've done is changed the boundary of search. So search, for us, is no longer about an email or an IM or a phone‑rep message; it's about the dialog that can be put back together with our algorithms. To give a concrete example of this, while it's become a bit hackneyed at this point; let's say you have a message, of whatever form, whose entire content is just, "Yes, let's do it." Well, what does that mean? Larry: [laughs] Elizabeth: Does it mean, "Let's go commit securities fraud"? "Let's go embezzle that 300,000 bucks"? Or maybe it just means, "Let's go fishing." Right? How are you going to know? It used to be that the answer was in the same document. Now the answer may be two or three documents or items away. And that's what our company's all about. Lucy: Well, it is really interesting. And I think the algorithms must really be pretty fascinating. Larry: Boy, I'll say. One thing I can't help but wonder, just as kind of an opening question, is how did you get into technology? And then maybe a second part of that question is what do you think is really cool today, in addition to what you're doing? Elizabeth: How I got into technology, originally, as a child? My father is an electrical engineer and very, very much, I think, pushed me that direction, initially‑‑especially since I was an only child, so I was his one opportunity. But when I was in college at the University of Michigan, they had a program in mathematics that was trying to subvert what everybody at the time thought was almost just a law of nature, which was the fact that no significantly original, or significant period, mathematics had ever been done by anybody over the age of 27. Lucy: I remember that. Elizabeth: So somebody endowed the University of Michigan with a program to try to push promising mathematicians through their PhDs, with a little bit more time before their brain turned to mush at the age of 27. And the program was so much better than anything else that was out there that, even though I had no intentions of being a math major when I entered college, within a few months it was pretty clear that that's what I was going to do. And that's what I did. Larry: Wow. Lucy: Theoretical mathematics degree. That's amazing. Lee: It is. Elizabeth: People don't believe me now. They assume I must be a lawyer because of the field that my company is currently operating in. [laughter] Lucy: And just as a follow‑up with that, as you look out into the technology spaces today, what, in addition to some of the things that you're working on at Cataphora, are you thinking personally are just really cool? Elizabeth: This is going to sound a little silly, perhaps, but I think there's going to be a lot more things out there like this. I don't know if any of you guys have a Roomba‑‑you know the robotic little cleaning vacuum... Larry: [laughs] Lucy: In fact, Helen Greiner has been one of our interviews as well, from iRobot. Elizabeth: It's a wonderful thing. And I think that they could have done more, in terms of making it more, I don't want to say cutesy, but something that would maybe appeal to a broader set of people. I actually bought it for my husband for his birthday just because I thought he'd think it was cool. Larry: [laughs] Elizabeth: And I think that home robotics that actually do something useful, that are engaging and are not ridiculously expensive, I think, are a big area. I think there's still a lot to be done, obviously, in the area of search, apart from what Cataphora is doing. It's not uncommon, in the work that we do‑‑which is, at this point, mostly investigation and litigation‑‑to get literally 10 million items or more for a case. And these are not Enron‑like cases; these are more run‑of‑the‑mill sorts of cases. Lucy: Wow. Elizabeth: And so, while we're right now focused on the enterprise aspects of it and the legal aspects of it, there are obviously the personal information management of it all that I think is a really interesting problem. And some of the social networking stuff, I think, while a lot of it is somewhat trivial, some of it's really quite interesting. If you can build special‑interest groups for different types of research, or for people who are really expert or compassionate about a certain, very specific kind of thing, I think that's technology very well used. Lucy: I agree. It's huge. And it's changing so many things: the way people market, the way people find out what their interested in. It's amazing. Larry: Hmm. Lucy: Well, Elizabeth, you mentioned your dad as an EE, and he had influenced you into technology. What made you become an entrepreneur, and what about being an entrepreneur makes you tick? Elizabeth: In my case, those who have watched me progress, especially since I've come out to Silicon Valley‑‑because I'm from Michigan originally‑‑I think would say that it had to do with the fact that I was, again and again, in situations in much larger companies where I could see that the company was in decline, and there really was nothing much that I could do about it. And I wanted to have a center of excellence around me. I wanted to do work that I was proud of. I wanted to be working someplace where it was good to get up in the morning and go to work. And that sort of drove me to wanting to roll my own. For example, I joined Hewlett‑Packard at the point that it was starting to decline, and saw what that looked like, and it was just a very frustrating place to be. And it was interesting for me to see the "Wall Street Journal" extensive coverage of the firing of Carly Fiorina, and they were noting that many of these problems really pre‑dated her, even if she