Podcasts about different kind

*Watch this video episode now at youtube.com/greendreamer*Back in March, when I visited Chiang Mai, Thailand, I got to sit down and dialogue with Gregory Pettys and Ramphai Noikaew of Panya Forest, as well as Thai Elder Jon Jandai of Pun Pun Organic Farm.This is the first of those three live-recorded conversations — during which Gregory and I chat about a different kind of materialism, a different kind of privilege, and what it means to not just be seed savers but also carriers of their stories.The featured music in this episode is "Sik Gong Gaw" by Klee Bho — a Pgakenyaw artist collaborator of of Greg and Ramphai.

This full video episode is now live on our YouTube channel! Watch now at youtube.com/greenreamer.The audio version will be published here in the podcast feed next week.

John Maxfield has spent 16 studying banking leadership and performance, first at The Motley Fool, then at Bank Director magazine and more recently on his own, creating videos and visuals to tell the story of community banks in new and creative ways (including with drones). On this episode of the ABA Banking Journal Podcast, Maxfield discusses: His own family origins in agriculture and banking What he's learned from interviewing and shadowing community bank leaders and investors across the country What it takes to be a discipline to be a CEO in a business with little margin for error, especially when short-term incentives run the other way.

In this episode, we sit down with Jenny Hsu, a former Web3 operator who went from managing P&Ls, restructuring teams, and scaling startups to spending nearly three years working on farms, coral reefs, and regenerative agriculture.That unexpected journey eventually brought her back to entrepreneurship — this time through coffee.Jenny is now building ventures around regenerative agriculture and coffee, including Omawild, which she describes as “a nature fund disguised as coffee.”We talk about why she walked away from tech, what she discovered in Indonesia, why coffee became the vehicle for her bigger mission, and whether regenerative agriculture can actually scale without losing what makes it regenerative.In this episode, you'll learn:Why Jenny walked away from the Web3 worldWhat she discovered through regenerative agriculture and coral restorationWhy coffee became her next businessWhat we don't see behind a bag of coffeeHow Omawild connects coffee with nature restorationWhether regenerative agriculture can actually scaleWhat Jenny is bringing back to Taiwan從 Web3 到再生農業：她如何用一杯咖啡打造「偽裝成咖啡的自然基金」？ ft. Omawild 創辦人 Jenny Hsu從經手損益表、重組團隊到推動 Web3 新創規模化，Jenny Hsu 曾身處科技與數位資產的最前線。然而，她卻選擇毅然轉身，走入印尼的農場、走進珊瑚礁與再生農業現場，度過將近三年的田野歲月。這段看似意料之外的歷程，最終引領她帶著全新的視角重返創業圈——這一次，她以「咖啡」為載體，創辦了再生農業品牌 Omawild，將其定義為「偽裝成咖啡的自然基金」。本集節目邀請 Jenny 深入分享她告別科技業的心路歷程、在印尼土地上的實地發現，以及如何在商業規模化與永續生態復育之間找到真正的平衡。本集重點：轉身告別 Web3 浪潮：放下損益表與團隊擴張的日常，為何選擇跨入看似遙遠的自然土地泥土與珊瑚礁的現場震撼：深入印尼三年實地耕作，第一線看見再生農業與海洋修復的真實困境為何是咖啡？：揭開每一包咖啡背後被忽視的產銷鏈真相，讓日常飲品化為驅動生態修復的槓桿Omawild 的商業模式解密：如何跳脫傳統綠色倡議框架，將商業利潤精準導向長期的大自然投資永續與規模化的拉鋸戰：探討再生農業能否在擴大市場規模的同時，守住對土壤與生態的核心承諾

Webb Simpson, 2012 U.S. Open Champion, seven-time PGA TOUR winner, a former Ryder Cup and Presidents Cup competitor, shares insights on faith, mental toughness, hinge moments, and high performance. 2:42 The Origin of the Bible Caddie Podcast and a Friendship Built Through Golf and Faith 7:37 How Studying the Bible Shapes the Mental Approach to Life and Competition 11:39 Titus 3:3–7: A Favorite Bible Passage About Grace, Mercy, and Faith 14:21 How Fatherhood Deepens the Understanding of God's Love 16:54 Living a Life That Others Are Watching 19:29 The Caddie Relationship That Helped Build Mental Toughness and Belief 23:46 Returning to a Long-Term Mindset Instead of Chasing Short-Term Results 25:12 Why Belief, Fundamentals, and Mental Toughness Have to Work Together 28:13 The Impact of Wake Forest Coach Jerry Haas On and Off the Golf Course 30:40 “Pleased, But Never Satisfied”: The Drive to Keep Getting Better 33:25 HINGE MOMENT: The Question That Changed the Mindset at the 2012 U.S. Open 35:00 Winning the U.S. Open by Focusing on the Process, Not the Leaderboard 39:33 Total Commitment: Why a Decision Means Eliminating Every Other Option 41:41 HINGE MOMENT: The Struggles That Made the 2018 PLAYERS Championship Victory So Meaningful 46:36 Remembering the Feeling of Walking to the 17th Hole at TPC Sawgrass 48:37 Why Ryder Cups and Presidents Cups Create a Different Kind of Pressure 52:28 Fight, Resolve, and the Spirit of the U.S. Ryder Cup Team 57:25 What Makes Scottie Scheffler a Once-in-a-Generation Golfer Don't forget you can also follow Dr. Rob Bell on Twitter or Instagram! Follow At: X @drrobbell Instagram @drrobbell 5 Mental Toughness Advantages for Financial Advisors: https://pages.drrobbell.com/ If you enjoyed this episode on Mental Toughness, please subscribe and leave a review! Dr. Rob Bell Exclusive Podcast Partner: Morton Brown Family Wealth https://mortonbrownfw.com/  Morton Brown Family Wealth is the Presenting Partner of The Mental Toughness Podcast with Dr. Rob Bell. Sponsorship of this podcast does not imply endorsement of the views, opinions, products, or services expressed by individual guests.

