Podcasts about designed

In this episode of the You Are Not Broken podcast, Dr. Kelly Casperson sits down with Dr. Christine Maren to explore one of the most under-recognized truths about women's bodies: female physiology is exceptionally adaptable—and that adaptability comes with trade-offs. Women's bodies evolved to support reproduction, and that evolutionary priority shaped a physiology that can adjust rapidly to stress, environment, and demand. But that same flexibility can come at a cost, especially in today's world of chronic stress, environmental exposures, and constant pressure. Together, Dr. Casperson and Dr. Maren unpack how this rapid adaptability may contribute to issues like thyroid dysfunction, hormone imbalance, gut disruption, and infertility—and why understanding these patterns is essential for improving women's health care. Why female physiology is uniquely adaptable—and how reproduction shaped that design How rapid physiological adaptation can stress systems like the thyroid The links between chronic stress, hormones, gut health, and fertility How environmental factors interact with women's biology Why adaptability can be both a powerful strength and a vulnerability The importance of recognizing these trade-offs in modern women's health care Women's bodies are not “broken.” They are highly responsive systems doing exactly what they evolved to do—often in environments that no longer support them. Understanding the costs of adaptation is the first step toward more compassionate, effective, and science-based care. Dr. Maren's Website To my fellow clinicians: listen to the You Are Not Broken podcast on ⁠⁠⁠Pinnacle's network to earn FREE CME credit⁠⁠⁠ Listen to my Tedx Talk: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Why we need adult sex ed⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Take my Adult Sex Ed Master Class:⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠My Website⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Interested in my sexual health and hormone clinic? ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠List is open⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Thanks to our sponsor ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Midi Women's Health⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Designed by midlife experts, delivered by experienced clinicians, covered by insurance.Midi is the first virtual care clinic made exclusively for women 40+. Evidence-based treatments. Personalized midlife care.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.joinmidi.com⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Would you like access to our advanced agency training for FREE? https://www.agencymastery360.com/training How big do you actually want your agency to become? Does the idea of running a massive team sound exciting or completely exhausting? For many agency owners, scaling feels less like growth and more like trading freedom for complexity. Scaling an agency isn't about hustle. It's about surviving the moments that almost break you, building systems that actually work, and accepting that what got you here won't get you there. Today's featured guest understands that running a big agency is about structure and leadership. He's grown a global agency to 700 people without losing profitability, sanity, or culture and now he'll unpack the hard-earned lessons that most agency owners don't think about until it's too late. Nital Shah is the co-founder of Mavlers, a full-service, lifecycle digital agency headquartered in India, with operations supporting global brands and agencies across multiple geographies. Today, Nital leads a 700-person organization focused on marketing operations, delivery excellence, and scalable systems for agencies around the world. Having experienced both sides of the agency equation, client-side pressure and operational scale, Nital brings a grounded, operator-first perspective to growth, profitability, and leadership. In this episode, we'll discuss: An early principle: Profit should be intentional. Achieving operational excellence at scale. Structuring scale to make it manageable. Why alignment beats micromanagement. Subscribe Apple | Spotify | iHeart Radio Sponsors and Resources This episode is brought to you by Wix Studio: If you're leveling up your team and your client experience, your site builder should keep up too. That's why successful agencies use Wix Studio — built to adapt the way your agency does: AI-powered site mapping, responsive design, flexible workflows, and scalable CMS tools so you spend less on plugins and more on growth. Ready to design faster and smarter? Go to wix.com/studio to get started. The Wake-Up Call: COVID, Cash Flow, and Retainers Like many agencies, Nital's biggest inflection point came during COVID. Before the disruption, the agency was focused heavily on top-line revenue rather than predictable recurring income. When 40 percent of revenue disappeared almost overnight, the weakness in that model became painfully obvious. Luckily, the agency's consistent focus on profit from day one helped them overcome this ordeal. However, it changed Nital's perspective on retainers and helped him understand that, without retainers, any similar unexpected bump in the road could destroy the agency. The agency had enough cash flow to survive the shock and rebuild and the lesson was clear: at scale, a large team without consistent recurring revenue is fragile. Retainers aren't just about stability; they are about survival. The other advantage that helped soften the blow was diversification. By spreading clients across industries and geographies, the agency avoided being wiped out by a single market downturn. When one region slowed, others carried the load. That balance didn't eliminate pain, but it reduced risk in a way most agencies underestimate until they feel it firsthand. Profit Is Not an Afterthought One of the most important principles Nital and his co-founder agreed on early was: profit must be intentional. It's not something you hope shows up at the end of the year. It's something you design into the business. That mindset shapes everything from service selection to client qualification. The agency actively avoids hyper-competitive, race-to-the-bottom services and continually evolves its offerings as markets become saturated. When a service becomes unprofitable, they pivot. When a client isn't aligned or drains margin, they say no. Profit isn't just about owner income. It funds experimentation, innovation, and future growth. Without margin, you can't test new services, pivot when the market shifts, or invest in better systems. You just stay busy. And busy is often the enemy of profitable. Operational Excellence at Scale Running a 700-person agency isn't about heroics but about process. Nital is clear that consistent, documented, and enforced workflows are what reduce mistakes, rework, and delivery friction. The agency is structured into service-based business units, each with its own leadership and accountability. On top of that sits a customer success layer that ensures delivery stays aligned with expectations. Everyone is trained on defined protocols, and those protocols exist to protect quality, not bureaucracy. When processes are clear and followed, the probability of hitting client outcomes increases. That reduces rework, lowers internal stress, and improves margins. In a people-driven business, operational discipline is what turns chaos into leverage. Alignment Beats Micromanagement One of the hardest challenges for Nital's agency came after rapid post-COVID growth, when the team doubled in size and remote work became the norm. Processes broke, alignment slipped, and as a result, communication suffered. The turning point came with adopting the Scaling Up framework by Vern Harnish. This framework, aimed at businesses ready to scale in a more structured manner, forced clarity across four areas: people, strategy, execution, and cash. More importantly, it created alignment from leadership all the way down to individual contributors. Every team member understands how their work connects to departmental goals, quarterly priorities, and long-term vision. When people understand the why behind the process, ownership replaces micromanagement. Accountability becomes cultural, not enforced. Leadership, Tough Calls, and A-Players When it comes to mistakes in team alignment, Nital openly acknowledges that the team that gets you to one stage may not be the team that gets you to the next. That realization isn't easy, especially when loyalty and shared history are involved. But over the last two years Nital has embraced the fact that growth demands adaptability. The agency now prioritizes agility, learning speed, and ownership. When someone can't evolve with the business, they are given time, feedback, and support, but the standard doesn't change. You don't win championships by protecting weak links. You win by putting the best players on the field while still treating people with respect and empathy. It's not cold. It's responsible leadership. Structuring Scale So It's Manageable When Nital decided to go back to India and start an agency, his mentor back in Australia offered him the chance to run their offshore center. From there, he started supporting other agencies in several countries and expanded his team to where they are now. Seven hundred people sounds overwhelming until you understand the structure. Instead of one massive organization, the agency operates as multiple business units, each capped around 100 to 150 people and run as its own P&L. This turns an impossible leadership problem into a manageable one. Leaders focus on coaching their direct reports, not managing hundreds of individuals. Each layer carries responsibility downward, creating clarity instead of bottlenecks. As Nital points out, no founder manages 700 people directly. You manage your leadership team. And if that team is strong, aligned, and accountable, scale becomes less scary and far more sustainable. The Future: AI, Change, and Opportunity Despite the uncertainty surrounding AI and marketing technology, Nital is optimistic. The pace of change has leveled the playing field. Years of experience no longer guarantee an advantage. Everyone is adapting at the same time. For smaller agencies, this creates opportunity. They can adopt tools and workflows faster than large organizations. For larger agencies, the challenge is moving faster without breaking structure. Either way, the shift toward complex marketing technology orchestration opens doors for agencies willing to master it. For him, the future belongs to agencies that can adapt, systemize, and evolve without clinging to what used to work. Do You Want to Transform Your Agency from a Liability to an Asset? Looking to dig deeper into your agency's potential? Check out our Agency Blueprint. Designed for agency owners like you, our Agency Blueprint helps you uncover growth opportunities, tackle obstacles, and craft a customized blueprint for your agency's success.

In this episode of Wake Up Fresh, Olivia Howell reframes uncertainty as a meaningful and necessary part of personal growth. Rather than treating not knowing as failure, this daily morning reflection invites listeners to see uncertainty as a sign of listening, recalibration, and self-trust.Designed as part of a short daily ritual, this episode supports emotional wellness, intuitive decision-making, and patience during periods of transition. Olivia offers reassurance for anyone feeling unsure about next steps, reminding listeners that clarity often arrives after — not before — a pause.Wake Up Fresh with Olivia & Jenny is a daily motivational podcast focused on helping listeners start their mornings with compassion, clarity, and emotional steadiness. New episodes release daily throughout January, alternating between Olivia Howell and Jenny Dreizen.

Charlie Kirk's murder wasn't a chance—it was a calculated Zionist takedown of the last barrier to Jewish control of America, unleashing Venezuela invasions, Mexico wars, and rigged civil riots straight from Tel Aviv's playbook. With Kirk erased, scheming Israeli donors and their DC puppets sacrifice American blood for stolen oil and endless foreign schemes, prepping their jets to flee while we burn.  

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In this episode of Wake Up Fresh, Jenny explores emotional responsibility and the difference between kindness and over-functioning for others' feelings. As part of a daily morning ritual, this reflection supports listeners in setting boundaries without guilt or self-blame.Designed for anyone who struggles with people-pleasing or emotional over-responsibility, this episode helps listeners practice respectful communication while releasing the pressure to manage others' reactions. Jenny offers reassurance that honesty and compassion can coexist.Wake Up Fresh with Olivia & Jenny is a daily motivational podcast focused on emotional wellness, boundaries, and beginning each day with clarity and self-trust. New episodes release daily throughout January, alternating between Olivia Howell and Jenny Dreizen.

PREVIEW FOR LATER TODAY PI: THE POLITE CHATBOT DESIGNED FOR EMPATHY Colleague Gary Rivlin. Gary Rivlin examines the creation of "Pi," a chatbot designed by personality engineers to exhibit good manners and empathy. Rivlin explains how humans fine-tuned the bot to be polite, predicting a future where such AI could serve affordable therapeutic roles or even function as romantic partners.1955

Zionist vulture capitalist Paul Singer, Trump's mega-Jewish donor, just hijacked Citgo—the only U.S. heavy crude refinery—at dirt-cheap prices after Trump deliberately tanked its value through pirate ship seizures and brutal blockades. Now Trump is siphoning billions in stolen Venezuelan oil directly into Singer's coffers to bankroll Israel's endless wars and globalist schemes.   A white American mom of three was gunned down cold-blood by a faceless ICE agent in Minneapolis. Owen Shroyer teams with Stew to rip open this engineered psyop designed to unleash riots, crush freedoms, and force-feed the AI Gestapo down our throats. Is this the deep-state trigger for martial law? There is no law requiring Americans in the 50 states to file or pay federal income tax—yet trillions are seized to bomb nations for Jewish billionaires and push global degeneracy at gunpoint. Peymon Mottahedeh exposes the century-old fraud and gives you the exact, battle-tested steps to go exempt, keep your earnings, and join the millions already refusing to feed the swamp. Erika Kirk isn't just grieving—she's the centerpiece of a decades-long web connecting Romanian orphanages, U.S. military bases, and accusations of child trafficking that go straight to the top.  

What if the food you're eating every day is either helping you heal—or slowly breaking you down? And what if God designed your body with the capacity to heal when you fuel it the right way? In this Expert Interview, Jim Ramos sits down with Alex Morgan, author of Designed to Heal, to unpack the powerful connection between food, lifestyle, and whole-person health. Alex shares the deeply personal story behind the book and how a return to organic, whole foods played a critical role. Together, they dive into alarming health trends in the U.S., the root causes of chronic inflammation, and why modern diets are working against the body instead of with it. You'll walk away with some practical ways to start caring for the body God gave you.  Check out Alex's book: Designed to Heal (https://tinyurl.com/designed115) Jim's newest book, Guardrails: Ten Boundaries for an Unbreakable Marriage will be releasing in April 2026. Sign up to be notified when it's available at https://meninthearena.org/guardrails. This episode is sponsored by Compassion International. Our goal is for the Men in the Arena tribe to sponsor 1,000 boys over the coming year! Help us reach that goal and make a difference in a child's life today. When you sponsor a child using our link, you'll receive a free copy of Jim's book, Dialed In: Reaching Your Full Capacity as a Man of God! We are also sponsored by MTNTOUGH Fitness Lab, a Christian-owned fitness app. This app, combined with diet, has helped Jim get in the best shape of his life! Get 6 weeks free with the code ARENA30 at MTNTOUGH.com. Every man needs a locker room. Apply to join an exclusive brotherhood of like-minded men in The Locker Room, our monthly live Zoom Q&A call! We meet in the Locker Room once a month for community, fellowship, laughter, and to help each other find biblical answers to life's difficult questions. Locker Room members also get access to monthly exclusive leadership trainings, historically only available to the staff team at Men in the Arena. Membership is by application only. Go here to apply: https://patreon.com/themeninthearena Get Jim Ramos' USA TODAY Bestselling book, Dialed In: Reaching Your Full Capacity as a Man of God (https://tinyurl.com/dialedinbook)

Stay ahead of hazardous winter weather with our regional road and interstate forecast covering I-80, I-70, I-90, and I-25 across Wyoming, Nebraska, Montana, Colorado, and New Mexico. This daily 3 PM Mountain Time update (Monday through Friday, with weekend editions as needed) delivers the latest information on snow, ice, high winds, reduced visibility, and dangerous travel conditions. Designed for both the general public and commercial drivers, including long-haul truckers, our forecast highlights critical impacts to major freight corridors and holiday travel routes. If you depend on safe and efficient travel across the central and northern Rockies, this winter-weather road report helps you plan ahead, avoid delays, and stay informed.