exacerbated some of them. And I was just so happy to see that, after 10 years, that now it was out in the open. But yeah, I spent a good several years there, and similarly joined Sun at the point it was arguably starting to decline. And I felt that I could do a better job, and I wanted to do a better job, even if at a smaller scale. Lucy: So, in terms of entrepreneurship, many people have mentors or people who influence them along the way. And we were just curious who your role models are. Who influenced you, and how did they influence you? Elizabeth: As an entrepreneur in different ways, John Nesheim‑‑the guy who writes the books on startups, he's best well‑known for writing the book, "High‑Tech Start Up" which here in the Valley is considered the Bible for starting a startup‑‑is an adviser of the company and is a really great mentor. At this point, he really spends his life teaching high‑tech entrepreneurial ship at Cornell, and writing books about it and advising a few companies. So he's seen many, many, many variations of the movie. He's very wise, and he's always willing to help. Julie Wainwright, who was the much‑maligned CEO of Pets.com during the bubble, I think is a really good person, and has a lot to offer in terms of, well, when you take a fall, you get back up on the horse‑‑has a great deal of personal grace and elegance. And Philippe Courteaux, who hired me into their elite, who I believe is the only four‑time successful CEO in Silicon Valley history. Obviously, there's a huge amount to learn from. Larry: Wow. I was not aware of that fact. I'm going to have to look more up on that. Lucy: You've got another book to read. Larry: Yeah, I do. Two other books... Lucy: [laughs] Two other books. Lee: That's an impressive list of mentors. Larry: Boy, I'll say. Elizabeth, I do have to point out that I was born in Michigan, so I understand. But I chose Colorado. I wanted to be surrounded a bunch of really neat people in a wonderful climate. Lucy: [laughs] Little plug there for Colorado. Larry: Little plug. Elizabeth, if you were to look back at the different things that you've been through‑‑and I'm sure you've had a couple of the tough moments‑‑what's maybe the toughest thing that you had to live through during your career? Elizabeth: Unfortunately, there's more than one... Lucy: Like or us all. Elizabeth: This is my second company. My first company was during the bubble, and we ended up having to sell it after the individual VC left the VC firm after the bubble burst‑‑at the point that many venture capitalists were no longer getting along with one another. And that was very, very difficult, not just because it was failure in some sense, even though we ultimately were able to sell it and at least get everybody a job, but because it was so unfair, in the sense that we had met all of our goals, we had exceeded some of our goals, and there was an exogenous failure event, as one person put it. And that's very difficult to explain to people who have really put their heart and soul into something. Obviously, it was a very difficult time, yet one of the things I am most proud of was that many of those same, original people joined this company, Cataphora, and made it possible for us to get to the point we are now‑‑which is to say we're a 100‑employee company in the Valley that has never taken a dime of investment from anybody, not even ourselves. Lucy: And I noticed that in some of the information on the web about your company. And I can really empathize with some of these unfair events in the world of startups. I was on the board of a company where a venture capitalist, in a Series B round, backed away at the very last minute, when, if that company had chosen to just bring more partners to the table originally, the company could have kept going. And as a result, gone. Larry: Yep. Lucy: That can be very, very hard. Elizabeth: I think that, as a practical matter, one of the things that very few people understand about the startup world is that there is very, very, very little‑‑and in fact, arguably no‑‑accountability on the part of the investors. Lucy: So it's clear you've been through a lot of challenges. Elizabeth: Yes. Lucy: If you were sitting with a young person and giving them advice about entrepreneurship, what kind of advice would you give them? Elizabeth: Something, actually, that is very much stressed on John Nesheim's site, at least when last I looked, which is that if failure will completely destroy you, you should not go down this path. Lucy: Hmm. Larry: Good point. Elizabeth: Kind of an odd thing to say, perhaps, on a website of that nature. But it's a very important one, I think, because, statistically, depending on whose numbers you believe exactly, 99 percent of all startups fail. It depends at what point you start measuring. At what point does the startup become significant enough that it exists? Does it have to incorporate? Does it have to have people spending significant amounts of time on it? Where does conception occur? If you want to look at it that way. No matter how you measure it, the vast, vast, vast majority fail‑‑some for avoidable reasons, some for unavoidable reasons. Some were perhaps ill‑conceived. But for whatever the reason, statistically, you're very, very likely to fail. And if you can't accept that initially, then it's perhaps better to stay in that larger company, then to go out there and follow somebody else who's taking the load on their shoulders more than you are on yours. Lucy: And so I'm sure you have a network of friends who are in various stages of startup companies. And if they fail, what do you tell them