As a truly memorable Summer draws to close, the Irish boxing year is far from finished. We look forward to JB Promotions show this Saturday night at the National Stadium and from there it's on to Cork on October 9th where Louise Creaven will take on Christina Desmond for the first ever female Irish title fight. Louise was born in Galway and moved to Australia when she was 19. She found boxing at time when life was a fight of a very different kind and she takes time out of her preparations for October 9th to tell us that story.LEE REEVES GoFundMe: https://gofund.me/ae4c17643Louise Creaven Socials:Instagram: https://tinyurl.com/mr3esjn2Facebook: https://tinyurl.com/4jwdejn2Eating Disorder help Body Whys: https://www.instagram.com/bodywhys?stkn=eGNobTFsYmZ0NGxpLocal Sponsors Tribe Windows and Doors Scully Plant Hirehttps://tinyurl.com/y2ymbspuMadeen Plumbing & Heating https://tinyurl.com/ydnsxd8w

On this episode of Exclusively Van Halen on Johnny Beane TV, we take a closer look at the EVH Limited-Edition Wolfgang Special 2015 in Distressed Ivory — the guitar inspired by Eddie Van Halen's legendary Wolfgang used during the 2015 Different Kind of Truth world tour. With its road-worn Distressed Ivory finish, lightweight basswood body, graphite-reinforced quarter-sawn maple neck, ebony fingerboard, and EVH Wolfgang AL2 and AL3 humbuckers, this Wolfgang Special was built to deliver Eddie's signature combination of power, sustain, clarity, and playability. The guitar also features an EVH-branded Floyd Rose 1000 Series tremolo, EVH D-Tuna, kill switch, and EVH Bourns controls, giving players plenty of tools for dive bombs, squeals, Drop D tuning, and classic Van Halen-style effects. We're taking a look at what makes this limited-edition Wolfgang Special so special, how it connects to Eddie's 2015 touring era, and why it remains such a sought-after EVH Van Halen guitar for collectors and players.

How has God used people to shape your faith, calling, and life? In this special conversation, Hanna Seymour sits down with her father, Michael Easley, to trace the people and moments God used throughout Michael's journey—from his conversion as a teenager to his years in ministry. Michael shares how C. Ridley Fatnau used John 3:16 to help him understand the gospel, how Danny File challenged him to pursue Scripture, and how Bob Tolson, Ed Bloom, Floyd Sharp, and others became significant voices in his spiritual formation. Years later, Bob Tolson told Michael that he had prayed for him every day and followed his ministry through the years. That conversation prompted Michael and Hanna to reflect on the “tapestry” God weaves through our lives. The challenge is simple: take stock. Remember the people God used. Thank them. Encourage someone. And ask where God may be using you. Chapters 00:00 – A Different Kind of In Context Conversation03:21 – 16-Year-Old Michael Easley03:45 – Coming to Christ05:48 – The Man Who Taught Him John 3:1608:27 – Danny File and the Power of Friendship10:32 – Hearing the Bible Taught Clearly12:35 – From Tradition to Scripture17:48 – Wrestling With Questions of Authority18:34 – Leaving the Catholic Church20:23 – Considering Seminary23:19 – Ed Bloom and Bible Teaching25:24 – Meeting Floyd Sharp27:37 – Floyd Sharp Comes to Christ29:53 – How God Weaves the Tapestry31:47 – Bob Tolson's Unexpected Phone Call32:38 – “I Pray for You Every Day”34:20 – Taking Stock of Your Life35:10 – The Power of Praying for Children and Grandchildren36:56 – Write the Note39:42 – The Ministry of Encouragement42:24 – Where Is God Using You?46:09 – “Christ Loves You”47:31 – Who Do You Need to Thank? Key Topics • God's providence• Spiritual formation• The authority of Scripture• Mentorship and discipleship• Encouragement• Prayer• Legacy• Christian influence• Faithfulness in ministry• Gratitude Watch the highlights and full version of this interview on our Youtube channel. For more inContext interviews, click here.

A different kind of hanging chad HR 4 full 2508 Tue, 22 Sep 2026 18:03:08 +0000 ykVICRMkS7BQzAhvm9QR8Z5DBw22nd4a news MIDDAY with JAYME & WIER news A different kind of hanging chad HR 4 From local news & politics, to what's trending, sports & personal stories...MIDDAY with JAYME & WIER will get you through the middle of your day! © 2025 Audacy, Inc. News https://player.amperwavepodcasting.com?feed-link=https%3A

Agricultural tours have been popular among North American farmers for a long time, and while France may not immediately come to mind when Canadian farmers start planning an agricultural tour, Beauvais offers an interesting combination of machinery, agriculture and history. Beauvais, France, is home to the largest Massey Ferguson factory in the world, with the... Read More

What happens when the gospel crashes into the places we least expect it to go? In Acts 8, we find one of the most surprising missionary stories in all of Scripture -- the good news of Jesus reaching Samaria, a region defined by centuries of deep-seated hatred and mutual distrust with the Jewish people. This is not a tidy, predictable story. It is full of unexpected characters, unlikely moments, and outcomes that left eyewitnesses stunned. The central lesson woven through the entire account is that the gospel is not limited to people we like, cultures that are easy to reach, or territories that seem spiritually fertile. God's reach is wider than our assumptions, and his story is always longer than the moment we happen to witness. We are invited to reconsider who we have quietly written off as beyond redemption -- and to ask ourselves whether God might actually be at work in those very people right now, long before we ever show up.

I WAS THINKING:  TACOMA BUSINESS OWNERS AND PHILANTHRIPISTS UNJUSTLY CANCELED. Tacoma brewery caught in controversy as owners’ political donations spark “anti-trans” allegations // Domestic violence allegations raise questions about holdout juror in Lindsay Clancy trial. Other jurors on a media tour tout their reasonings. Gale King shocked to learn the holdout was black // Gen Z is making room for a different kind of college party. Introducing the 'wellness darty.' 

In this episode, we see that Jesus tell Pilate his Kingdom is not of this world!