Andrew Elliott shares his inspirational story of going from UCP Oneness Pentecostal to Calvinist to the Catholic Church!FOLLOW US:Our Main YouTubeOur Family YouTubeBlog ArticlesFacebook Page hereInstagram TikTokXPinterest4 DIFFERENT WAYS TO SUPPORT THIS MOST IMPORTANT WORK! 1. Stripe2. Patreon (only monthly) 3. PayPal4. GoFundMe (Billboards) QUESTIONS? https://www.subscribepage.com/e3e8c7WEBSITE (Retreats, Keynotes, Parish Missions, Articles, and more) CHECK OUT OUR T-SHIRTS & MERCH https://catholictruth.org/shop/Like our Tees? Designed by Glorybound Apparel: https://gloryboundco.com/BOOK: Counterfeit Spirituality (Centering Prayer, Yoga, Reiki, Astrology, etc). What is good? What is not? How can we know the difference?)BOOK: WHY Do You Believe In GOD? (True conversations with atheists and evidence for God and faith).In-person or online Confirmation retreat? https://catholictruth.org/speaking-and-retreatsCheck out our YouTube Channel! https://www.youtube.com/@CatholicTruthOfficial

Eliot Shorr-Parks joins the 94 WIP Morning Show to preview the Eagles-49ers Wildcard Weekend Matchup! He says the Eagles will essentially have all of their defensive starters playing this game, which will be helpful for the Eagles. Lane Johnson potentially being back would be huge as well. Eliot thinks the Eagles will call more designed runs for Jalen Hurts in the playoffs as well.

Living Light - Apsis (Original Mix) The Dub Bass Expander - Sofa Beats SOFABEATS168 1. Living Light - Wild Type (Original Mix) 2. Living Light - Faces In A Crowd (Original Mix) 3. Living Light - Spindle-Like Oscillations (Original Mix) 4. Living Light - Thought Box (Original Mix) 5. Living Light - Edge Times (Original Mix) 6. Living Light - Apsis (Original Mix) 7. Living Light - Up And Atom (Original Mix) 8. Living Light - Liminal Vignette (Original Mix) 9. Living Light - Molecular Mittens (Original Mix) Living Light – New Album: The Dub Bass Expander Boston-based producer Eartha Harris, the creative force behind Living Light, returns with a mesmerizing downtempo album that establishes a sound unmistakably her own. Blending deep dub atmospheres, slow techno grooves, trance-infused tension, and the lush textures of psychill, this release invites listeners into a shimmering world of rhythm, reflection and bass. Designed to be both DJ-friendly and deeply immersive, each track flows with clean, spacious production and hypnotic low-end—equally suited for the dance floor or a restorative solo listening journey. Ethereal elements whisper across the mix like messages from other worlds, guiding the listener through dreamlike landscapes and offering a perfect escape from everyday routine. Down the sofa! With this album, Living Light continues to expand the boundaries of downtempo electronic music—crafting a sonic voyage that is warm, transportive, and endlessly replayable. We are very excited and proud to share this release with the world, and we can't wait to see Eartha out on tour with this new release.

Sheriff Mack joins Stew to dissect bombshell 2015 Phoenix Trump rally footage where Erika Kirk (Frantzve) sits right next to his own son, raising red flags on her shady ties, promiscuous vibes, and elite puppet strings. Sheriff Mack drops explosive truths with Stew—his direct talk with the Tyler Robinson case prosecutor's office reveals they were clueless about the assassination site's earth-deep dig-up and quick pave-over, erasing forensic evidence and splatter patterns forever.   Big Pharma's worst nightmare unleashed— they've suppressed the TZLA plasma tech for generations to keep you hooked on toxic drugs and killer injections, but Jeff Berwick rips the lid off this game-changer that vaporizes tumors, fixes stroke damage in hours, and cranks your energy to god-mode levels. Mainstream quacks like the FDA are scrambling to bury this, but the proof is exploding.

This week on Everybody in the Pool, we're starting the year with an audacious question: what if we reinvented one of the most basic materials in the world?Decarbonizing the built environment means tackling the stuff we use everywhere — wood, concrete, and steel — at the same time we're trying to build millions of new homes, strengthen supply chains, and reduce our exposure to geopolitical and climate risk. That's a tall order. But it's also unavoidable.My guest is Nathan Silvernail, co-founder and CEO of Plantd, a company building a tree-free, carbon-negative alternative to engineered wood. Designed as a drop-in replacement for OSB (oriented strand board), Plantd's material looks and behaves like conventional wood — but without cutting down trees. And they're not stopping at the material itself: Plantd is building the machines, manufacturing process, and agricultural supply chain needed to produce it at scale.We talk about:Why “sustainable wood” isn't always as sustainable as it soundsWhy trees can't scale fast enough to meet demand and climate goalsWhat it takes to replace a commodity material without asking builders to change how they buildThe co-benefits: turning waste into biochar and high-purity carbon for adjacent industrial marketsThe hard realities of scaling hardware, agriculture, and manufacturing at the same timeLINKS:Plantd: https://www.plantdmaterials.com/All episodes: https://www.everybodyinthepool.com/Subscribe to the Everybody in the Pool newsletter: https://www.mollywood.co/Become a member for the ad-free version of the show:https://everybodyinthepool.supercast.com/Visit our sponsor, Climatize, and get $50 in investment credits when you create a profile! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week's episode of PSA: The Mental Health Podcast picks back up with a heavy mix of faith, culture, and uncomfortable reflection as Izzy dives into the latest installment of Social Media & You Reloaded featuring AmRock from The HL Podcast. The episode opens with Izzy addressing creator fatigue and the reality that working in seasons is necessary for mental and emotional survival in a culture that worships constant output. From there, he transitions into how politics has turned into one of the most toxic conversational spaces for Black people, questioning whether cutting someone off over an election is truly normal or just the result of social engineering.AmRock helps pull apart how social media has turned politics into performance and outrage into identity, pushing Black men especially into silent corners where opinion equals cancellation and disagreement becomes betrayal. Together they explore how political alignment has become a mental health issue, how groupthink has replaced critical thinking, and how generations of Black folks approach voting differently due to trauma, distrust, and survival.The conversation expands into abortion debates, civil rights, Trump-era polarization, white liberalism, the weaponization of religion, and class divides inside Black communities. Izzy emphasizes that most people are more informed by memes than policies, that the media incentivizes emotional extremes, and that everyone claims to “do their research” without ever touching a primary source. They also discuss how political identity has become a substitute for personality, how conspiracy theories sometimes feel safer than institutions that Black people no longer trust, and how therapy, faith, and history are necessary for decoding why we argue instead of building. Instead of picking sides, Izzy challenges whether Black unity requires ideological agreement or whether maturity means learning to disagree without destroying relationships. This episode is controversial, introspective, and culturally honest—and it reminds listeners that most people don't actually hate each other; they just don't know how to talk to each other without losing themselves in the algorithm.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/p-s-a-the-mental-health-podcast--5520511/support.TrustBuilder Package

Stay ahead of hazardous winter weather with our regional road and interstate forecast covering I-80, I-70, I-90, and I-25 across Wyoming, Nebraska, Montana, Colorado, and New Mexico. This daily 3 PM Mountain Time update (Monday through Friday, with weekend editions as needed) delivers the latest information on snow, ice, high winds, reduced visibility, and dangerous travel conditions. Designed for both the general public and commercial drivers, including long-haul truckers, our forecast highlights critical impacts to major freight corridors and holiday travel routes. If you depend on safe and efficient travel across the central and northern Rockies, this winter-weather road report helps you plan ahead, avoid delays, and stay informed.