to console them? Elizabeth: The main thing I say is, hopefully, you learn something from it, whether it's something to do with things to do again, things to avoid doing. If at all possible, what you learn about yourself, what you learn about other people that you are in the endeavor with. And you, at this point, have to make a real decision, not a knee‑jerk one, as to what you now want to do. Lucy: Well, and I think that that's very wise advice. I'm sure that that wisdom is part of what has given you your success as an entrepreneur. What other characteristics do you have that you think have given you advantage? Elizabeth: I would certainly say that one of them is persistence and discipline. So that's two, but obviously they're interrelated. Levelheadedness is something that I always tell people at Cataphora is a huge, huge, huge component to startup success because, without it, it's almost impossible to take the long view of anything. If you can't take the long view, then you're not going to last very long. The former VP of marketing here at my last company said, "Well, the startup experience is like a roller coaster, but with the key difference that when you're high, you're on the top of the roller coaster." You can either make $800 million or dominate the world. The reality is that you're not actually as high as you think you are. But the inverse is also true. When you're at the low part of the roller coaster, you're probably not as badly off as you feel that particular day. And trying to avoid riding the roller coaster, I think, is a really critical part of success. Obviously, there's passion for it. I think people greatly underrate the importance of leadership, character flexibility, and all those traits that make other people follow that person into the fire. Lee: And they have to want to follow you, especially in the startup world. Elizabeth: Exactly. Larry: Boy, I tell you what, you mentioned earlier that many people joined your company that you have today that were with the other company. That really does say a lot about you and the management team you put together. Lucy: So, Elizabeth, considering this is the second startup you've done, how do you bring balance into your personal and professional lives? Because we all know startups are seven by 24. Elizabeth: Nobody ever likes this answer, but the truth of it is you can't do both. Maybe at some point you can, but startups are 24 by 7, so either you have enough people at the right positions to really delegate everything to you in such a way that you can not have to work massive numbers of hours. But I've never really seen that happen in practice. I do work less than I did two or three years ago. Probably a year or two from now, I'll work a little bit less. But if you want 40 or 50‑hour weeks, startups, but especially being a startup CEO, is not for you. I do make sure I exercise and do yoga and make some time for the things that I really have to. Fortunately, my husband works here, so that is a simplifying assumption. Lucy: [laughs] That is something that you do to bring balance. Make sure that you employ your husband. Larry: One of the things that author, John Nesheim, had brought up about, "If failure is going to crush you, " or something to that effect, I think the idea is, also, if the entrepreneur has this fear of failure, that's what they really also have to avoid. Lucy: Right. So, Elizabeth, you've really achieved a lot in your career so far. What's next for you? Give our listeners a little hint of what you're thinking about for the future. Elizabeth: Well, we think Cataphora is a great opportunity. As anybody who's been out there in the tech world knows, it's not just a matter of having a really good idea; it's also the timing of it. Timing is everything in these things, and so we intend to stick with this for quite a while. And who knows? Maybe my next one will have to do with robots. Larry: [laughs] Elizabeth: But right now, I am very much focused on making Cataphora the next big software company. And I think it can be. And that's what I'm looking forward to doing. Lucy: Well, and in fact, with the robots, we'll make sure that you and Helen get together. Larry: [laughs] Lucy: Helen has shown us little pictures of Roombas in costumes and things like that, which are pretty exciting. So, we really do want to thank you, Elizabeth, for your time. We know you're busy. And I know our listeners will really appreciate hearing your views on entrepreneurism. I wanted to also congratulate you on your "Fast Company" Fast 50 article. It was a great picture. I loved it. The caption, like, "So don't mess with Elizabeth Charnock, CEO of Cataphora." Larry: That's why we were so gentle to begin with. [laughter] Lucy: We really do appreciate your time. Thank you very much. And I wanted to remind listeners where they can find this podcast. It's at www.ncwit.org. And it will also be syndicated on... Larry: www.w3w3.com. Lucy: And please make sure you pass this podcast along to a friend. Thanks very much, Elizabeth. Elizabeth: Thank you. Lee: Bye‑bye. Larry: See you soon. Bye‑bye. Series: Entrepreneurial HeroesInterviewee: Elizabeth CharnockInterview Summary: Starting with a good idea and a group of four kitchen-table employees, and funded entirely by revenues from clients (without any outside investment), Elizabeth Charnock has guided Cataphora into a profitable company with three consecutive years of at least 100% growth in revenue, customers, and employee head count. Release Date: July 24, 2007Interview Subject: Elizabeth CharnockInterviewer(s): Lucy Sanders, Larry Nelson, Lee KennedyDuration: 17:34