September 13, 2026Speaker: Joshua Earl 

In the sweltering heat of the legendary 1976 UK heatwave, a different kind of horror was unfolding within the walls of a quiet British farmhouse. While the country baked under an unrelenting sun, the inhabitants of the Hunt house were discovering a secret so sadistic it has remained largely unheard of for decades.In this episode of Into the Fog, Peter Laws deep-dives into the chilling case of a woman bricked up alive, a tragedy born from a "sin" the church tried to bury. We explore the haunting accounts of the crying behind the walls, the dark history of a nun's secret, and the malevolent atmosphere that gripped this isolated rural home during one of Britain's most extreme summers. In this video, we investigate:-The true story of the 1976 Hunt House mystery.-Why a woman was walled up alive inside a farmhouse.-The connection between the "Sadistic" events and a hidden religious secret.-First-hand accounts of the haunting that occurred during the 1976 heatwave.If you enjoy forgotten cases, true British hauntings, and atmospheric mysteries, make sure to subscribe and step Into the Fog.#TrueHaunting #1976Heatwave #BritishMysteries #PeterLaws #IntoTheFog #ParanormalInvestigation #forgottenhistory 0:00 Into the Fog: The 1976 Heatwave & The Hunt Family4:57 Renovating the Barn: Ambitious Plans6:50 Strange Noises: Crying Behind the Sealed Door9:10 The Manic Chanting: A Frightening Prayer12:00 Sabotage: The Mystery of the Falling Walls14:10 The Stakeout: Donald and Annette's Night Watch18:45 The Vision: Stumbling into a Medieval Dungeon22:05 The Sadistic Secret: Walled Up Alive30:45 A Different Kind of Exorcism: Sarah's Compassion33:55 The Research: Colin Parsons and the Medieval Records36:15 Final Thoughts from the FogEditorGerard Giorgi-CollArtworkSteph LayResearch and Image CreditsThis episode draws on Colin Parsons's account ‘The Girl in the Wall', published in the book Encounters with the Unknown (Robert Hale, 1990).The book is now out of print, but a digitised edition can be borrowed free of charge from the Internet Archive: https://archive.org/details/encounter...Cover image: Encounters with the Unknown by Colin Parsons (Robert Hale, 1990).Note: I don't currently have YouTube memberships but I do offer extra content and connection via Patreon: www.patreon.com/peterlawsHave a genuine experience to share? Submit it here:https://bit.ly/ITF-YourStoryFind me:https://www.peterlaws.co.ukFollow me on Instagram, Twitter etc @revpeterlawsREAD PETER'S NON-FICTION BOOKS:Non-fiction on why it's healthy to like scary things: The Frighteners (US Hardback) https://mybook.to/thefrightenersUSThe Frighteners (UK Paperback) https://mybook.to/thefrightenersAlso on AudibleREAD PETER's CREEPY CRIME FICTION NOVEL SERIES:https://mybook.to/MattHunterCollectionCHECK OUT PETER'S ONLINE HORROR CHURCH, CREEPY COVE:Creepy Cove Community Church Podcast offers complete and immersive church services broadcast from a mysterious fishing town - 'Like Songs of Praise meets Stephen King'.) www.creepycove.com Real paranormal cases. Real witnesses. Told by a real person. I'm Peter Laws: author, Fortean Times columnist, former church minister, and recurring expert on BBC's Uncanny. I investigate and document true (and often terrifying) reports of the unexplained. These cases are never fictionalised, and many are told here for the first time.Peter regularly speaks at events, conferences and on radio. His literary agent is Joanna Swainson of Hardman and Swainson.

Andrew Chupp — coach, queer adult gymnast, creator and joy distributor — joins us to talk about making gymnastics your own. From Britney Spears floor choreography to competing on beam, Andrew shares how returning to the sport brought him community and creative freedom. You pick the topic. We make the episode. Our Full Episode Commission Raffle is the ONLY way to commission a full GymCastic episode. It's a fundraiser for our trip to Rotterdam for the World Championships. Enter here for a chance to choose the topic. The GymCastic store sale is on! IN THIS INTERVIEW Inclusive competition and bringing performance back to floor. Starting adult classes, making time to train and finding your people. Coaching adults, revisiting basics and letting go of old expectations. Rethinking deductions, facing internet hate and staying visible. Queer joy, body image, courage and accountability. FIND ANDREW AND YOUR COMMUNITY Andrew Chupp's YouTube channel Adult Gymnastics Like a Fine Wine: Find your community, meets and classes. Adult Gymnastics resources CHAPTERS 00:00 Meet Andrew Chupp 01:42 Adult Meets & Inclusive Competition 05:01 A Different Kind of All-Around 10:26 Growing Adult Gymnastics 13:47 Britney Spears & Finding Joy Again 21:07 How to Start an Adult Class 23:20 Making Time & Finding Community 25:28 Coaching Adults & Starting Small 33:19 Rethinking Deductions 36:34 Queer Sports & Belonging 40:21 Adult Meets at Every Age 46:47 Facing Internet Hate 57:57 Courage, Accountability & Growth 1:00:58 What's Next for Andrew RELATED EPISODES It's Never Too Late to Start Adult Gymnastics Tumble: The Adult Gymnastics Reality TV Show Tumble Episode 2 Tumble Episodes 3 and 4 Tumble Episode 5 Tumble Finale Nadia Promotes Adult Gymnastics New USAG President Kyle Albrecht's First Interview on Athlete Safety & the Future of Gymnastics SUPPORT OUR WORK Join Club Gym Nerd for weekly Behind The Scenes episodes and the members-only archive. Shop the GymCastic store sale. TOOLS AND RESOURCES GymCastic tools: LA 2028 Roster Lab Elite Score Explorer International Gymnastics Calendar GymCastic Games GymCastic Newsletters The Balance Beam Situation: Spencer Barnes' GIF Code of Points Gymnastics History: Gymnastics history and Code of Points archive from Uncle Tim Resistance Resources  

The recent death of legendary musical artist and humanitarian Dolly Parton, as well as this week's 25th anniversary of the September 11 attacks, inspired this episode of Deacons Pod about the experience of collective grief. "It's just a different kind of grief that sort of spills over into the lives of us all," says Deacon Mike Hayes, who co-hosts the episode with Deacon Mike Berstene. Both deacons are Paulist Deacon Affiliates.

Send us Fan Mail“I did the best I could” can sound like an explanation, but when it is used to avoid accountability for real harm, it can leave adult children questioning their own reality for years.In this episode, we unpack why “I did the best I could” is not always a viable excuse, especially when a parent refuses to acknowledge, repair, or change harmful patterns. Emilia and Bianca explore how entire family systems can reinforce denial, why the sibling who speaks up is often labeled the problem, and what happens when maintaining a relationship requires you to repeatedly betray your own truth. They also discuss what future parents can do differently by practicing accountability, apology, emotional attunement, and the willingness to keep bettering their best.Here's a related episode that builds on today's conversation: #529 | The Truth About Wanting Them to Apologize - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/529-the-truth-about-wanting-them-to-apologize/id1511831621?i=1000781645317  Learn more about:

In this week's message from Matthew 20:17-28, Thadd considers Jesus's example of servanthood and humility in His instructions to the disciples as He prepares to go to Jerusalem and face His crucifixion.