Welcome back to another episode of the unSeminary podcast. We're talking with Andrew Hopper, Lead Pastor of Mercy Hill Church in North Carolina. Planted in 2012 with just 30 people, Mercy Hill has grown into a multi-campus, fast-growing church known for its gospel clarity and sending culture. In this conversation, Andrew shares why adoption and foster care have become central expressions of Mercy Hill's mission—and how those practices flow directly out of the gospel. He also unpacks the heart behind his book, Chosen: Building Your Family the Way God Builds His. Is your church unsure how to engage big social needs without drifting from the gospel? Are you looking for a way to mobilize people beyond church walls while keeping discipleship front and center? Andrew offers a clear framework for doing both. Doing good as a sign of the kingdom. // Andrew addresses a common tension churches feel between community engagement and disciple-making. Mercy Hill refuses to treat these as competing priorities. Acts of service—whether foster care, adoption, or family restoration—are not the kingdom itself but signposts pointing to it. Meeting tangible needs creates openings for gospel conversations. These ministries don't replace evangelism; they amplify it by demonstrating the heart of God in visible ways. A church’s collective heartbeat. // Mercy Hill's deep involvement in adoption, foster care, and family restoration didn't start as a top-down strategy but emerged organically from the gifts and passions within the church. Many leaders and members have adopted children themselves, shaping the church's collective heartbeat. Rather than attempting to address every social issue, Mercy Hill chose to focus deeply on a few—believing churches are most effective when they lean into the specific good works God has prepared for them. This focus has mobilized hundreds of families and created a powerful witness in their community. Rope-holding and shared responsibility. // Not everyone is called to adopt or foster, but everyone can hold the rope. Drawing from the William Carey analogy, Mercy Hill equips members to support families on the front lines through prayer, childcare, meals, financial help, and presence. Over time, they've learned that rope-holding works best when built on existing relationships rather than formal assignments. The goal is to ensure no family fights alone in what Andrew describes as intense spiritual warfare. Big vision with baby steps. // Mercy Hill isn't afraid to cast a bold vision—whether for global missions, adoption, or church planting—but they pair that vision with accessible next steps. Prayer nights, giving opportunities, short-term service, and relational support allow people to grow into greater obedience over time. High challenge without guilt creates healthy discipleship. Why Andrew wrote Chosen. // Andrew wrote Chosen: Building Your Family the Way God Builds His not to promote a program, but to give churches a theological foundation for engaging adoption and foster care. The book weaves together Andrew's family story, Mercy Hill's journey, and a deeply gospel-centered motivation rooted in Scripture. Designed to be used individually or in groups, Chosen includes discussion questions and practical guidance for churches or small groups wanting to explore this calling in community. Andrew's prayer is that the book would catalyze thousands of Christian families to participate meaningfully in caring for vulnerable children and families. Gospel-driven motivation. // Underneath everything is Andrew's conviction that gospel motivation outlasts guilt. Behavior rooted in grace goes further than behavior driven by pressure. Adopted people adopt people. Chosen people choose people. That theological clarity fuels Mercy Hill's sending culture, their community impact, and their ongoing growth. To explore Andrew's resources on adoption, foster care, and grab his book, Chosen, visit andrewphopper.com/chosen or follow him on Instagram @andrewphopper. You can learn more about Mercy Hill Church at mercyhillchurch.com. Thank You for Tuning In! There are a lot of podcasts you could be tuning into today, but you chose unSeminary, and I'm grateful for that. If you enjoyed today's show, please share it by using the social media buttons you see at the left hand side of this page. Also, kindly consider taking the 60-seconds it takes to leave an honest review and rating for the podcast on iTunes, they're extremely helpful when it comes to the ranking of the show and you can bet that I read every single one of them personally! Lastly, don't forget to subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, to get automatic updates every time a new episode goes live! Thank You to This Episode’s Sponsor: Portable Church Your church is doing really well right now, and your leadership team is looking for solutions to keep momentum going! It could be time to start a new location. Maybe you have hesitated in the past few years, but you know it's time to step out in faith again and launch that next location. Portable Church has assembled a bundle of resources to help you leverage your growing momentum into a new location by sending a part of your congregation back to their neighborhood on Mission. This bundle of resources will give you a step-by-step plan to launch that new or next location, and a 5 minute readiness tool that will help you know your church is ready to do it! Click here to watch the free webinar “Launch a New Location in 150 Days or Less” and grab the bundle of resources for your church! Episode Transcript Rich Birch — Hey friends, welcome to the unSeminary podcast. We have got a multi-time guest on, and you know what that means. That means that I really respect, deeply admire, and want you to listen up, and today is no exception. Excited to have Andrew Hopper with us. He is the lead pastor of a church that they should be following, that you should be following. He’s a lead pastor of Mercy Hill Church with five locations, if I’m counting correctly, in North Carolina, and is repeatedly one of the fastest growing churches in the country. I love this church on many levels. They’re centered on the gospel and have a radical commitment to sending people to the nations. They have a desire to make disciples and multiply churches. Andrew, welcome to the show. So glad you’re here.Andrew Hopper — Man, I’m so pumped to be here. Love the podcast. Really appreciate it, man.Rich Birch — Yeah, I’m honored that you would come back. For folks that that don’t know Mercy Hill, give me a bit of a kind of an update. Tell us a little bit about the church.Andrew Hopper — Yeah.Rich Birch — Maybe update us from last time you were on.Andrew Hopper — Yeah, man. So just real quick, planted in 2012. We had 30 people, all you know kind of young professional age, and man, just really believe that God could do something incredible ah through, you know just through our our open hands, and he did.Andrew Hopper — And so it’s been 13 years. It’s crazy. We’ve been sort of pushing the same boulder up the same mountain for 13 years, just flywheel kind of concept and keep pushing. And ah the Lord has done an incredible thing, like you said, five campuses. And man, just moved into a new home and hub. That was from last time we had a chance. That’s been really great. Andrew Hopper — We were in a rented location for a long time as our main like broadcast campus. We’re a video-based multi-site. And so um it’s ah it was a three or four-year journey to raise the money and build this new facility. But we’re in, and the Lord has really blessed that with tons of new people, highest baptisms, sent ones, first time guest numbers, all everything that we’ve done. This has been a, you know, we’ve gone been on a ride – praise God for that. It’s it’s, um, it’s for his sake and his renown, but this year has been unlike the others. So it’s been…Rich Birch — Yeah, you were saying beforehand, it’s like 30 or something like 30 some percent year over year growth. That’s insane to keep up with.Andrew Hopper — It is man. And the, and the giving does not, uh, you know, the giving doesn’t happen.Rich Birch — Reflect that yet.Andrew Hopper — So it’s, it’s like, we’re trying to do ministry on a budget of a church that’s 3000, but a church that’s running 4,500. And it’s like, how do you do that effectively without killing everybody?Rich Birch — Nice.Andrew Hopper — All your staff, I mean, so, but we’re, we’re learning, man, we’re figuring it out. It’s fun. We got, we just planted our sixth church. So that’s apart from the campuses. This is first time, Rich, we’ve planted a church in our own city.Rich Birch — Oh, nice. That’s cool.Andrew Hopper — It’s been really, a really cool dynamic and it’s been fun. He’s doing great. Man, it was a college student that we met when he was 19 years old at North Carolina AT&T 10 years later. He’s an elder here. He’s done a lot of different things. And man, he goes and plants a new church in Greensboro about five minutes from one of our campuses and they’re doing great.Rich Birch — Wow. Yeah, that’s so good. Well, the thing, there’s lots I love about Mercy Hill, but one of the things that I’ve loved about your church from the you know the chance we’ve had to journey a little bit over the years about it is you just have real clarity around the mission, this idea of making disciples, multiplying churches. It’s like that has been rock solid from the beginning. When you think about we want churches to have discipleship at its core, this idea of a church that actually grows people up in their relationship with Christ. What matters most at the foundation? How are you keeping that so foundational to you know what’s happening at Mercy Hill?Andrew Hopper — Yeah, I think um I think that we always sort of bought into kind of what we see in Acts 2 as a little bit of a flywheel. We call it gather, group, give, go. A lot of churches have something like that.Andrew Hopper — The the difference, I think, at Mercy Hill a little bit than what I see ah in in in a lot of churches that we help mentor and coach is that 2020 hit and everybody was like, man, what is a church? What is discipleship? What are we going to do now? And and people were kind of… And I do think it was and it wasn’t, you know, it wasn’t just me. I mean, our, you know, our executive pastor Bobby, he was really integral in this. We sort of really doubled down on no, I kind of think the church is going to come back. Rich Birch — Right.Andrew Hopper — And I kind of think what we were doing is sort of what our church is set up to do. It kind of a brand thing. We are sort of a big box sending brand. And that, you know, for us, when we look at Acts 2, we’re like, dude, the gathering, there’s no more there’s no more important hour for discipleship and evangelism. And I know there’s a lot of things written against that. And people are kind of almost like downplaying it. Andrew Hopper — We’re just like, man, we just don’t believe it. We believe people need to be in a group. You know, we they need generosity is lead step in discipleship, give. And we got to teach people that there’s a mission bigger than themselves. And if we do that, it’s going to funnel more people into the gathering. Andrew Hopper — So I think fundamentally what I would say, we need to get, you know, we could talk about our value, you know we can talk about values to gospel and [inaudible] identity, but I think landing on you know, it’s very hard now to, to not get a word salad book form or thing. When you ask somebody, how are you making disciples? It can just be like…Rich Birch — Right. Very vacuous. Who knows what that means? Yeah.Andrew Hopper — For us, it’s just been a very clear, simple process.Rich Birch — Right.Andrew Hopper — Like, man, we believe if someone is in the gathering, if they’re in relationship, if they’re being pushed on generosity, and if they’re living for a mission bigger than themselves, that’s a current of maturity that will move them. They just get in the stream, they’ll move.Rich Birch — Yes. Yeah. Yeah. It’s so good.Andrew Hopper — that’s kind of So you know for us, I think that’s as, you know we’ve we’ve tried to simplify things there.Rich Birch — Yeah. And, and your last episode, I’ve pointed a ton of people to it, uh, to really, and we really unpack a lot of what you talked about there in more detail.Andrew Hopper — Right. Yeah.Rich Birch — You’re going to want to go back and, uh, and listen to that. You’ve reached as a church, you’ve reached a lot of people who don’t grow up in church that it’s like, there’s a lot of people who are there. You know, we used to say we ain’t your mama’s church, but mama didn’t go to church, you know? So, you know, and it’s been a long time that people were there. What challenges have you seen, you know, helping move people from curiosity into real ongoing discipleship? So like, I think there are, we’re seeing a swell of attendance across the country. People are like, oh, I’m kind of interested in this, but we got to move them from just, oh, this is something interesting to like, oh, I’m actually want to grow my relationship with Jesus.Andrew Hopper — Yeah, I mean, and it’s it’s funny too, Rich, you probably have a better bird’s eye view of this than I do. But I feel like churches that have been faithfully growing for like the last 10 years, they’re not really doing a lot different now. Or even though there’s this big swell happening, what I do think is that some churches have sort of decided like, oh, clarity does matter.Rich Birch — Yes. Yeah, that’s true.Andrew Hopper — And don’t try to be friends with the culture. We’re going to speak in and be prophetic. And, you know, even even to the you know Proverbs 25:26 says, you know, there’s there there’s no there’s no benefit in a muddied spring. You know, it’s like you got to be sort of you got to figure out if we’re going to be clear.Andrew Hopper — So, I you know, for me, I think like and you’re right, we do reach most of the people that we reach that are in the camp that you’re talking about our college age. We reach a lot of people, though, ah that are, you know, they’re they’re coming back to the faith because they’re a southerner.Rich Birch — Sure.Andrew Hopper — You know, they they kind of they kind of were, you know, they they did have some church in their background. They’re coming back. Their kids are not only born, but they’re realizing they’re sinners and they don’t have answers. They’re trying to figure that out.Rich Birch — Right. Right.Andrew Hopper — They’re coming back to church.Andrew Hopper — And, you know, I think the biggest thing that moves people from like interest into a decision point is just being very clear on this is what the gospel is. This is the life it compels you to. Are you going to be in or out?Andrew Hopper — One of the things we say at Mercy Hill a lot is like, man, if you’re if you’re just intrigued, you know, if you’re interested, you’re not going to stay at Mercy Hill because we’re never going to let you, you’re going to get pushed every week. And it’s like, man, people are not really in or like that. I’m not going to do that. You know, they’re just like, no I’m not going to sit here and get like pushed every single week on something I don’t really… And the flip side is when people say, all right, you know what? Stake in the ground. I’m in.Rich Birch — Yeah, we’re doing this, yep.Andrew Hopper — I wanna look like this, I want to build my life on this. It’s like, well, now, you know, it’s it’s man, I’m hopefully, you know, putting tools in the belt every single week to live that life.Rich Birch — Yeah. Yeah, it’s good. I do think there was a time where people wandered into our churches where I don’t think that happens as much anymore. I think people, when they arrive, they come with questions, with live active questions that they’re trying to wrestle with, kind of regardless of where they’re they’re at in their journey.Andrew Hopper — Yeah.Rich Birch — And they’re what you to your point around, you know, there’s no benefit in a muddy stream. People aren’t looking for anything that sounds like, well, what do you think? Because the reason why they’re there is because they’re asking questions. And so, you know, they’re they’re looking for clarity, like I think you’re saying. Rich Birch — Well one of the things I love about your church is there’s a high commitment to, you’re you’re you’re tearing down what I think is a false dichotomy. Sometimes I think when churches come to this idea of outreach or making a difference in their community, there’s this there can be this gap or false dichotomy between doing good in our communities and making disciples. Like we gave that up at some point. We were like, you can’t, you know, we can’t do both of those things for some reason. Why, why did we do that? Why did we, as churches say, we can’t both make a difference in our communities and also make disciples?Andrew Hopper — Yeah, I think it’s, I actually have a lot of sympathy for the fundamentalist leaning. I know it sounds a little bit weird. Rich Birch — No, that’s fine.Andrew Hopper — Churches that led from the, you know, from the good do good in your city kind of thing. I don’t think they’re right, but I do have sympathy for that because I understand how quickly that sort of, you know, is so hijacked by liberal, by theological liberalism to where it’s finally man we’re digging wells and wherever but we’re not talking about who the true source of living water is. Like we don’t want to be offensive we just want to do good without speaking the whole you know you know live your life as a Christian only use words if necessary, whatever, you know. And and I so I understand why people kind of fled and have fled that.Andrew Hopper — Like, you know, I’ve even had our church before when I when I talk about adoption or we we have a ministry, and a ministry called No More Spectators. We’re like moving people towards community ministry. And we had people kind of going on like, oh, my gosh, this seems like a sign of like churches start going this way and then they lose the gospel.Andrew Hopper — And I’m like, well, the reason you’re kind of feeling like that is because a lot of churches have done that. You know, you’re not [inaudible] like that just out of nowhere. Now, of course, I think it’s a little bit immature and we’ve got to push through. The way we talk about it, Rich, is, man, we want to do good in our community as signs of the kingdom coming.Andrew Hopper — They are not building the kingdom. You know, if we go repaint a house or house a homeless person, one day that person would parted with that house, whether they, you know, get messed up and leave or whether they do great and then would die one day, you know.Andrew Hopper — Or, if we have, ah you know, if we go and, and you know, we’re going to, for example, we have ah ah a family in our church that they need a ramp built because, man, the the brother is struggling with MS and he’s, they’re they’re fighting it like Christians do. We’re going to go do that. You know, we’re going to go build that ramp. That ramp’s going to rot and die one, you know, rot and rot away one day. And, you know, whether it’s 100 years from now or whatever.Andrew Hopper — Like it’s not literally the kingdom. But when the outside world sees us engage and, you know, our church will talk about this primarily when we think about community ministry, we think about it in terms of adoption, foster care and families count, which I can talk to you about. I think it’s bringing a sign of the kingdom that is to the community around us to say, hey, this is not the gospel. But it sure points to the gospel. Rich Birch — Right, right.Andrew Hopper — You know, it’s a pretty good signpost of like, yeah, there’s a kingdom coming where kids aren’t separated from their parents, you know. And and so that’s kind of the way that we think about, it’s not, you know, it’s not the kingdom. It’s a sign of the kingdom that is coming.Rich Birch — Yeah, let’s let’s dive in. So adoptions, foster care, families count. These are not small issues. Like you started with like putting a ramp on, painting somebody – those are like, okay, I can organize my head around that. And then we jump to what I think are obviously significant. How, it can be easy, I think, for church leaders it can be easy where, you know, we got a lot of fish to fry in our own backyard. When you see big problems like that, help us unpack that. Why do you as a lead pastor, why are you passionate about these issues? Why are these the things that you’ve chosen?Andrew Hopper — I think it’s, man, I think it’s great. I mean if you can’t if you don’t mind I’ll go back and give you a little bit of context. I’m a context [inaudible]… Rich Birch — Yeah, absolutely. Let’s do it. Yeah. Andrew Hopper — …number one so I always want to frame it in where we’ve been. But the short answer to the question is I think that every church because it is made up of individual believers that have individual gift matrix, you know they’re they’re gifted the church is gifted in a unique way because the people which are the church are gifted in a unique way, right? Andrew Hopper — And so to me, you know, slapping, you know, a top down every single church has to to manifest signs of the kingdom in X way, which, for for example, I’m not to pick on it, but like, you know, the whole diversity church kind of movement. I love you know, if that’s your brand, that’s awesome. That’s great. Go, go bring signs of the kingdom in that area. But you know what people do is they take their thing and then slap it on every single church. You know, this is the sign of the kingdom that you have to manifest.Andrew Hopper — I don’t think that. It takes every kind of church to reach a city because there’s all you know, there’s every kind of people in the city. Right? For us, though, and I think for a lot of churches that that maybe are are made up a little bit like we are, I think there is a lot of meat on the bone for adoption, foster care, families count ministry. And I think churches could be greatly helped by latching on to maybe, you know, something in particular, maybe this, maybe this specifically. How we got there, Rich, was we had we had, you know, huge movement in our church in 2019. I was very convicted.Andrew Hopper — Some of the exponential stuff was coming out, you know, mobilizing people outside the walls of the church. And I really was, man, I was just really affected by that. And I don’t want the dichotomy, you know, I don’t want, well, you your people serve in the church and not outside the church. It’s like, no, most people serve outside the church. If you watch them, they are serving inside the church as well. It’s it’s like a it’s like, man, you know, just just because serving inside the church is not the finish line, don’t demonize it because it is a starting place.Rich Birch — That’s good.Andrew Hopper — So it’s like, I don’t like that kind of whole thing. But but it did affect me to say, OK, what are we doing to push to the outside? So we we we did a thing. You would have loved this, man. But it except for the fact that it didn’t really work that good. OK, it was awesome.Andrew Hopper — It was, we still have the domain name – nomorespectators.com – I had the tagline: Jesus didn’t die to create spectators. He died to create servants, not spectators, workers, not watchers. We, man, you could go to nomorespectators.com and, you know, it was like, it was like a funnel for all of these community ministry opportunities in our city. So it was, you know, people from the housing, you know, authority type stuff would post things. And it was, it was all this kind of, it had a bunch of stuff in it. Andrew Hopper — In the end of the day, great idea. It was a little too complex. Our people latched on to the foster care, pregnancy network, you know, ended up being families count, Guardian ad Litem and adoption. So our guy that was over all that at the time our sending director, which is hard for me to have a good idea that ends up dying hard, okay that’s just tough for me.Rich Birch — You had a great sticky statement and everything. Come on.Andrew Hopper — I’m the king of sunken cost bias. Okay. Like, I’m like, dude. And so finally around 2020, he came to me and he said, bro, I know this is hard for you. Cause it was like a two year initiative. He’s like, this is hard. He said, No More Spectators needs to just turn into Chosen. And it needs to be like, you had this idea for 30 different things. It just, this needs to be our niche, man. You know, we we don’t do a lot of these other things, but we do this really well.Andrew Hopper — And it was hard for me. Ultimately, it was great wisdom by them, not me. And we started going down that road. And partly, I think it’s because, Rich, is heart is near to my heart. I have an adopted daughter. A lot of our staff have adopted kids. We just have a guy right now. Our associate director of first impressions at the Rich campus is in Texas right now, you know, bringing their daughter home.Andrew Hopper — I mean, so it’s just, and so it’s sort of started to morph into, and the the the big thing I’ll say, and I, you know, I’ve been talking a lot here, but the big thing I’ll say is, if you think about the way I just ah described all that, it doesn’t start with the need in the community. It starts with the gift matrix of the church. The poor we will always have with us. Like there there is no there’s no scenario until Jesus comes back that there’s no kids that need to be adopted, you know.Rich Birch — Right, right.Andrew Hopper — And it’s just the reality of it. And so there’s always going to be need in the community. It’s more about, okay, what are the Ephesians 2:10 works that your church, because the church is made up of people who are individually called, what are the you know what are those works that God has set out for your church? Rich Birch — That’s good.Andrew Hopper — And, you know, so for us, we just felt like, dude, this is a a heartbeat thing. Our people got more, they get more fired up. The greatest thing I’ve ever been able to mobilize our people for prayer for is go to the abortion clinic and pray. I mean, a thousand people on their face in the pavement. It’s like, it just strikes a chord with our church and who we are. So we wanna run after that.Rich Birch — Yeah. Well, I love that. And we’re going to dig out a bunch of this, but let’s think about it first from a perspective of somebody who’s maybe attended your church. They just started. They’re they’re relatively new, you know. The idea of something as weighty as adoption or foster care, that’s a big ask. And you know when you yeah how do I experience that as someone who’s just new? What are some ways that I could get plugged in? What does that look like? That, that, cause I, I’m hard, it’s hard to imagine that I go from zero to, to, you know, adoption, you know, how do I end up or flying to Texas to, you know, pick up a kid. That’s a lot. Help me understand. How are you, cause I know you guys are so good at moving people along from kind of where they are to where you’re hoping to – what’s that look like? What’s the kind of, how do you bring people along in this?Andrew Hopper — Man, totally. I think you’re right. I think it’s a combination of big vision on one end and then baby steps on the other. But the big vision matters.Rich Birch — That’s good.Andrew Hopper — Like we don’t want to be scared of the big vision. So, you know, for example, our weekender process, which I know you talked about some, you know, that weekender process, you know, people literally for years, we would give them a passport application in the weekender process. Because we’re like you’re at this church you’re probably going to be overseas at some point on a mission trip. And so to me it’s like people are like dude that probably scares the crap out of people. And it’s like well, I mean we want to make sure they know what they’re getting into, you know. We’re not telling them they got to do that tomorrow… Rich Birch — Right.Andrew Hopper — …but that is the, and then and then there’s all these baby steps, right? Like hey come to you know, every February we do Sent weekend. Come to the prayer night. Like that’s a baby step. That’s not you getting on a plane to go to Nepal. But you know hey we’re doing this missions offering at the end of the year, like maybe get you know. So there’s all these I would say that our the way we think about Chosen ministry, which again: adoption, foster care, families count, and rope holding, which is a big part of this discussion… Rich Birch — Okay. Andrew Hopper —…is that way. It’s big vision on the front end so we’re never going to tell somebody, hey you know, I know you could never do this. Like I’ll never…I think people can do it and they should. Or or you know more Christians than are should. At the same time we’re also not guilting anybody. Like so I’m I you know the the first thing I’ll tell people is like, hey, you know we start talking about adoption. I always say always say, hey, we have not lined up a bunch of little kids in the lobby for you to take one home today, okay. And then I’ll tell them, that’s next week.Rich Birch — That’s great.Andrew Hopper — Okay, so yeah but and we we try hard to like put some levity in it. Man, we’re not everybody’s not going to do that. In fact, a minority, of a small minority is going to do it. But everyone can be involved and there are baby steps.Andrew Hopper — So we try to highlight giving, man. Like if you someone adopts from Mercy Hill, we pay 25% of their adoption. Okay.Rich Birch — Wow. Yep.Andrew Hopper — If they’re a member and they’re in a community group, they get 25%. All right, well, you know, we’re going to connect that. Like, man, you you are never going to adopt. You feel like that’s, but it’s like, well, I give $100 a month to the church. Rich Birch — Right.Andrew Hopper — Well, hey, what? You know, you’re you are you are supporting.Rich Birch — We’re making a difference.Andrew Hopper — We do parents night out, you know, for all of our foster and adoptive parents. We do it quarterly. It’s like, hey, those are opportunities to come and serve, man. You can serve the meal you can do. We do rope holding, which I know we’ll probably talk about. But but the the idea of rope holding is just like, man, I’m not going to do this, but I can be in the corner for somebody. They’re in my community group. I want to be their first call if they need a babysitter or they need, you know, a gift card, or whatever they need.Andrew Hopper — So I think, man, we try to do big vision. You know, we’re going we’re going to set a huge vision, you know, for 2030 for 2030. Actually, we just hit our vision for 2025, which is 200 adoptive or foster families. There’s a lot of ways people can be involved with it.Rich Birch — So good. There’s, I think thing I would encourage friends who are listening in, you really should be following Mercy Hill, Andrew, because I do think you’re a very unique communicator where you, and you just described it. And I think to you, it’s just like, that’s just what you do. But this idea of like, you’re calling people to a high bar, but you’re not leveraging shame, guilt. you know, it’s, and I think so many times our language can kind of lean in that direction. Or we can, if we really are trying to push people towards something, or we can just undersell the vision. You know We can be like, oh, it’s not that it’s not that big of a deal. You know It’s not for everybody. So I would encourage people to listen in.Rich Birch — Talk to me about rope holding. How is that, what’s that look like? Unpack what that looks like a little bit.Andrew Hopper — Yeah, so rope so the the the rope-holding analogy, which a lot of your listeners probably gonna already know this, but you know William Carey, Andrew Fuller, William Carey, father of modern missions, he’s he he he makes the statement, “I’ll dangle at the end of the rope in the pit, if you’ll hold the rope,” talking to Fuller. And Fuller held the rope for him. Like, you know, Carey the mission field, Fuller’s raising money, preaching sermons, organizing mission boards. So that’s kind of the picture. Right.Andrew Hopper — So we say, all right, not everybody is going to go down into the pit of foster care adoption, even even families count. I mean, these are these are massive spiritual warfare battlegrounds you know um which is one of the reasons why our church wants to be involved so much. I mean you if you want to talk about getting to the you can do all the rhetoric in the world, brother, you want to get to the very bottom of societal issues, you you be involved in somebody’s story that’s trying that’s trying to get their kids back from the foster care system. You’re trying to help them with that. I mean, every you could fatherlessness, poverty, drug abuse. I mean, everything you can think, you know.Rich Birch — Right.Andrew Hopper — So this this is just spiritual war. So what we tell people is like, hey, man. If we got people that are mobilizing for for adoption and foster care, we better have people in their corne,r because the enemy is going to bring his war machine.Rich Birch — Right.Andrew Hopper — And we see it all the time. I mean, you’re going to see, you know, a family steps in to adopt and you’re going to start seeing them, you know, there can be sickness. They can have marital problems. They can have financial things that come up. They can begin to believe lies, frustrations. I mean, There’s just so they can become, you know, their their heart can start getting hard toward the system. I mean, there’s so many things that come at them. And so what we say is we need people in their corner, right. Andrew Hopper — Now, it’s funny because like the way our church has operated was at first we said, all right, we’re going to we’re going to do, you know, the the community group is going hold the rope for the people. And and that that was fine. The problem is when we really kicked off this ministry, so many people got involved that it became overwhelming to the group. So we said we got to start this… Rich Birch — Right. Andrew Hopper — …rope holding ministry. The rope holder ministry is good. It’s like, what does a rope holder do? They kind of do whatever the person needs them to do. Rich Birch — Right. Andrew Hopper — So there are examples of the rope holding ministry going really well, where it’s like, hey, man, they’re they’re helping with ah child care with the other kids when they’re going to foster care appointments in court. And or, hey, we’re we’re helping you do some things around the house whenever you’re overseas doing your adoption, which is going to put you three weeks in country. You know, there are some good examples like that. Andrew Hopper — But the other thing that we’ve learned is, you know, foster care and adoption families that are that are walking through this, they’re going through a very trying time. And to just pair them with somebody they don’t know and say, hey, look, here’s your supporter, it can be a little bit like, oh, that’s awesome, and then they never reach out to them.Rich Birch — Right.Andrew Hopper — They never reach out – the rope holder’s ready.Rich Birch — Right.Andrew Hopper — But it’s just like, dude, I don’t I don’t know you. And this is a hard time.Rich Birch — Who are you? Yeah, yeah.Andrew Hopper — And so what we’re trying to figure out now as we reboot that rope holder idea is, you know, how how do you kind of integrate relationships they’ve already had? Almost like, hey, do you have this massive pool of people called rope holders? Or when an adoptive family comes up, you say to them, hey, who can we shoulder tap, rope holder for you.Rich Birch — That’s good.Andrew Hopper — And then we’ll train them.Rich Birch — Oh, that’s cool. Yeah.Andrew Hopper — But not have this pool, but say for you, we’ll put them in. So that’s kind of what we’re, so as part of our reboot for 2030, you know, that’s sort of what’s in our mind right now.Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s cool.Andrew Hopper — We have a whole playbook for the way we’ve done it, which anybody, you know, if anybody wants any of those things, they can go to AndrewPHopper.com/chosen. And I can send you any of that stuff we have, but on the rope holder side, you know, just full transparency, we’re still, you know, kind of, of you know, and I’m sure it’ll always be that way that we make an improvement.Rich Birch — Yeah, always trying to make it better. Yeah. And I want to, yeah, at some point in this journey, you decided, hey, we’ve got to put this vision and framework into writing, like we and you actually ended up writing a book, and friends who are listening in, I want to encourage you to pick up a copy of this book. Listen, we’re almost half an hour in. I know you’re interested in this. This is the kind of thing you, Andrew’s a trusted leader. He’s, I’ve had a chance to take a peek at the book. This will be super helpful for you. But, but that’s a lot of effort to put this together into a book. What pushed you from just leading this ministry to ultimately saying, hey, I want to capture this into a resource that could help other people?Andrew Hopper — Well, you know, Rich, I never really saw myself as like a writer, just like a practitioner, man. Let’s just keep keep working on the thing and going.Rich Birch — Right.Andrew Hopper — And truthfully, I got approached. Hey, would you have any interest in writing? You know, New Growth Press is the one that’s editing this book and putting it out. And it was funny, though, because the second I was asked, I was like, man, I know what we should do [inaudible] that should be what we should do. It’s it’s our it’s it’s my story’s family story with our special needs child that we’ve adopted. It’s our church’s journey. But more important than either of those two things, it’s a grounding in the gospel-centered motivation. Because I think that is what is so important. We don’t do guilt motivation. And you know, cute kids and sad, cute kids and and sad stories are good reasons, but they you need a great reason, because it’s hard. Rich Birch — That’s good. Yep.Andrew Hopper — You know, and the great reason is of course, adopted people adopt people. And so we delve way into the helplessness of our spiritual condition, how God adopted us and then how, you know, that provides a deep motivation for us to go and do the same for others.Rich Birch — Can you unpack that a little bit more? Because I think this is, ah to me, a core part of the book that I think is really helpful. Even if you’re maybe listening in, you’re thinking, okay, I’m not sure adoption or foster care is necessarily the thing, but you unpack this idea of gospel rather than guilt. And can you talk us through, you know, how, yeah, just talk us through that part, that concept a bit more. Just double click on that a little bit.Andrew Hopper — Yeah. So, you know, when we think about behaviors that flow from the Christian life, there’s really only two ways to think about it, right? Like one of them is we try to do things in order that God would approve of us, you know, that he would, you know, he would, ah he would, he would let us in his family, you know, those those types of things. And we, you know, this is for a lot of Baptistic world, which I am, this was kind of like, wow, this is really revolutionary, but that was 20 years ago – Keller and all that. You know, we just started understanding what more of a gospel center motivation. Andrew Hopper — Of course, the other way to think about Christian behaviors is you are part of the family because of what Christ has done for you. And the family has a culture. The family works a certain way. There’s fruit that will pop out in your life, not so that you can gain entrance into the vine. That’s not how it works. Like, ah you know, you don’t you don’t produce fruit to get in the vine. You produce fruit because you’re in the vine. Andrew Hopper — And so, you know, when we think about like like Titus 2, for example, we think about how the grace of God appears to all men, teaching us not just salvation, but teaching us to obey his commands. So there’s something about salvation that and is inherent to the gospel-centered motivation of of of going out, living the Christian life. You know, it’s it’s kind of the John Bunyan idea when they said, man, if you, you know, if you keep preaching this gospel message, people are going to do whatever they want to do. And he said, no, if I keep preaching this gospel message, people are going to do whatever God wants them to do. Rich Birch — Right.Andrew Hopper — You know, and so I think what we’ve done in this book is just say, hey, that that is true universally in our Christian life. Like if I’m not tithing and I’m stingy, I can do motivation in two ways. Number one, how dare you, you piece of trash that you never, you know why would you never give? Look what God, you know, blah blah blah, blah, blah, guilt, guilt, shame, shame. Right. Andrew Hopper — Of course, the other way to say is like, man, what kind of riches has God given you in the gospel? And what kind of inheritance do you now have as a son of the king? It’s like, all right, that’s powerful, you know, and it will it will take us places that guilt never can. Guilt will work for a while. You can put fire under somebody and it’ll move them. But if you put it in them, they’ll run through a wall, you know. Rich Birch — So true.Andrew Hopper — And so it’s like it’s like, hey, OK, so you could do it with all these different things. We’ve tried to take this book and do that with adoption to say, all right.Rich Birch — Right.Andrew Hopper — We know James 1:27, we need to care for the fatherless and the orphan. We understand. I mean, dude, there ain’t, when you talk about metaphors, there’s two big ones, marriage and adoption, you know? And so if you want to do adoption well, we can do it from two motivations. One motivation is look how many kids need. That’s all and that’s all true. That moves my heart. You know, look, can you believe this story of this kid? And that’s fine.Andrew Hopper — Of course, you could do guilt, too. Like, how dare you, you know, have this nice, happy family and not go adopt a little poor orphan kid. You know, you could do guilt. All those things will be fine. They’ll put fire under you a little bit. But if you want to put the fire in someone that is going to carry them through the long haul of all this stuff, I think it’s better to start with: All right. There’s kids that need to be chosen. Were you chosen?Andrew Hopper — You know, so like one of the you know, one I’ll give you an example. We know of a family here in the tribe. They’ve got an awesome son that is 20-something years old, kids got Down syndrome, and they adopted him from Ecuador. And his story was one day a carpenter was working on this building and he heard cries coming out of a dump, like a trash heap. This child had just been born and been left you know with his deformities had just been left for the dumpster. Andrew Hopper — And they brought him to the orphanage. And next thing you know, you know about three or four years later, he got adopted by this family that we know. And that family’s father, he said, Eddie’s story is my story. I was pulled from a trash heap by a carpenter. And if you it’s like that is powerful. Rich Birch — Right. Yes.Andrew Hopper — You know, when you start thinking about, man, in my sin, I was one who had no part and parcel in the kingdom of God. I was headlong in rebellion. I had rejected. I was not a son. And God lavished his love upon me, that I would be called his child. And if if that has happened to me spiritually, how could I not want to do that? Or at least help those. you know I’m not saying that’s a call for everybody, but be involved in others that are doing that as well.Andrew Hopper — And so that’s what we say. Adopted people, adopt people, chosen people, choose people. And hey, I didn’t answer your last question. Rich Birch — That’s fine.Andrew Hopper — Okay. Your last question was, why did we write the book? Very simply, I think more people just need to think about what I just said. You know, and I think churches do. And I think that if, you know, a lot of churches have adoption-minded people and a little bit of of fuel in that fire might create some really cool ministry in that church. And this book lays really well for being like, man, make it a small group resource for eight weeks. You know, it’s got questions at the end of each chapter.Andrew Hopper — Like my my prayer is that this book would catalyze tens of thousands of Christian adoptions. Rich Birch — Wow. Andrew Hopper — And that’s why we wrote the book.Rich Birch — Yeah. It’s and I thought the same thing as I was looking through it, that this would be a great resource for a small group, a great resource as a staff training thing. Because again, I think there’s two things happening on two levels. From my perspective, there’s what you’re actually talking about – adoption, but then there’s how you talk about it. And I think even both of those, I think could be interesting as a as a staff team to kind of unpack and think about. How do we ensure that what we’re doing is so gospel-infused. That’s part of why i love you as a communicator. I think you do such a good job on that. It’s just fantastic. So I would strongly encourage people to pick it up.Rich Birch — Help me understand the connection. So Mercy Hill is known for, or at least from my perspective, known as a sending church. You know, the thing, one of the and I’ve told again, I told you this before, you’re the first church leader I’ve ever bumped into that has connected new here guests to number of missionaries sent. This like idea of like this funnel of how do we move people all the way along to that? I think that’s incredible. How does that kind of sending culture and adoption, how does that fit together? How does that help kind of fuel the flywheel of what’s happening at Mercy Hill?Andrew Hopper — Well, you you helped me think about this when you came and did our one day for our for our Breaking Barriers group, you know, for the pastoral trainings that we do. Because in your church growth book, you talk about how, ah you know, community ministry is used as an evangelism tool. I’m not, I’m probably butchering the way you talk about it.Rich Birch — Yep. Yep. Oh, that’s good. Yep. That’s great.Andrew Hopper — That was like a big light bulb for me because because we we definitely do that, but we have not leveraged the communications of that.Rich Birch — Right.Andrew Hopper — And so, um you know, for us now, what we’re trying to really think about is how does our adoption of foster care ministry and rope holding and families count ministry, how does that create open? We call them open doors, right? Rich Birch — Yep.Andrew Hopper — Like, how does it create open doors, questions in the community, where people come in? And we’ve seen it. You know, so like when we’re talking about the sending culture, that pipeline starts when new people get interested in faith, they get interested in church.Andrew Hopper — And, you know, like, for example, we we had a guy, we just did a historic video. Man, he’s saved, baptized, serving now, ah or, you know, family, young family, prototypical Mercy Hill guy, like, man, just you know blue collar heart, white collar job, just that. I mean, just everything we talk about. Right. He’s our he’s kind of our guy. And the way he got connected was his boss had signed up to be a rope holder. And it just blew his mind. Like, why would a guy take limited time and go help these families? I mean, he of course, he thought it was a good thing. But it really intrigued them. Andrew Hopper — And so we’ve tried to we’re trying to leverage more of the communication side. It’s tricky. You don’t want to be like, hey, look at us you know in the community. At the same time, I’m like, man, this year, you know when we’re going to do a pretty significant upgrade to some of the there our foster care system has, there’s a house that has a backyard and the backyard is where families come to play with kids, play with their kids they’re trying to get back from the foster care.Rich Birch — Right. Yep.Andrew Hopper — And we’ve said like, you know what, man, if these parents are putting in, that needs to be like the best, the best backyard, and you know?Rich Birch — Right. Yeah, absolutely. 100%.Andrew Hopper — And so, you know, we’re, we’re going to do a significant investment in some, you know, whatever…Rich Birch — Play structures and yeah. Andrew Hopper — …like a, you know, whatever, like a pergola type thing. They’re going put a shed out there. All going to connect it, pavers, all that stuff is what we want to do. And, you know, we’re, we’re looking at that and I’m going like, yeah, I mean, I get it. Like you don’t let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, but at the same time, that’s not for us. That’s for people that are interested to say like, why would a church do that? You know, like why do they care so much?Andrew Hopper — And it’s because, Hey, sign of the kingdom. We want to build families through adoption. We want to restore families through foster care and families count. This is part of that. So we’ve tried to we’ve tried to use it as a way. And I would really encourage church leaders to think about that. Like, hey, is your community ministry actually an evangelism strategy?Rich Birch — Right. Yeah, that’s good. Love that. And yeah, I would encourage you continue to encourage you to think through those things because I do think that there’s, we’ve seen that there’s huge opportunity for folks who don’t normally attend church. They’re interested the way I’ve said in other contexts is they see it as a good thing. We see it as a God thing. We’re not going to fight them over the semantics of it at the front end. Because like you say it’s it’s the kingdom puncturing through that grabs their attention and you’re like oh what what you know what’s going on there? It’s a first step – how do we encourage those people? Rich Birch — Like on that backyard project, I no doubt if you’re rallying a bunch of guys to go work there, I know that there are guys in your church who have friends who they could invite who don’t attend church who maybe would never walk in your church who’d say, hey, will you come and work for a Saturday for a couple hours and swing a hammer and help us do this thing? Let me explain what this is about.They absolutely would show up, right? 100% they’d show up and and they’ll get intrigued by that. And they’ll be like, oh, what’s going on there? That’s that’s fantastic. Rich Birch — Well, friends, unabashedly, I want you to pick up copies of, not just a copy, copies of this book. So where do we want to send people to pick up copies, that sort of thing?Andrew Hopper — Yeah, man, they can just go to andrewphopper.com/chosen. Rich Birch — Perfect. Yep.Andrew Hopper — The book’s out so they can pick up a copy. I mean, it’s also just like on Amazon or whatever, but that link will take you straight to New Growth Press.Rich Birch — Right.Andrew Hopper — So, yeah, man, would love it. Would love to hear from anybody who’s using it well in a church context um to catalyze Christian adoption.Rich Birch — Love it. Anything else you want to share just as we close and how can people track, go to the website, other places we want to send them as we close up today.Andrew Hopper — Also on Instagram, we have a lot of stuff on Instagram, andrewphopper on Instagram. Yeah, the last thing I would say as a closing thought, Rich, is you know, the Christian adoption boom has sort of happened 20 years ago. People started talking about this a lot more. And now you can feel in some of the podcast world and all that, there’s a bit of a backlash, not not to don’t do it, but also like, hey, no one told us how hard this was going to be. Andrew Hopper — You’re dealing with traumatic situations, kids that have been brought, you know, I mean, it’s, it’s crazy. One thing I try to do in this book is I try to say, Hey, that’s not a good reason to take our ball and go home, you know.Rich Birch — That’s good.Andrew Hopper — Instead we just need to try to shoot as straight as we can. And I do that in this book, man. It is hard. It’s you’re on the front lines of spiritual war. I mean, it’s almost like, dude, the, the, the greatest transfer of faith from one generation to another happens in the home. We love it when adults get saved. I get that. But let’s be honest. Statistically, where does it normally happen? Right. Rich Birch — Yeah. Kids. Andrew Hopper — And so if you got a home that’s broken apart, that Christians are trying to put back together, what did we think Satan was going to do? You know, and so instead of taking our ball and going home, let’s just call it what it is, and then ask the Lord to steel our spine… Rich Birch — That’s good. Andrew Hopper — …and to move forward with the mission. So, yeah, man, I’d love for people to pick it up. And I appreciate the time to talk about it today.Rich Birch — Andrew, thanks so much. Appreciate you. Just want to honor you for the work you do. You’re a great leader. And I love how God’s using you and your church to make a difference. Thanks for being on the show today.Andrew Hopper — Thanks, brother.