Originally broadcast Saturday, September 3, 2022Hour 1 - Mr President starring Edward Arnold, originally broadcast September 3, 1950, 72 years ago, A Different Kind of Loneliness. As Mr. President tries to put the country's economic house back in order, he also tries to get the White House repaired.  Hour 2 -The Adventures of Philip Marlowe starring Gerald Mohr, originally broadcast September 3, 1949, The Bums Rush. Marlowe is hired to find an old geezer, and finds murder instead.  Also Claudia, originally broadcast September 3, 1948, Difficult Dress Rehearsal. Hour 3 -The Whistler, originally broadcast September 3, 1945, Ambition Perilous.  A scheming politician's plan to further his career by giving a job to an ex-con he helped send to jail has interesting results.  Also Part 1 of a 5-part Yours Truly Johnny Dollar story, The Curse of Kamashek Matter, originally broadcast September 3, 1956.  An expedition is forming, but family conflicts are too.

On this episode of Exclusively Van Halen on Johnny Beane TV, we're talking about the upcoming re-release of Van Halen's final studio album, A Different Kind of Truth! Originally released in 2012, A Different Kind of Truth featured Eddie Van Halen, Alex Van Halen, Wolfgang Van Halen and David Lee Roth and marked Roth's first original Van Halen studio album since 1984.

Join our champion program: mark@themomentumcompany.comAttend a Thriving Leader event: https://thriving-leader-2026.lovable.app/Instagram: @the.momentum.companyLinkedIn: /momentum-companyIn this episode of The Intentional Agribusiness Leader Podcast, Mark sits down with Dan Stachofsky, founder and managing director of Essential Energy, for a thought-provoking conversation about technology, health, agriculture, and the environments surrounding people, plants, and animals.Before moving into this work, Dan was a tech executive helping Fortune 100 companies, including Microsoft and Amazon, manage digital infrastructure during the rise of cloud computing and AI. Today, he leads Essential Energy, a nonprofit focused on EMF and light-conditioning tools.Dan defines intentionality this way:Live into what is true—with compassion.For Dan, intentional leadership means being willing to share what you believe while staying curious about what someone else believes. When truth and compassion meet, conversations shift from defending to discovering.From Big Tech to a Different Kind of EnergyDan's perspective changed after his firstborn daughter was born with complex medical challenges.That experience led his family to explore health, nutrition, environment, and alternative approaches. They eventually moved away from Seattle, began growing their own food, and became increasingly interested in how the surrounding environment might affect health.That journey ultimately shaped the work Dan does today through Essential Energy.Are We Paying Enough Attention to the Farm Environment?A major focus of the episode is electromagnetic fields, or EMFs.Dan explains his view of the difference between naturally occurring electromagnetic fields and artificial fields produced by modern technology—from electrical infrastructure and Wi-Fi to wireless communications and equipment.The bigger question becomes:As agriculture adopts more technology, are there environmental factors we aren't measuring yet?Dan sees the physical environment as another part of the farm-management puzzle—alongside genetics, nutrition, soil health, and management practices.What Farmers Are SeeingDan shares examples from farms using Essential Energy's conditioning technology, including reported changes in cattle performance, crop yields, animal behavior, and food nutrient measurements.His media kit also includes farmer testimonials reporting differences in soybean and corn yields, conception rates, cattle gains, and berry production.At the same time, Dan acknowledges that some of the comparisons discussed in the episode were not tightly controlled experiments and that more detailed testing is still needed.That leads to one of the strongest themes of the conversation:Stay curious.Ask questions.Test ideas.Gather better data.And don't dismiss something simply because it's unfamiliar.Stewardship Beyond the SoilDan's challenge to agriculture is to broaden how we think about stewardship.Farmers already steward soil, water, livestock, crops, and natural resources.What else in the environment deserves our attention?What aren't we measuring?And what could we learn if we're willing to investigate?Because intentional leadership doesn't require having every answer.Sometimes it starts with being willing to ask a question nobody else is asking.Listen if you are:Curious about technology and farm healthInterested in emerging approaches to livestock and crop performanceThinking about how AI and increased technology use are changing agriculturePassionate about stewardship and regenerative agricultureWilling to explore unconventional ideas while asking for better dataIntentional leadership requires curiosity. As technology becomes more embedded in agriculture, great leaders stay open to asking what we're gaining, what we may be overlooking, and how we can become better stewards of the environment around us.

Discussion on why Shimshon's methods of saving the people is very different and unique from other leaders in Tanach

Singer and songwriter Robbie Love from Los Angeles joins Lin. Woods for an inspiring conversation about faith, family, discovering your gift, and having the courage to release it to the world.Robbie shares what it was like growing up in a home with her mother, recording artist Mary Love, a deeply spiritual woman of faith whose influence helped shape Robbie's life and music.But Robbie's journey to becoming an artist wasn't always obvious. She opens up about being very shy, discovering her voice, and learning to recognize that the gift inside of her was something she was meant to share with the world.In this powerful conversation, Robbie and Lin. Woods talk about: The definition of LOVE and what it means beyond a word  Growing up with a recording artist mother and woman of faith  How being shy once kept Robbie from fully expressing herself  Recognizing your gift and releasing it to the world The story behind Robbie's music  Why you must BELIEVE IN YOUR GIFT  Going from a computer science techie to an artist  Faith, purpose and following the path God has placed before you  What happens when you stop hiding your gift and start sharing it Robbie Love's story is a reminder that sometimes the gift you are carrying has been there all along—you simply have to believe in it, nurture it and have the courage to release it.