In this episode of the Club Junkie Podcast, we take a deep dive into TaylorMade's all-new Qi Max and Qi Max HL irons. Designed for maximum forgiveness, launch, and consistency, these irons are built to help golfers play better—and today we break down exactly how they do it. We're joined by Matt Bovee from TaylorMade, who walks us through the technology behind the Qi Max family, including face design, CG placement, forgiveness differences between Qi Max and Qi Max HL, and who each iron is really built for. We also discuss fitting considerations, shaft pairings, and how these irons compare to previous TaylorMade game-improvement models. If you're considering new irons for 2026 or want to understand how modern iron tech is evolving, this episode is a must-listen.

It’s Time to Redefine Success for You and Your People In the high-stakes game of business, we are often obsessed with the scoreboard—profit margins, market share, and rankings. But the greatest mentor of all time, Coach John Wooden, taught us that true success isn't merely about winning; it is about the peace of mind attained only through self-satisfaction in knowing you made the effort to do the best of which you are capable. Too many leaders today are burning out chasing the “win” while losing the heart of their team. It is time to redefine what it means to lead. This week on A New Direction, I am sitting down with the man recognized as “America's Breakthrough Coach,” Brian Biro. We are discussing his book, Beyond Success, and the profound lessons he learned directly from his mentor, John Wooden. Brian doesn’t just theorize about culture; he shows you how to build it. We are going to explore how to apply Wooden's timeless principles to the modern workplace, shifting your team from a group of employees to a collective of high-performers who genuinely care about the mission and each other. This conversation is vital for every leader, entrepreneur, and coach who wants to build a legacy that lasts. We will dive into how to foster a spirit of “industriousness and enthusiasm” in your organization and how to break through the fear that stifles innovation. Brian is going to share the secrets of how to lead with love and discipline simultaneously, creating an environment where success is the natural by-product of character. This is about taking your business from transactional to transformational. This is your opportunity to learn the blueprint for greatness from a man who learned from the master himself. Bring your notebook and your team—this is the kind of wisdom that changes trajectories. If you cannot join the livestream, make sure to subscribe and download the podcast later. Don't settle for being a boss; tune in and learn how to become a leader who goes beyond success. Brian Biro‘s book, “Beyond Success: – The 15 Secrets to Effective Leadership and Life Based on Legendary Coach John Wooden’s Pyramid of Success” is a timeless and outstanding read!  The stories and practical applications are just as relevant today as they were when John Wooden coached his last year in the mid-seventies. In today’s world we are so focused on the results we are employing strategies at the sacrifice of human fundamentals that either burn our people out or burn us out.  Let’s be honest all business is about people. Not just the people we sell to, but the people who do the selling, who handle the paperwork, who mop the floor.  All of business is people, and if we are not handling our people well.  We have already lost. The fact is all success is going to start with the number one person we need to develop first. And that is us.  Sadly, in today’s world we are so concerned with our reputation and what other’s think we are less focused on developing our character.  But it is from our character that will drive our enthusiasm, beliefs, and vision.  Without fully developed character or vision is nothing more than words on the wall.  Empty and meaningless. Beyond Success is truly a refreshing read, that gets grounded into the basics of who we are, getting the most out of the people around us, and building the right blocks so that what naturally flows is competitive greatness. Get your copy of “Beyond Success” by clicking here. Please thank the sponsors of A New Direction Linda Craft Team, Realtors   Linda built her business in 1985 one relationship at a time, and her team and her continue to do the same things she did 40 years later. They have provided thousands of people the ability to help people sell or buy their next home with personalized legendary customer service. They have the experience, knowledge, and understanding of the home industry.  They also understand you and what you want and need from your next home purchase or sale. What is more they can help you regardless of where you live.  Ready to buy or sell your next home or your first…click on over to to www.LindaCraft.com Enhance Your Audiobook Experience with Zoundy! If you're an author or narrator looking to produce high-quality audiobooks with ease, Zoundy is the ultimate tool you need. Designed specifically for audiobook creation, Zoundy delivers crystal-clear sound, seamless editing capabilities, and professional-grade production tools—all in one intuitive platform. Whether you're recording your own book or refining your narration, Zoundy ensures every word is heard with perfection. And here's the best part: As a listener of A New Direction, you get an exclusive deal! Head over to zoundy.com/jay and use the code JAY25 at checkout to unlock special savings on your audiobook production. Don't settle for anything less than studio-quality sound—power up your audiobook journey today with Zoundy! Here is the truth: You tune into A New Direction because you want to grow. But consuming content and executing strategy are two different things. If you are leading a company between $5M and $50M and you feel like you are hitting a ceiling, the problem isn't a lack of information. It's likely a “human” bottleneck. I am Coach Jay, a Behavioral Strategist who specializes in fixing the friction that kills profit. I don't just look at your P&L; I look at the psychology of the people driving it. I recently helped a stalled mid-market firm save $3 Million and secure new capital—not by firing people, but by realigning their behavior. Stop guessing. Let's find the millions trapped in your org chart. Reach out for a discreet conversation: 919-369-2121 or visit TheCoachJay.com.

JD Sharp joins Stew to blow the lid off Trump's brutal betrayal—U.S. black ops just snatched President Maduro and his wife in a midnight raid, igniting an all-out war to crush one of the last holdout nations against the global elite. JD drops explosive details on how Venezuela's fierce fightback will drain American blood and treasure for the power brokers' agenda.   Description: Six years after the COVID death shots, turbo cancers are exploding, kids are dropping dead from myocarditis, and babies are born broken yet no doctor, nurse, or pharma exec has faced justice. Laura Hartman from Ezra Healing joins me to expose this protected genocide and revea   Charlie Kirk wasn't gunned down, his neck was ripped open by a concealed bomb in his lapel mic, detonated from afar to crush a voice challenging the Zionist power structure. John Bray joins Stew with game-changing evidence that proves the mechanics behind Charlie's fatal blow.  

Would you like access to our advanced agency training for FREE? https://www.agencymastery360.com/training Do you feel constantly worried about shrinking organic visibility, heavier ad pressure, and constant change? Running an agency has never been a straight line. Platforms change, algorithms shift, and what worked five years ago can quietly stop working overnight. Organic visibility is shrinking, ads are getting more expensive, and uncertainty feels constant. Today's featured guest knows that reality and will share her journey from agency employee to founder of a 43-person local SEO agency, along with her honest perspective on Google, AI, remote teams, and why growing bigger can actually create more freedom and impact when done for the right reasons. Joy Hawkins is the founder and owner of Sterling Sky, a specialized local SEO agency focused on helping businesses rank on Google Maps and local search results. She has been working in the SEO industry since 2006 and is widely known for her deep understanding of how Google's algorithm works, especially in local search. Sterling Sky is a fully remote agency with team members spread across Canada and the United States. What started as a small consulting experiment has grown into a 43-person team over eight years. In this episode, we'll discuss: Google, AI, and the future of local SEO Why SEO agencies must diversify to survive Building a fully remote team. Subscribe Apple | Spotify | iHeart Radio Sponsors and Resources E2M Solutions: Today's episode of the Smart Agency Masterclass is sponsored by E2M Solutions, a web design, and development agency that has provided white-label services for the past 10 years to agencies all over the world. Check out e2msolutions.com/smartagency and get 10% off for the first three months of service. From Agency Employee to Founder of a Local SEO Agency After more than a decade inside agencies, Joy realized she was more interested in how systems worked than in selling them. When disagreements about services and sales responsibilities reached a breaking point, she decided to try consulting (fully prepared to dip into savings and return to a job if needed). Clients came faster than expected. Eight years later, that experiment has grown into a 43-person remote agency. Google, AI, and the Future of Local SEO One of the biggest challenges Joy sees in the industry right now is the pace of change inside Google's ecosystem. Features are constantly being swapped out, organic real estate is shrinking, and small businesses are feeling the impact more than ever. While agencies can usually adapt, clients often struggle because Google still represents such a large percentage of their lead flow. A major concern Joy sees is how Google is pushing more ads and limiting organic exposure, especially in local results. On mobile devices, users are now seeing local service ads dominate the top of the screen, followed by AI-driven local results that are shrinking from three listings down to one in some cases. For businesses that used to rely on being second or third in the map pack, this shift can mean a dramatic drop in calls almost overnight. Despite the fear around AI, Joy does not believe Google is going anywhere. As she points out, Google's real advantage is data. Reviews, location history, calls, visits, and behavior all live inside Google Maps. That depth of information is something other platforms struggle to match. Local SEO is still viable, but it is no longer free traffic in the way many business owners became used to. The bigger lesson is not about Google itself, but about dependency. When an agency or a business relies too heavily on one channel, any change can feel catastrophic. The agencies that struggle the most right now tend to be those built around rigid, cookie-cutter systems that cannot flex with the landscape. Why SEO Agencies Must Diversify to Survive Agency owners who want time to adapt should keep in mind it's always better to have an outbound strategy, an inbound strategy, and partnerships that you can rely on. If all your business comes from one channel and that channel changes, you are forced into reaction mode. The opportunity here is for agencies to guide clients toward broader strategies. That might include paid ads, partnerships, or even old school tactics like direct mail and local sponsorships. The exact tactic matters less than the mindset. Businesses need multiple levers to pull so they are not held hostage by one platform's decisions. For instance, right now everyone's scrambling to adopt AI in their processes, services, and more. But you should also try to understand the economics behind AI and advertising. The massive data centers, energy consumption, and infrastructure costs mean that today's low prices will not last forever. Platforms are investing heavily now with the expectation that monetization will follow. For agency owners, this reinforces the importance of pricing correctly, setting expectations with clients, and building offers that account for rising costs and shrinking organic margins. Building a Fully Remote Agency Joy's agency started more as a practical decision than a remote-first experiment. After years of working from home she saw no reason to take on the overhead of an office. The cost savings mattered early on, but the flexibility mattered even more. Without a commute, Joy could better balance work and family life. That same benefit extended to her team. Many of her early hires were former coworkers from an agency that later shut down, people she already trusted and respected. Since they were geographically spread out, an office would have created unnecessary friction. Expanding into the United States was also a strategic move. Joy wanted access to a larger talent pool so she could be extremely selective about who she hired. Being remote made it possible to hire people who were already passionate about local SEO instead of settling for whoever happened to live nearby. Culture, Connection, and Team Building at Scale One of the risks of running a remote agency is losing human connection. Joy is very intentional about avoiding that. While informal meetups happen more often in Canada, the entire team gets together once a year for an in person retreat. The goal of these retreats is mostly relationship building. Joy genuinely likes the people she works with and considers many of them friends. She believes that strong relationships create trust, better communication, and a healthier work environment overall. Joy sees firsthand how flexible work, reasonable boundaries, and a supportive environment can be life changing for employees who came from toxic workplaces. That impact has become a meaningful part of why she continues to grow the agency. Why Scaling the Agency Became a Mission When she first started her agency, Joy wanted a small team. Ten people or fewer. Highly experienced. Minimal management. That vision changed a few years in, and the reason surprised her. Around two years in, her agency began supporting a charity in Uganda, and the more she built that relationship, the more Joy saw how far a single dollar could stretch there compared to North America. Visiting in person made the impact real. She realized that by growing the agency, she could dramatically increase the good they could do through that partnership. The same realization applied to her team. As the agency grew, Joy saw how stable, flexible work improved her employees' lives. That sense of responsibility and opportunity shifted her perspective as she figured out her purpose. Now growth was no longer about ego or scale for its own sake. It became a way to create more impact both inside and outside the business. Leadership, Delegation, and Hiring for Your Weaknesses Agency owners who wish to keep their businesses small are often thinking about the nightmare that running a big agency can be. They imagine that the headaches they deal with at ten employees will just double if the team doubles. However, this was never the case for Joy. When she thinks about overworking she thinks about her time working for others. This is probably because Joy has always been very clear about what she does not enjoy. Accounting, taxes, and people management are high on the list, and instead of forcing herself to become good at everything, she hired people who genuinely enjoy those areas. A strong accountant removed massive mental load early on and hiring leadership team members who thrive on managing people allowed Joy to focus on strategy and innovation. She believes this is one of the biggest unlocks for agency owners who feel trapped. Delegation is not about offloading busywork. It is about trusting capable people to own outcomes. Joy prefers hiring experienced professionals over entry level talent because she does not want to micromanage. Her expectations are high, but so is her respect for her team's autonomy. Do You Want to Transform Your Agency from a Liability to an Asset? Looking to dig deeper into your agency's potential? Check out our Agency Blueprint. Designed for agency owners like you, our Agency Blueprint helps you uncover growth opportunities, tackle obstacles, and craft a customized blueprint for your agency's success.

5pm: Two break-ins, one week: Seattle shop owner ‘scared it’ll happen again’ // Harger: WA leads the nation in retail theft. Issaquah shows how to fix it //  ‘Designed to be addictive’: Study finds teens spend more than an hour per day on phones at school // Why smaller houses can lead to happier lives // Letters

Stay ahead of hazardous winter weather with our regional road and interstate forecast covering I-80, I-70, I-90, and I-25 across Wyoming, Nebraska, Montana, Colorado, and New Mexico. This daily 3 PM Mountain Time update (Monday through Friday, with weekend editions as needed) delivers the latest information on snow, ice, high winds, reduced visibility, and dangerous travel conditions. Designed for both the general public and commercial drivers, including long-haul truckers, our forecast highlights critical impacts to major freight corridors and holiday travel routes. If you depend on safe and efficient travel across the central and northern Rockies, this winter-weather road report helps you plan ahead, avoid delays, and stay informed.

Mitch Snow, Special Forces vet who spotted Erica Kirk at Fort Huachuca days before Charlie's assassination, is under savage attack by deep-state shills. Tonight he fires back, obliterates their lies, and proves their smears only drag the killers closer to justice. The quiet beach getaway turned into a spectacle when I went shirtless – ripped like a pro athlete because John & Chelsea Jubilee's Energized Health Protocol rebuilt me cell by cell with insane energy and clarity. Real fat loss and age reversal awaits,  grab the My 555 Challenge at My555Challenge.com for just $5 and lose 5 pounds in 5 days!

Signed into law by President Dwight D. Eisenhower, The Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956, otherwise known as the National Interstate and Defense Highways Act, ushered in an unprecedented era of roadbuilding in the United States, becoming the largest public works project in the country's history. Designed to spread freedom and prosperity — and, as the name implies, provide for the national defense — these highways tore through urban neighborhoods, destroying once-thriving communities and displacing countless citizens, many of them people of color. In this special report, we examine just what inspired this massive project and the effects it had on two communities, one in New Orleans and one in Syracuse. This episode was produced with the generous support of the Helen & William Mazer Foundation. Join The War on Cars on Patreon and listen to exclusive ad-free versions of regular episodes, Patreon-only bonus content, Discord access, invitations to live events, merch discounts and free stickers! Order our new book, Life After Cars: Freeing Ourselves from the Tyranny of the Automobile, out now from Thesis, an imprint of Penguin Random House. Find us on tour and get tickets at lifeaftercars.com. Thanks to Cleverhood for sponsoring this episode. Listen to this episode for the latest discount code and get the best rain gear for walking and cycling. www.thewaroncars.org  

In today's devotional, Dr. Michael A. Youssef reveals that the source of contentment is understanding who we are in Christ.   If you would like more insight into today's devotional topic, listen to Dr. Michael A. Youssef's sermon It's Contagious . . . Pass It On!, Part 7: LISTEN NOW

Stay ahead of hazardous winter weather with our regional road and interstate forecast covering I-80, I-70, I-90, and I-25 across Wyoming, Nebraska, Montana, Colorado, and New Mexico. This daily 3 PM Mountain Time update (Monday through Friday, with weekend editions as needed) delivers the latest information on snow, ice, high winds, reduced visibility, and dangerous travel conditions. Designed for both the general public and commercial drivers, including long-haul truckers, our forecast highlights critical impacts to major freight corridors and holiday travel routes. If you depend on safe and efficient travel across the central and northern Rockies, this winter-weather road report helps you plan ahead, avoid delays, and stay informed.

Click here to Shop Affirmation Decks, Oracle Decks, and more! Use Promo code: RCPODCAST20 for 20% off your first order!   Today's Power Affirmation: As I give to others, my life becomes fulfilled.   Today's Oracle of Motivation: When you give something to another person, whether material or in service, a physiological response happens within you. A warm, fuzzy feeling creeps in and helps you make sexy time with your happiness. Your brain releases pleasure endorphins, including oxytocin, which lowers stress. Oxytocin makes you feel more connected to others, which is why good deeds are often paid forward. The greatest gift to yourself is a gift to someone else. Pay it forward!   Designed to Motivate Your Creative Maniac Mind The 60-Second Power Affirmations Podcast is designed to help you focus, affirm your visions, and harness the power within your creative maniac mind! Join us every Monday and Thursday for a new 60-second power affirmation followed by a blast of oracle motivation from the Universe (+ a quick breathing meditation). It's time to take off your procrastination diaper and share your musings with the world!   For more musings, visit RageCreate.com     Leave a Review & Share! Apple Podcast reviews are one of THE most important factors for podcasts. If you enjoy the show, please take a second to leave the show a review on Apple Podcasts! Click this link: Leave a review on Apple Podcasts Hit “Listen on Apple Podcasts” on the left-hand side under the picture. Scroll down under “Ratings & Reviews” & click “Write A Review” Leave an honest review. You're awesome!  

Episode Title: Personal Attention ASMR with Soft Thunderstorm Ambience for SleepDescription:In this episode, immerse yourself in a soothing blend of personal attention ASMR paired with the gentle sounds of a soft thunderstorm. Designed to help you unwind and drift into restful sleep, this calming combination creates a peaceful atmosphere that eases the mind and relaxes the body. Whether you're struggling with insomnia or simply want to enhance your bedtime routine, let these tranquil sounds guide you toward deep relaxation and rejuvenating rest.Take a moment to pause, breathe deeply, and allow the comforting whispers and rain-soaked ambiance to wash away the day's stress. Sweet dreams start here.Join us next time as we continue to explore ways to bring calm and relaxation into your daily life.DISCLAIMER

Episode 207. We're wrapping up 2025 with a look back at the things we absolutely loved this year! Join us as we dive into the movies, books, and beauty products that made the year unforgettable. It's like a year-end recap mixed with a conversation with your besties!On this episode >> dance dance dance >> movie nights >> cheerleading __________Join the Geriatric Millennials Community! Instagram: @thegeriatricmillennialsFacebook: facebook.com/TheGeriatricMillennialsTheme music by The Finley Ghost__________Connect with Beth:Instagram: @eransofarInstagram: @paperwhale_paper whale: www.paperwhale.comConnect with Jayme:Instagram: @justenjoyjaymeFacebook: facebook.com/jayme.jones.75__________Beth and Jayme are long time friends and geriatric millennials. Relish in their unique perspectives as you workout, commute, fold laundry, or just need a break from the reality of this timeline! Listen in as they tell stories, discuss every topic under the sun, and just enjoy being in conversation with a friend. Designed to be the soundtrack for the mundane.

First Baptist Arlington, hosts Katy Reed Hodges and Dr. Dennis Wiles gather around the mic to unpack Flourishing.In this episode, the team reflects on the first Sunday of New Year and Dr. Wiles' sermon, Designed to Flourish! -by discussing their theme of "flourishing together" and their upcoming study of the Book of John.The Tell Me More podcast hosts return for 2025 with excitement about their church's new focus on "flourishing together." Drawing from the powerful imagery of a super bloom in Death Valley, they illustrate how God can bring extraordinary life from seemingly barren places. This becomes their central metaphor for the year - that under the right spiritual conditions, people who seem dormant can experience incredible growth and transformation.The discussion centers on their upcoming study of the Book of John, which contains rich imagery about abiding, gardening, and spiritual fruitfulness. They emphasize that true flourishing isn't about material prosperity or the absence of pain, but about experiencing God's goodness even in difficult circumstances. The hosts share their partnership with the Global Flourishing Study and their commitment to intentional discipleship. They believe that consistently putting oneself in the right spiritual conditions - through Bible study, community, and faithful obedience - will bear fruit over time, not just in individual lives but in ways that bless everyone around them.