In this episode, Coach Daniel welcomes his namesake, Daniel who shares a powerful story of transformation. For over thirty years, Daniel struggled with a combination of chronic fatigue and severe insomnia that completely reshaped his life. Everything changed when he learned what truly had been happening as that he was NOT alone. If you'd like to learn more with Coach Daniel Shai (highly recommend!), here are his links: YouTube:  @restedandfree  Website: https://www.restedandfree.com/ — If you're ready to leave insomnia for good, check out our coaching options. Head over to www.thesleepcoachschool.com and click on GET SLEEP in the menu. The Insomnia Immunity program is perfect if you like learning through video and want to join a group on your journey towards sleeping well. BedTyme is ideal if you like to learn via text and have a sleep coach in your pocket. The 1:1 Zoom based program is for you if you like to connect one on one with someone who has been where you are now.  Do you like learning by reading? If so, here are two books that offer breakthroughs! Tales of Courage by Daniel Erichsen https://www.amazon.com/Tales-Courage-Twenty-six-accounts-insomnia/dp/B09YDKJ3KX Set it & Forget it by Daniel Erichsen https://www.amazon.com/Set-Forget-ready-transform-sleep/dp/B08BW8KWDJ Would you like to become a Sleep Hero by supporting the Natto movement on Patreon? If so, that's incredibly nice of you

Send us Fan MailThis week's episode of Mother's Guide Through Autism is a little different.Brigitte welcomes back Maureen Brice, an author, intuitive energy coach, certified health coach, autism parent, and advocate with more than 25 years of experience in neurodiversity and holistic wellness.In her coaching work with autism moms, Maureen incorporates intuitive practices, energetic frequency work, and biofeedback alongside more traditional forms of support. Maureen says her intuitive abilities became much stronger following a near-death experience, eventually becoming another way she helps women explore what may be happening beneath the surface emotionally and energetically.For this special episode, Brigitte gives listeners a glimpse into that side of Maureen's work by receiving an angel card reading herself.Rather than a typical interview, you'll hear an intimate, unscripted conversation as Maureen interprets the cards, reflects on the messages that come through, and explores themes that many moms may recognize in their own lives.In this episode, we discuss:- Why Maureen began incorporating intuitive work into her coaching- How she describes the changes she experienced after her near-death experience- What an angel card reading actually looks like- Why autism moms may sometimes need support that goes beyond problem-solving and practical strategiesWhether this kind of work is already part of your world or you're simply curious about it, consider this episode an invitation to listen with an open mind and take away whatever resonates with you.

In this episode, I share a profound experience I had with a group of elder rescue horses at a retreat I hosted—and how they helped me see strength in a different way.A circle formed with four horses, six women, and two dogs, all coming together by some unseen force. And in that circle, the horses showed us that strength doesn't have to be about dominance or power.That experience led me to reflect on my own leadership and the qualities I once believed made a leader “strong”—qualities I didn't possess. I've come to understand that my quieter way of leading—listening, reflecting, creating space, and bringing different perspectives together—is its own kind of strength.It's what I bring to the circle.This episode asks you to consider: What do you bring that strengthens your circle? Order Your Copy of Whispers of the Soul here: https://mybook.to/Whispersofthesoul About Anita AdamsI'm Anita Adams, your host and the founder of Joyful Inspired Living, an organization devoted to teaching The Wisdom Way—a practice that helps individuals reconnect with their authentic selves and create lives filled with meaning, well-being, and joy. In addition to hosting the Joyful Journey Podcast, I lead transformative retreats and workshops, and offer both group and one-on-one coaching. I'm also the bestselling author of Whispers of the Soul: A Guide to Clarity, Confidence, and Joy. If you have any questions, please reach. My contact information and ways to connect with me are below. And please subscribe for updates and consider leaving a review to help others discover this podcast. Thank you!Offerings by Anita: Coaching Services: https://www.joyfuljourney.ca/coaching Retreats: https://www.joyfuljourney.ca/retreats 30-Day Nature Challenge: https://www.joyfuljourney.ca/nature-challenge Whispers of the Soul: https://mybook.to/Whispersofthesoul Weekly newsletter: https://joyfuljourney.myflodesk.com/joinConnect with Anita: Email - anita@joyfuljourney.caWebsite - https://www.joyfuljourney.ca/Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/joyful_journey_with_anita/Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/anitaadamsyvr/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/anita.adams.904/Book a Discovery Call: https://calendly.com/anitaadams

After 15 years in corporate law, Sne Alan Sharma stepped away from a high-pressure career to pursue her lifelong connection to yoga and build Intarya Yoga in Mill Valley. In this episode, we explore what the Western world often misses about yoga, why the practice is about so much more than movement, and how yoga and Ayurveda can help us better understand what our bodies need. Sne also shares how she built a business around three essential pillars—intentional movement, nourishment, and community—and why reconnecting with our authentic selves begins with self-love. This is a beautiful conversation about career reinvention, Eastern wisdom, creating balance, and giving yourself permission to honor the life you truly want. In this conversation, we explore: Sne's journey from corporate lawyer to yoga entrepreneur The deeper meaning of yoga beyond physical exercise How yoga and Ayurveda work together Building a business that creates more balance instead of more burnout Why honoring your authentic self is an act of self-love

Strong profits and rising share prices no longer guarantee job security. As companies invest in AI, streamline operations, restructure teams, and redirect capital toward higher-growth priorities, even high-performing executives can find themselves impacted by layoffs and organizational change.In this episode of the Hire Yourself Podcast, Pete Gilfillan explores the growing “jobless boom” and what it means for corporate professionals. He explains why companies can report strong financial results while simultaneously reducing headcount, how AI is changing the economics of white-collar work, and why individual performance alone may not be enough to protect your position.For executives thinking about their long-term future, Pete makes the case for building a Plan B before it becomes necessary. By exploring business ownership and franchising while still employed, professionals can diversify their income, build equity outside of a paycheck, and create a greater level of control over their financial future.Chapters00:00 - Good Performance Doesn't Guarantee Job Security01:01 - What Is the “Jobless Boom”?02:00 - Why Profitable Companies Are Still Cutting Jobs03:13 - How AI Is Reshaping White-Collar Work03:40 - Why Individual Performance Is No Longer Enough04:07 - The Psychological Shift for Corporate Executives04:44 - Why More Professionals Are Exploring Business Ownership05:06 - How Ownership Creates a Different Kind of Security05:39 - Why You Should Build Your Plan B Before You Need It06:16 - Turning Corporate Experience Into Business OwnershipCONNECT WITH PETE GILFILLAN:

What if the life we're chasing is upside down?Everything around us teaches us to look out for ourselves first. Protect yourself. Get ahead. Build your own success.But when Paul writes to the church in Philippi, he points them to a completely different way of living. At the center of his letter is a beautiful picture of Jesus, who didn't grasp for power or privilege but willingly emptied himself in love.This week, we explored why the way of Jesus often feels upside down—and why it might actually be the truest way to live. From everyday conflicts to suffering, generosity, and relationships, Paul keeps bringing us back to the same place: the self-giving love of Christ.Because the life Jesus invites us into isn't centered on self-preservation.It's centered on self-giving love.Chapters00:00 Welcome & The Church in Philippi00:48 Why Paul Loved This Church04:10 What Would Jesus Do?06:13 Living as a Different Kind of Community09:50 When Faith Becomes a List of "Shoulds"12:09 The Poem at the Center of Philippians13:24 Adam, Jesus, and the Choice We All Make16:00 The Upside-Down Life17:03 Why Paul Had Hope for Philippi19:08 One Question That Changes Everything20:53 Remembering the Way of JesusKey TakeawaysPhilippians is centered on the person of Jesus, not a list of religious expectations.The hymn in Philippians 2 is the foundation for everything Paul teaches throughout the letter.Jesus chose humility and self-giving love instead of grasping for power.The way of Jesus often runs against our natural instincts and the values of our culture.The simple question, "What would Jesus do?" remains a powerful way to center our lives on Christ.Communion reminds us that following Jesus means continually remembering and embodying his self-giving love.Scripture ReferencesPhilippians 1–4Philippians 2:5–11Acts 16Genesis 3Matthew 26

Heather gets a bizarre phone call from a man claiming to be her boyfriend's friend—and he has an unusual proposition involving the two of them. She quickly realizes something is seriously off, but the truth behind the mysterious “D” is even more unexpected. Hear the hilarious reveal in this Jubal Phone Prank from The Jubal Show, and find out what Heather thought her boyfriend had gotten her into! The wildest, most hilarious prank call podcast from The Jubal Show! Join Jubal Fresh as he masterminds the funniest and most outrageous phone pranks, catching unsuspecting victims off guard with his quick wit, absurd scenarios, and unmatched comedic timing. Whether he's posing as an over-the-top customer service rep, a clueless boss, or an eccentric neighbor, no call is safe from his unpredictable humor. Get ready to laugh out loud and cringe in the best way possible! New episodes drop every weekday—tune in and let the prank wars begin!➡︎ Submit your Jubal Phone Prank - https://thejubalshow.com This is just a tiny piece of The Jubal Show. You can find every podcast we have, including the full show every weekday right here…➡︎ https://thejubalshow.com/podcasts The Jubal Show is everywhere, and also these places: Website ➡︎ https://thejubalshow.com Instagram ➡︎ https://instagram.com/thejubalshow X/Twitter ➡︎ https://twitter.com/thejubalshow Tiktok ➡︎ https://www.tiktok.com/@the.jubal.show Facebook ➡︎ https://facebook.com/thejubalshow YouTube ➡︎ https://www.youtube.com/@JubalFresh Support the show: https://the-jubal-show.beehiiv.com/subscribeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Would you like to learn how to accelerate your agency growth ?  https://www.agencymastery360.com/training What happens when two founders build a successful marketing agency without ever clearly defining who owns what? In this episode, John Scheer shares how eight years of overlapping responsibilities created hidden friction inside Herman-Scheer, and how a simple role clarification transformed the business. He explains why moving upmarket after the 2022 downturn required a completely different level of strategy, why bringing in a third partner accelerated growth instead of creating complexity, and how his agency is approaching AI as an amplifier of expertise rather than a replacement for it. If you're leading an agency that's outgrown founder improvisation, this conversation is a masterclass in evolving your leadership before it becomes your biggest bottleneck. What You'll Learn Why undefined founder roles create invisible bottlenecks, even when there's no conflict. How a 360° leadership review helped two co-founders finally divide ownership and improve decision-making. What it really takes to move a digital marketing agency from startup clients into Series A and enterprise engagements. Why adding a third partner succeeded after previous senior hires failed. How to evaluate executive talent beyond impressive resumes. Why AI should accelerate strategic thinking, not replace it. The 10-80-10 framework for using AI without sacrificing creativity or expertise. Key Takeaways Clear ownership creates leverage. When founders stop sharing every responsibility, the team gains clarity, decisions move faster, and each leader can operate at a higher level. Market changes often demand business model changes. Herman-Scheer's shift upmarket after 2022 wasn't just about larger clients; it required stronger strategy, operational discipline, and deeper industry expertise. The right partner fills capability gaps, not title gaps. Their third partner succeeded because she wanted to build alongside the digital agency team instead of managing from above. Great branding is driven by judgment, not just creativity. AI can accelerate execution, but differentiation still comes from human insight and strategic thinking. Founder evolution is less about doing more and more about creating the structure that allows others to lead with confidence. Have you and your co-founder been stepping on each other's toes for years, not because of conflict, but because nobody ever drew the line between your roles? Today's featured guest moved across the country to Santa Monica after his current partner called him and asked him to take a chance on building something of their own instead of "working for the man". It took eight years of figuring out what not to do, a 360 review that finally split their roles, a niche into healthcare and wellness, and eventually a third partner to unlock what the agency is today. He'll walk through how the role division changed everything, why going upmarket after 2022 forced a more rigorous kind of work, and what he actually thinks AI is doing to branding. John Scheer is the co-founder and chief creative officer of Herman-Scheer, a branding agency based in Los Angeles focused on healthcare, self-care, and well-being. They work with clients at three inflection points: zero to one startups, high-growth companies around Series A and beyond, and enterprise legacy businesses looking to regain relevance. Two and a half years ago they brought on a third partner with 20 years of operational and insights experience, which shifted the agency's growth trajectory significantly. In this episode, we'll discuss: Two founders. No defined roles. The decision to move upmarket as a response to a shifting market Why the third partner hire worked 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. The Two-Headed Monster Problem For eight years, John and Chapin ran Herman-Scheer without defined roles. Neither of them was trying to undermine the other. They just both did everything: sales, creative direction, project leadership, client management. Clients did not always know who to call. The internal team did not always know who to go to. And both founders kept stepping into the same spaces without realizing it was costing the agency something real. The shift came from an outside advisor who ran a 360 review and surfaced the pattern clearly. Chapin got voted in as chief executive and John got voted in as chief creative. The way John sees it, they both got promoted at their own agency. This way, clients knew who handled creative direction and who set operational direction. The internal team had a clear routing system. And for the first time, each founder could fully commit to a lane without the other one also running it. That kind of clarity is not just organizational tidiness. It is what makes both roles more effective and makes the agency feel less like two people doing the same job. Why Going Upmarket After 2022 Required a Different Kind of Agency John's agency spent several years focused primarily on zero-to-one startups, building deep roots in the Los Angeles venture capital and entrepreneurial community. It worked well until 2022, when the economic environment shifted and early-stage funding dried up. Founders who had been raising millions to launch consumer products suddenly could not. The client base Herman-Scheer had depended on was no longer buying at the same rate. The response was a deliberate move upmarket toward Series A and beyond, and eventually toward enterprise legacy brands looking to regain relevance. That shift required closing the gap between brand strategy and execution, getting closer to conversion rather than staying in the lofty world of brand identity alone, and integrating more rigorous insights work into the process. The outcome is that Herman-Scheer no longer competes on portfolio or personal chemistry alone. The decision to work with them is a decision to work with people who understand the healthcare and wellness consumer, the mechanics of those businesses, and what brand actually has to do at each stage of growth. The Third Partner Hire and What Made It Work John and Chapin hit another plateau several years after the reset. Revenue was solid. Growth had stalled and they both knew they did not have what it took internally to push through it. At this point, their advisor introduced them to Allison Servey, who had been head of strategy and insights at a major agency and had reached the point where her job was managing people and traveling rather than doing the work she was good at. They'd already tried with big-company hires and failed, but hiring a senior person who wanted to roll up her sleeves again was the filter. People who come from large organizations where 10 people supported a single role often struggle in lean agency environments. Allison came in wanting to be close to the work, not above it. Within two and a half years she had helped manage out the people who were not a fit, brought in strong people from her network, and shifted the agency's operational foundation in ways that made the growth trajectory possible. What AI Is Actually Doing to Branding John is confident enough in his work to know that AI is not a replacement for creative thinking. What it has done is allow people to get ideas out more efficiently, which is genuinely valuable when used correctly. The problem is what happens when junior people or clients start treating the output as the finished work rather than as a starting point. Herman-Scheer now includes language in their contracts preventing clients from submitting AI-generated onboarding forms. This means clients were doing it, submitting AI-filled questionnaires without reading them, and expecting the agency to build a strategy from questions answered by a chatbot with no real context about the business. He makes sure AI usage at his agency complies with the 10-80-10 framework: 10% great thinking and prompting going in, 80% of the lifting done by AI, and 10% refinement and judgment coming out. That ratio requires real expertise at both ends. Without it, the middle 80% produces the average of everything the model has seen, which is not a brand strategy. It is a synthesis of other people's brand strategies. 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.

Heather gets a bizarre phone call from a man claiming to be her boyfriend's friend—and he has an unusual proposition involving the two of them. She quickly realizes something is seriously off, but the truth behind the mysterious “D” is even more unexpected. Hear the hilarious reveal in this Jubal Phone Prank from The Jubal Show, and find out what Heather thought her boyfriend had gotten her into! The wildest, most hilarious prank call podcast from The Jubal Show! Join Jubal Fresh as he masterminds the funniest and most outrageous phone pranks, catching unsuspecting victims off guard with his quick wit, absurd scenarios, and unmatched comedic timing. Whether he's posing as an over-the-top customer service rep, a clueless boss, or an eccentric neighbor, no call is safe from his unpredictable humor. Get ready to laugh out loud and cringe in the best way possible! New episodes drop every weekday—tune in and let the prank wars begin!➡︎ Submit your Jubal Phone Prank - https://thejubalshow.com This is just a tiny piece of The Jubal Show. You can find every podcast we have, including the full show every weekday right here…➡︎ https://thejubalshow.com/podcasts The Jubal Show is everywhere, and also these places: Website ➡︎ https://thejubalshow.com Instagram ➡︎ https://instagram.com/thejubalshow X/Twitter ➡︎ https://twitter.com/thejubalshow Tiktok ➡︎ https://www.tiktok.com/@the.jubal.show Facebook ➡︎ https://facebook.com/thejubalshow YouTube ➡︎ https://www.youtube.com/@JubalFresh Support the show: https://the-jubal-show.beehiiv.com/subscribeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Army Vet's Trauma Recovery and Message: He Speaks About PTSD, Sexual Assault, Faith, and Life. Military trauma does not always begin on a battlefield. For retired Army veteran Dr. PJ, known to many as Pastor Jeff, the wounds that changed his life came from a sexual assault committed by someone who outranked him during his military career. Supporting articles about this and much more from Law Enforcement Talk Radio Show and Podcast in platforms like Medium , Blogspot and Linkedin. The experience left injuries that could not be seen. Combined with other difficulties from his military service and personal life, the assault contributed to years of emotional pain and an eventual diagnosis of PTSD. The Podcast is available for free on the Law Enforcement Talk Radio Show and Podcast website, also on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, iHeartradio and most major podcast platforms. #LawEnforcementTalk #Free #Podcast #Radio His story, however, is not only about what happened to him. It is about what he did afterward. The Law Enforcement Talk Radio Show and Podcast social media like their Facebook , Instagram , LinkedIn , Medium and other social media platforms. Jeff Moffett, also known as Dr. PJ and Pastor Jeff, is a guest on the Law Enforcement Talk Radio Show and Podcast. The host originally connected with him through the Clubhouse social-audio app, where Pastor Jeff's compassionate voice and message of gratitude stood out. Today, this Army vet's trauma recovery and message reaches people struggling with grief, abuse, PTSD, isolation, relationships, and some of life's most difficult questions. He speaks because he knows silence can become another prison. A Different Kind of Military Trauma When people hear that a veteran has been diagnosed with PTSD, they often assume it resulted from combat, explosions, firefights, or the constant threat of death in a war zone. Army Vet's Trauma Recovery and Message: He Speaks About PTSD, Sexual Assault, Faith, and Life. Military trauma does not always begin on a battlefield. That was not the primary source of Pastor Jeff's trauma. He was sexually assaulted during his military career by someone who held a higher rank. The imbalance of authority added another layer to the pain. It was not simply an act of violence; it was also a devastating betrayal within an institution built on trust, discipline, leadership, and accountability. Military sexual trauma can affect every part of a survivor's life. It may influence personal relationships, professional confidence, faith, emotional stability, and the ability to trust other people. Survivors may wrestle with shame, anger, anxiety, depression, nightmares, or the belief that they should have somehow prevented what happened. For Pastor Jeff, the assault combined with other experiences from his life and military service, eventually creating problems that could no longer be ignored. He had been hurt, but he refused to allow the person who assaulted him to control the rest of his life. His journey would take him “from trauma to triumph, from broken to builder, and from abused to affirming others.” The PTSD Diagnosis PTSD can develop after a person experiences or witnesses a terrifying, violent, or deeply distressing event. Although the condition is frequently associated with combat veterans, it can also result from sexual assault, domestic violence, serious accidents, childhood abuse, violent crime, or other traumatic experiences. The symptoms can affect both the mind and body. A person may experience intrusive memories, emotional numbness, hypervigilance, sleep disturbances, anger, avoidance, or an overwhelming sense of danger. Army Vet's Trauma Recovery and Message: He Speaks About PTSD, Sexual Assault, Faith, and Life. Military trauma does not always begin on a battlefield. Pastor Jeff's diagnosis helped give a name to struggles that had already been affecting his life. A diagnosis, however, did not instantly erase the pain. Trauma recovery required honesty, faith, reflection, support, and the willingness to face what had happened. His story demonstrates that seeking help is not an admission of weakness. For a veteran accustomed to discipline, strength, and service, acknowledging emotional wounds can require tremendous courage. Pastor Jeff began learning how to live beyond the assault without pretending that it had never happened. He found relief and developed practices that continue to help him today. His healing became the foundation of his work with others. Pastor Jeff believes that “healing prepares the heart.” That conviction is central to his ministry, speaking career, grief consulting, relationship