CONSTANTINOPLE AS HELM'S DEEP AND THE LATIN-GREEK SCHISM Colleagues Gaius and Germanicus, Friends of History Debating Society, Londinium, 91 AD. The final segment eulogizes Constantinople as a "perfect," intentionally designed city that served as "Helm's Deep" for Western civilization, preserving law, credit, and military organization when the rest of the West was atomized. The speakers detail the tragic sack of the city in 1204 by Latin Crusaders, describing it as a betrayal driven by the enduring envy and "bipolar tension" between the Latin West and the Greek East. This event stripped the city of its "divine" status and gold, ending its role as a sanctuary. They conclude by linking this ancient schism to the modern world, positing that the current geopolitical conflict between the US (the inheritor of the Latin West) and Russia (centered in Moscow, the successor to the Greek East) is a continuation of this unresolved cultural and religious struggle. NUMBER 3 1954

Turn online alignment into an offline community — join us at TheWayFwrd.com to connect with like-minded people near you.If consciousness is moving forward, are you moving with it or resisting the invitation?In this episode, I sit down with Edmund Knighton for a grounded, uncompromising conversation on The Law of One, consciousness evolution, and why love isn't a feeling you wait for, it's something you practice.This discussion moves through the nature of density of consciousness, the accelerating forces of polarization, and why service to self vs service to others isn't a moral debate, but an evolutionary sorting process. Conflict, suffering, and global instability aren't framed as failures of the system here, they're revealed as catalysts for awakening, testing whether we respond with fear or clarity.We also address why spiritual bypassing keeps people stuck, how vulnerability functions as a stabilizing force rather than a weakness, and why embodiment — not dissociation — is required for real spiritual maturity.If you've felt unsure how to stay grounded, this episode offers clarity.You'll Learn:[00:00] Introduction[02:22] What vulnerability reveals about transformation in the present[08:44] Alec's dream about his grandfather revealed the movement from 3rd to 4th density consciousness[15:19] The Buddha in Red Face story[21:11] Integrating masculine and feminine energies increases the strength of both rather than diminishing either[32:52] When Edmund discovered The Law of One[42:53] The eight densities of consciousness [53:01] Practicing love during division without falling into spiritual bypassing[01:10:01] Why those in service to self are actually serving us by offering opportunities to choose love[01:20:05] How the veil of forgetting and free will allow us to remember our true nature as creators[01:43:58] Distinguishing your own essence from external noise through stillness and Steiner's practices[01:57:35] Why true forgiveness becomes unnecessary when we understand our projections[02:17:16] Why we cannot return to tribal ways and must move forward with new forms of conscious community[02:39:30] What the Germanic and Slavic epochs reveal about humanity's progression from individual thinking to soul-warmed communityRelated The Way Forward Episodes:Beyond Verbal Autists, Telepathy & The Nature Of Thought with Melissa Jolly Graves | YouTubeSoulstice Magic, 13 Holy Nights & Neurogenic Qigong featuring Lara Day | YouTubeMemoirs of a Child Sex Slave: Quest For Love featuring Anneke Lucas | YoutubeResources Mentioned:Law of One | WebsiteBe Here Farm + Nature | WebsiteBeing Human Event | WebsiteBuddha in Redface by Eduardo Duran | BookTranscendent Sex by Jenny Wade | BookThe Red Lion by Maria Szepes | BookMutant Message Down Under by Marlo Morgan | Book or AudiobookClick here to enroll in the 2026 season of Being Human. Mention that you found the Being Human program through The Way Forward and receive a $300 discount.Find more from Edmund:Edmund Knighton | EmailClick here for Dark Room RetreatsFind more from Alec:Alec Zeck | InstagramAlec Zeck | XThe Way Forward | InstagramThe Way Forward is Sponsored By:Paleovalley is 100% Grass-Fed Bone Broth Protein is a nutrient-dense, easy-to-digest source of collagen and essential amino acids. Sourced from grass-fed cows, this protein powder provides the building blocks for healthy joints, skin, and gut function—without fillers or artificial ingredients. Support the show and claim 15% off your PaleoValley order!Designed for deep focus and well-being. 100% blue light and flicker free. For $50 off your Daylight Computer, use discount code: TWF50New Biology Clinic: Redefine Health from the Ground UpExperience tailored terrain-based health services with consults, livestreams, movement classes, and more. Visit www.NewBiologyClinic.com and use code THEWAYFORWARD (case sensitive) for $50 off activation. Members get the $150 fee waived

As a mom, business owner and woman on the go, Allyson Mandelbaum was faced with the eternal question, "How can I look cute, but still have dirty hair?" ...And that is how Shady Lady was born. Allyson loves wearing hats but could never find the perfect one. They were either too stiff, too big, had team names, or adorned with cheesy catch phrases. After a lot of unsuccessful searching, she came to only one conclusion: If she couldn't find the hat of her dreams, she had to make it. Designed in Fairfield, CT and available for kids and adults, Shady Lady hats are inspired by fun times with fabulous girlfriends and beach days that turn into cozy nights around the fire pit. At Shady Lady they want you to have fun and not take yourself too seriously because every lady is a little bit shady. Allyson joins Justin to discuss this fast-growing "shady" brand!

Stay ahead of hazardous winter weather with our regional road and interstate forecast covering I-80, I-70, I-90, and I-25 across Wyoming, Nebraska, Montana, Colorado, and New Mexico. This daily 3 PM Mountain Time update (Monday through Friday, with weekend editions as needed) delivers the latest information on snow, ice, high winds, reduced visibility, and dangerous travel conditions. Designed for both the general public and commercial drivers, including long-haul truckers, our forecast highlights critical impacts to major freight corridors and holiday travel routes. If you depend on safe and efficient travel across the central and northern Rockies, this winter-weather road report helps you plan ahead, avoid delays, and stay informed.

Click here to Shop Affirmation Decks, Oracle Decks, and more! Use Promo code: RCPODCAST20 for 20% off your first order!   Today's Power Affirmation: I consciously connect with my meals, one bite at a time.   Today's Oracle of Motivation: Sharing a meal was once a sacred ritual for all living creatures. Though we still depend on food for survival, much of the developed world has forgotten the sacredness of the meal thanks to the easy access and the "busyness" of life. What if you slowed down, closed your eyes, and dedicated all your senses to each bite of a meal? What is the aroma, texture, flavor? Where did this food come from? What sacrifice, cultivation, and transportation occurred for this food to end up in your belly, providing you with energy and a new life force? Every meal should be a Thanksgiving...   Designed to Motivate Your Creative Maniac Mind The 60-Second Power Affirmations Podcast is designed to help you focus, affirm your visions, and harness the power within your creative maniac mind! Join us every Monday and Thursday for a new 60-second power affirmation followed by a blast of oracle motivation from the Universe (+ a quick breathing meditation). It's time to take off your procrastination diaper and share your musings with the world!   For more musings, visit RageCreate.com     Leave a Review & Share! Apple Podcast reviews are one of THE most important factors for podcasts. If you enjoy the show, please take a second to leave the show a review on Apple Podcasts! Click this link: Leave a review on Apple Podcasts Hit “Listen on Apple Podcasts” on the left-hand side under the picture. Scroll down under “Ratings & Reviews” & click “Write A Review” Leave an honest review. You're awesome!  

In this episode of Run the Numbers, CJ Gustafson sits down with Gordon Coyle, a 40-year commercial insurance veteran, to demystify one of the most anxiety-inducing topics for founders and CFOs: business insurance. Drawing on decades of experience with startups, scaleups, and regulated industries, Gordon breaks down what leaders need to know about D&O, E&O, cyber, and general liability, why investor pressure is rising, and where “cheap and easy” online policies fail when real risk hits. Through real-world examples, they explore how claims arise, how defense costs erode limits, why cyber insurance is as much about response as reimbursement, and how to balance budget, risk tolerance, and peer benchmarks—treating insurance as a critical layer of protection, not a box-checking exercise.—SPONSORS:Abacum is a modern FP&A platform built by former CFOs to replace slow, consultant-heavy planning tools. With self-service integrations and AI-powered workflows for forecasting, variance analysis, and scenario modeling, Abacum helps finance teams scale without becoming software admins. Trusted by teams at Strava, Replit, and JG Wentworth—learn more at https://www.abacum.aiBrex is an intelligent finance platform that combines corporate cards, built-in expense management, and AI agents to eliminate manual finance work. By automating expense reviews and reconciliations, Brex gives CFOs more time for the high-impact work that drives growth. Join 35,000+ companies like Anthropic, Coinbase, and DoorDash at https://www.brex.com/metricsMetronome is real-time billing built for modern software companies. Metronome turns raw usage events into accurate invoices, gives customers bills they actually understand, and keeps finance, product, and engineering perfectly in sync. That's why category-defining companies like OpenAI and Anthropic trust Metronome to power usage-based pricing and enterprise contracts at scale. Focus on your product — not your billing. Learn more and get started at https://www.metronome.comRightRev is an automated revenue recognition platform built for modern pricing models like usage-based pricing, bundles, and mid-cycle upgrades. RightRev lets companies scale monetization without slowing down close or compliance. For RevRec that keeps growth moving, visit https://www.rightrev.comRillet is an AI-native ERP built for modern finance teams that want to close faster without fighting legacy systems. Designed to support complex revenue recognition, multi-entity operations, and real-time reporting, Rillet helps teams achieve a true zero-day close—with some customers closing in hours, not days. If you're scaling on an ERP that wasn't built in the 90s, book a demo at https://www.rillet.com/cjTabs is an AI-native revenue platform that unifies billing, collections, and revenue recognition for companies running usage-based or complex contracts. By bringing together ERP, CRM, and real product usage data into a single system of record, Tabs eliminates manual reconciliations and speeds up close and cash collection. Companies like Cortex, Statsig, and Cursor trust Tabs to scale revenue efficiently. Learn more at https://www.tabs.com/run—LINKS:Gordon on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gordoncoyle/The Coyle Group: https://thecoylegroup.com/CJ on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cj-gustafson-13140948/Mostly metrics: https://www.mostlymetrics.com—RELATED EPISODES:The Coyle Group - Business Insurancehttps://www.youtube.com/@TheCoyleGroupNY—TIMESTAMPS:00:00:00 Preview and Intro00:01:53 Sponsors — Abacum | Brex | Metronome00:05:39 Interview Begins with Gordon Coyle00:06:23 Gordon Coyle & The Coyle Group00:07:21 Explaining Insurance on YouTube00:08:40 Turning Education into Inbound Leads00:09:40 Content as a Pull Strategy00:10:53 Insurance Complexity for Tech Founders00:13:28 Why Investors Require D&O Insurance00:14:09 What D&O Covers and Why It Matters00:15:50 Sponsors — RightRev | Rillet | Tabs00:20:19 Who D&O Covers and Rising Investor Pressure00:22:37 D&O Limits and Cost Tradeoffs00:23:21 Panic Calls and Late D&O Purchases00:24:39 How Defense Costs Erode Coverage00:25:31 Common D&O Claims and Employment Risk00:27:08 D&O vs E&O Explained00:29:12 Cyber Insurance and Social Engineering00:31:59 AI's Impact on Cyber Risk00:33:50 Real-World Ransomware Stories00:34:17 Cyber Insurance as Money and Response00:35:29 Business Email Compromise Scams00:39:43 Why Tech Still Needs General Liability00:41:16 What a BOP Covers00:42:32 Convenience vs Proper Coverage00:44:29 Surprising General Liability Claims00:46:45 Insurance Costs for Startups00:47:36 Higher Costs in High-Risk Industries00:48:26 Balancing Budget, Risk, and Coverage00:50:39 PEOs, Workers' Comp, and EPLI00:54:39 Choosing the Right Insurance Partner00:56:42 End Credits#RunTheNumbersPodcast #StartupFinance #BusinessInsurance #RiskManagement #CyberRisk This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit cjgustafson.substack.com

Episode Title: Quiet, Gentle Rain Ambience Designed to Help You Recharge at NightDescription:In this episode, immerse yourself in the soothing sounds of quiet, gentle rain created specifically to help you unwind and recharge during the night. Discover how these calming rain ambiences can ease your mind, promote restful sleep, and restore your energy for the day ahead. Whether you're winding down after a long day or seeking a peaceful background for meditation, this episode offers the perfect natural soundtrack to bring tranquility into your evening.Take a moment for yourself tonight—let the gentle rain wash away stress and invite deep relaxation.We look forward to having you with us in the next episode as we continue exploring ways to find peace and calm in everyday life.DISCLAIMER

Take a peek outside your window and, wow, it's like the universe decided to throw us into the wildest sci-fi mashup ever. We've got whispers of global conflict, aliens making headlines (seriously!), AI popping up everywhere you look, drones and robots straight outta Terminator, political drama that feels more like a thriller than reality, quantum tech threatening to flip everything upside down—and let's not forget those rumblings of civil unrest in places we never thought we'd see it.If your head's spinning just reading that list, you're not alone. But hey—maybe all this chaos is just the cosmic nudge we need to wake up and start weaving some real magic together.It feels like we're headed towards the climax of a movie that 8 billion of us came to Earth to witness and participate in…So what's actually going on, and how can you prepare yourself for what's coming?Simply put, we're entering the final climactic years of the Fourth Turning, and things are about to get serious…In other words…Buckle-up Dorthy Because This Is Going To Be One Heck Of A Ride…The Speed of Change and the Stagnation WithinWe live in a world where knowledge and technology evolve at breakneck speed—a phenomenon some call the “fourth turning,” a time of societal upheaval unlike anything since the Industrial Revolution. With so much shifting around us, it's no wonder many of us feel overwhelmed. Yet, paradoxically, while we adapt to external change, we often cling to outdated stories about ourselves: who we are, what we're capable of, and what we deserve. These internal narratives—rooted in fear, scarcity, or learned helplessness—can trap us in cycles of stagnation, even as the world races forward.But here's the truth: this moment of collective uncertainty is also an invitation. A chance to question the stories we've told ourselves and rewrite them. The Illusion of “Who We Are”Think about the beliefs you've carried for years. Maybe it's the voice that says, “I'm not good enough,” or “Money/love/success is always out of reach.” These aren't truths—they're narratives we've absorbed, often unconsciously, from family, culture, or past experiences.As I realized while chatting with my mom recently, many of us choose these limiting beliefs without even realizing it. I showed her a minimalist purse, symbolizing the freedom I've found in simplifying my life. “I don't just have simplicity,” I told her. “I choose it daily.” That conversation struck me: we're not trapped by circumstance—we're trapped by unconscious choices.From Collective Collapse to Personal AwakeningHistorically, periods of societal breakdown (what some call “civilization collapses”) have led to rebirth. We're in one now—a “nine-year cycle” culminating in what many see as a symbolic “Year of New Beginnings.” If the collective story of our world is shifting, why not our personal stories?If we've been taught that life is “hard,” “scarcity-driven,” or “unfair,” we've internalized a false reality. But just because we absorbed these ideas as children doesn't mean they're true. The first step to change is recognizing that you did choose these beliefs—unconsciously—and now, you can choose anew.Escaping the Poverty Mindset: Beyond “Learned Helplessness”Psychologist Martin Seligman coined the term learned helplessness to describe when people feel they have no control over their lives. This mindset isn't just about money—it's a mental trap that says, “Why try? Nothing changes.”But here's the good news: this is a choice you can undo. You didn't have to believe life is “difficult” or “not enough.” You learned it. And now, you can unlearn it.Take minimalism, for example. My mom and I both choose simplicity not because we lack, but because it frees us to focus on what truly matters. Financial abundance isn't the goal—it's a tool to create impact. The key is shifting from scarcity to choice.The Power of Conscious ChoiceThe most transformative decisions aren't grand gestures—they're daily acts of reclamation. Every morning, you choose:* Will I believe my worth is tied to my bank account?* Or will I trust my potential is infinite, regardless of circumstances?As we step into this new year (or a symbolic “Year of the Horse,” a time of renewal), I invite you to envision a reality aligned with your deepest potential. Picture yourself unburdened by fear, creating the life you've imagined but never dared to claim.Tools for Transformation: The Light Between OracleIf anxiety or self-doubt holds you back, consider exploring tools like the Light Between Oracle. Designed to guide reflective dialogue, it helps you:* Uncover hidden beliefs that limit you.* Replace fear with curiosity.* Discover unexpected paths forward.This isn't about magic—it's about reconnecting with your innate creativity and choice. By engaging in intentional conversation (with yourself or through guided prompts), you begin to see life not as a series of constraints, but as a canvas of possibility.Conclusion: Your New Year's InvitationThis is your moment. The world is changing, and so can you. You don't need to “fix” anything—just choose differently. Start small:* Question one belief that feels heavy (e.g., “I'm not enough”).* Write a new story (e.g., “I am worthy of abundance and joy”).* Take one action aligned with that truth.As we close this year and step into the next, I wish you the courage to rewrite your narrative. May you walk with a clear mind, an untethered soul, and the unwavering knowing: you are not a victim of your past—you are the author of your future.Wishing you a year of conscious choices, boundless curiosity, and the life you've always imagined.With warmth and belief in your potentialLove, Kassandra This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thelightbetween.substack.com/subscribe

This is the audio from an amazing webinar I did with Alloy Health. I was so fortunate to be interviewed by their community leader, Rachel Hughes. What I'm seeing clearly is that Gen X is leading the menopause conversation — we're asking better questions, demanding better answers, and refusing to be dismissed. At the same time, Millennials are shifting the focus toward prevention, not just treating disease after it shows up. That mindset matters, and it's changing healthcare. I talk a lot about why self-care isn't indulgent — it's essential if you want to thrive in midlife and beyond. That starts with education. You cannot make informed decisions about your body if no one ever taught you how hormones actually work. Hormones are not just reactive tools — they can be preventative, supporting long-term health when used thoughtfully and appropriately. Progesterone and testosterone play real, meaningful roles in women's health, and vaginal estrogen is both safe and incredibly effective for many women — despite how rarely it's discussed. We also have to talk about sex. Communication is foundational to a fulfilling sex life in midlife, and silence only benefits outdated narratives, not women. The bottom line? You have more control over your health than you've been led to believe. Empowerment doesn't come from perfection — it comes from understanding your body and advocating for yourself in a system that often won't do it for you. To my fellow clinicians: listen to the You Are Not Broken podcast on ⁠⁠Pinnacle's network to earn FREE CME credit⁠⁠ Listen to my Tedx Talk: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Why we need adult sex ed⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Take my Adult Sex Ed Master Class:⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠My Website⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Interested in my sexual health and hormone clinic? ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Waitlist is open⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Thanks to our sponsor ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Midi Women's Health⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Designed by midlife experts, delivered by experienced clinicians, covered by insurance.Midi is the first virtual care clinic made exclusively for women 40+. Evidence-based treatments. Personalized midlife care.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.joinmidi.com⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Would you like access to our advanced agency training for FREE? https://www.agencymastery360.com/training Starting with a clearly defined niche can make all the difference when you're landing your first clients and deeply understanding that niche can carry you through the toughest seasons of agency life. Today's featured guest built his agency on exactly that foundation. Before launching his firm, he spent years working as a consultant for governments, UN agencies, and the European Commission. Along the way, he identified a clear gap in the market. That expertise proved invaluable during the pandemic. While uncertainty hit many agencies hard, he trusted his understanding of the space and chose to weather the slow months, confident the work would return. His patience paid off as demand surged later in the year. He'll share the lessons learned from more than 20 years of building and running a thriving niche agency in one of the most political and complex markets in the world—and why focus, patience, and deep domain knowledge remain his greatest competitive advantages. Filip Lugovic is the co-founder and CEO of The Right Street, an EU-focused digital communications agency based in Brussels. For the last 20 years, he's lived in the middle of the "Brussels bubble," where organizations, trade groups, and companies fight for attention from the European Commission, Parliament, and Council. His agency sits at the intersection of public affairs + digital communications, serving organizations trying to influence policies that impact nearly half a billion people across Europe. In this episode, we'll discuss: Identifying and owning a highly specific niche. Building a client list with the power of low-hanging fruit. Getting their best quarter during COVID. Keeping a creative team inspired during slow cycles. Subscribe Apple | Spotify | iHeart Radio Sponsors and Resources This episode is brought to you by Wix Studio: If you're leveling up your team and your client experience, your site builder should keep up too. That's why successful agencies use Wix Studio — built to adapt the way your agency does: AI-powered site mapping, responsive design, flexible workflows, and scalable CMS tools so you spend less on plugins and more on growth. Ready to design faster and smarter? Go to wix.com/studio to get started. From Door-to-Door Sales to the EU Policy Bubble Before he ever pitched a digital campaign, Filip was strangers' knocking on doors in Southern California selling heart-shaped pillows and screwdrivers with built-in flashlights. Not exactly glamorous, but it taught him the skill most agency owners run from: sales. When he landed in Brussels in 2005, he fell into a job selling ads for EU Observer, one of the leading political publications at the time. His clients were the same organizations trying to get in front of policymakers. Over the next decade, he built a deep network and a knack for relationship-based selling. Eventually, he left to consult on his own, but by 2017, he hit the same wall most consultants do: "I'm making money… but it all goes to someone else." A lunch with his current business partner (a seasoned communicator who had served as spokesperson for governments, UN agencies, and the European Commission) led to a plan to build something together. Building a Niche Agency: Where Marketing Meets Lobbying Once they figured out their roles and what they brought to the partnership, Filip and his partner started making plans and realized something: Most agencies in Brussels fell into one of two buckets: Lobbying firms who knew politics but didn't understand digital. Marketing agencies who knew digital but didn't understand politics. No one sat in the middle. So they built an agency that merged both worlds, pairing policy context with high-quality digital production. At the time, it was a hypothesis, and a risky one. Only a couple of competitors existed. But they saw the gap and took it. Landing the First Clients by Leveraging Existing Relationships Filip is no stranger to knocking on doors to sell a product, and he would have for his agency. However, this wasn't the right environment for that, so when it came time to start looking for clients, he relied on his network. Filip's approach to sales was never transactional and he very much enjoyed building lasting relationships. This is something many agency owners overcomplicate. Filip's first step wasn't SEO, funnels, or paid ads. It was: "Let me call every single person I already know and ask them to grab a coffee." That alone got him his first tiny clients. It wasn't a big account. Five hundred euros for hours of work, and zero profit. But it built the early case studies they needed. Most agencies try to skip this part. They want the big brand logo first. But every agency you admire started by leveraging relationships and building proof. Pro tip: You should always continue to revisit these relationships. Reach out to that client and buy them a coffee. This is the low-hanging fruit that can get your agency out of a tough spot. If you're not doing this, you're leaving money on the table. How Deep Market Knowledge Helps in Hard Times By January 2020, Filip's agency was growing at a healthy pace, had a new office and a seven-person team. Then we experience COVID shut downs. Their contracts froze, clients stopped paying, and their pipeline evaporated. Meanwhile, the agency had fixed expenses and a growing team relying on them. Most agencies would've cut staff and hoped to survive. Filip didn't. Luckily, he understood his market: EU organizations operate on annual budgets. If they don't spend it, they lose it the following year. So he and his partner made the hard call: No salaries for themselves (they relied on their wives for a while). Keep the team. Use that time to aggressively market. Their bet paid off and by Q4, every organization that couldn't run events was suddenly scrambling for digital support. Their best quarter ever happened during one of the scariest years on record. It was the foundation of everything that came afterwards. Keeping the Team Inspired During Slow Cycles How do you keep a creative team motivated when client work stops? Filip's answer: "Let them create whatever they want." There were no clients nitpicking colors or people demanding designers to make the logo bigger. It was a rare opportunity for pure, unfiltered creative expression. The team remembers that period as one of the most enjoyable times in the agency's history, despite the financial uncertainty. Why Big Name Clients Don't Always Make the Best Case Studies Most agency owners are probably familiar with this scenario: A famous brand comes in with big expectations and a big budget, and you brush off early concerns thinking their reputation would suffice to make the use of their case story all worthwhile. It happened to Filip and, unfortunately, after dismissing those concerns, the client rewrote everything and destroyed the design. Now they couldn't even put it on their website. Filip laughs about this now, because it still happens. Sometimes the smallest project gives you the best case study. Sometimes the biggest one becomes a "please-don't-put-our-name-on-that" situation. Just show the work you're proud of, not just the work you were paid for. Do You Want to Transform Your Agency from a Liability to an Asset? Looking to dig deeper into your agency's potential? Check out our Agency Blueprint. Designed for agency owners like you, our Agency Blueprint helps you uncover growth opportunities, tackle obstacles, and craft a customized blueprint for your agency's success.

In this episode of Wake Up Fresh, Jenny explores the idea that boundaries don't require justification. As part of a daily morning ritual, this reflection encourages listeners to practice saying no without over-explaining or feeling guilty for protecting their time and energy.Designed for anyone who struggles with people-pleasing or boundary-setting, this episode offers a compassionate reframe: a clear no can be both kind and respectful. Jenny supports listeners in building self-trust and emotional steadiness through simple, honest communication.Wake Up Fresh with Olivia & Jenny is a daily motivational podcast focused on emotional wellness, boundaries, and starting each morning with clarity and confidence. New episodes release daily throughout January, alternating between Olivia Howell and Jenny Dreizen.

It's our annual recap episode! Your Polterguides look back on the year that was 2025, discussing our favorite episodes, top movies, and more. Also, we look forward to what's coming up in 2026.Thanks for listening, and don't forget to connect with us on Instagram, Facebook, Threads, or BlueSky! Let us know about any movies we should check out and share what you're most excited for this year! If you enjoyed this, please consider buying us a coffee? https://ko-fi.com/A487KYMOur logo was created by Billy Whala and Debbie Cragg.Some parts of it are used under a creative commons license: Designed by Freepik https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ http://www.supercoloring.com/silhouettes/log-cabinOur music was modified from Dementia by Decomentarium and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Thanks to Billy Whala for editing this episode.#beyondthecabininthewoods #beyondthecabin #horror #horrormovies #currentlywatching #DonnaLeahey #KenziWhala #MacBoyle #SnarkCasts #PartyApocalypse

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Click here to Shop Affirmation Decks, Oracle Decks, and more! Use Promo code: RCPODCAST20 for 20% off your first order!   Today's Power Affirmation: By pumping my action muscle, I make hesitation my bitch.   Today's Oracle of Motivation: Whenever you feel the hesitation gremlins sneaking in, count down from five and pump up your action muscle! Turn the alarm clock off, count down from five, and jump out of bed like a squid on a rocket to space! Put your gym shorts on, count down from five, and jog out the door like you're running from your mother-in-law. Sip your coffee, count down from five, and say hello to that sexy peer who is too shy to talk to you. If you don't pump up your action muscle, you have a 100% chance of never making progress. You can have it all if you flush your hesitation monsters down the commode.   Designed to Motivate Your Creative Maniac Mind The 60-Second Power Affirmations Podcast is designed to help you focus, affirm your visions, and harness the power within your creative maniac mind! Join us every Monday and Thursday for a new 60-second power affirmation followed by a blast of oracle motivation from the Universe (+ a quick breathing meditation). It's time to take off your procrastination diaper and share your musings with the world!   For more musings, visit RageCreate.com     Leave a Review & Share! Apple Podcast reviews are one of THE most important factors for podcasts. If you enjoy the show, please take a second to leave the show a review on Apple Podcasts! Click this link: Leave a review on Apple Podcasts Hit “Listen on Apple Podcasts” on the left-hand side under the picture. Scroll down under “Ratings & Reviews” & click “Write A Review” Leave an honest review. You're awesome!  

With the holidays in full swing and the New Year just around the corner, we're reflecting on all the great times we've had in 2025. Kick back and enjoy these highlights from the past year as we take a little winter break!

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How can the Old Testament feel relevant and approachable to us today? In this episode, Dr. Joshua M. Sears, associate professor of ancient scripture, discusses his new book A Modern Guide to an Old Testament. Designed for everyday readers, this resource helps demystify the Old Testament by providing historical context, literary insights, and practical applications for modern discipleship. Professor Sears explains why the Old Testament matters, how its themes connect to Christ, and offers tips for studying its complex narratives with confidence and faith. Whether you're a seasoned scripture scholar or just beginning your study, this conversation will inspire you to see the Old Testament in a new light. Publications: A Modern Guide to an Old Testament (Deseret Book, 2025) "The Law of Moses and the Goodness of God: Navigating Challenging Texts," in Tender Mercies and Loving-Kindness: The Goodness of God in the Old Testament (Religious Studies Center, 2025) "Learning from People of Other Faiths," Religious Educator, 24.2 (2023) "'Let Me Take Another Wife': Israelite, Jewish, and the Latter-day Saint Polygamy in Historical and Literary Perspective," in The Household of God: Families and Belonging in the Social World of the New Testament (Religious Studies Center, 2022) "Deutero-Isaiah in the Book of Mormon: Latter-day Saint Approaches," in They Shall Grow Together: The Bible in the Book of Mormon (Religious Studies Center, 2022) "Study Bibles: An Introduction for Latter-day Saints," Religious Educator, 20.3 (2019) ·      Previous Y Religion Podcast Episodes: https://religion.byu.edu/y-religion