work, and personal life. Before a title, a platform, or public recognition can have meaning, a person must examine what remains unsettled within. The work begins with what someone has made peace with, and what still needs attention. Healing does not necessarily mean forgetting. It does not require a survivor to minimize the offense, excuse the offender, or deny the damage. Instead, it may mean reaching a place where the trauma no longer controls every decision, relationship, or expectation. Army Vet's Trauma Recovery and Message: He Speaks About PTSD, Sexual Assault, Faith, and Life. Military trauma does not always begin on a battlefield. Pastor Jeff speaks from the ground on which he has personally stood. His message is not based solely on academic theories or motivational slogans. It comes from experiencing abuse, living with PTSD, confronting grief, and rebuilding a meaningful life. He knows what it means to feel broken. He also knows what it means to become a builder. From Victim Mindset to Victor Mindset One of the most important parts of Pastor Jeff's message is the movement from a victim mindset to a victor mindset. That does not mean denying that someone was victimized. He was sexually assaulted, and the responsibility belongs to the person who committed the assault. Recognizing the truth is essential. The transformation occurs when the survivor decides that victimization will not become a permanent identity. Pastor Jeff helps people recognize their pain without surrendering their future to it. His approach encourages survivors to reclaim their voice, purpose, dignity, and ability to choose what happens next. His message is not that recovery is easy. It is that recovery is possible. He challenges people to look beyond what was done to them and ask what they can build from the life that remains. That transition, from victim to victor, is not a single event. It may involve counseling, prayer, medical care, spiritual guidance, supportive relationships, difficult conversations, and daily decisions. Progress may be uneven, but every step can move a survivor closer to freedom. Pastor Jeff's work also focuses heavily on grief. “Grief isolates us, but gratitude reconnects us,” he says. Grief can make people feel separated from the rest of the world. Friends and family may not understand the depth of the loss. Some people avoid conversations because they do not know what to say. Others offer quick solutions to pain that cannot be quickly repaired. Grief does not only follow a death. People may grieve the loss of safety, trust, health, identity, career, marriage, friendship, faith, or the life they believed they would have. A survivor of sexual assault may grieve the person they were before the assault. A veteran may grieve the end of military service or the loss of the trust once placed in a leader. Someone living with PTSD may grieve the sense of peace they once took for granted. Army Vet's Trauma Recovery and Message: He Speaks About PTSD, Sexual Assault, Faith, and Life. Military trauma does not always begin on a battlefield. Pastor Jeff teaches that gratitude can become a bridge back to connection. Gratitude does not erase grief or turn tragedy into something good. It helps people recognize that pain is not the only thing still present in their lives. Love, purpose, faith, relationships, opportunities, and acts of kindness may still exist alongside sorrow. This perspective is at the heart of his book, Embracing Gratitude in Grief: A Transformative Perspective. An Army Veteran, Pastor, and International Speaker Pastor Jeff's work has taken him far beyond a single pulpit. He is an international inspirational speaker and grief consultant who has addressed audiences across the United States and in Honduras, Haiti, Germany, Kuwait, Afghanistan, and Africa. In Haiti, his service took shape through “Church with No Walls,” reflecting his belief that ministry does not have to be confined to a building. He has trained and mentored more than 100 ministers around the world. He also formerly served as pastor of Historic Hosannah Missionary Baptist Church in Augusta, Georgia. His professional life reflects an unusual range of experience. In addition to his ministry and speaking, he is a marriage and relationship facilitator, real estate investor, videographer, and consultant. Each role gives him another way to connect with people and help them see possibilities beyond their present pain. As a retired Army veteran and recipient of the Presidential Lifetime Achievement Award, Pastor Jeff has been recognized for a life of service. Yet the titles and honors are not the center of his story. The deeper story is how a man who experienced abuse learned to affirm others. His Books Carry the Message Forward Pastor Jeff is also the author of several books that explore grief, gratitude, faith, war, prayer, and personal reflection. His works include: Embracing Gratitude in Grief: A Transformative Perspective Conversations with God from the War in Afghanistan, a 31-day devotional Each book offers another window into his experiences and beliefs. The devotional born from the war in Afghanistan reflects the private spiritual conversations that can occur when a person faces uncertainty, danger, isolation, and questions without easy answers. The companion journal invites readers to examine their own experiences and conversations with God. For readers facing grief or PTSD, his writing provides something more than information. It offers companionship from someone who understands that healing rarely follows a straight line. Faith, Prayer, and the Work of Recovery Faith has played a vital role in Pastor Jeff's life, but he does not present prayer as a way to avoid the difficult work of recovery. To pray can be part of confronting pain rather than hiding from it. For many survivors, spiritual questions become part of the trauma. They may wonder why the assault happened, where God was at the time, or why the emotional consequences continue years later. Pastor Jeff's message leaves room for those questions. His life demonstrates that faith and professional help do not have to compete with each other. Prayer, therapy, medical treatment, community support, honest conversation, and personal responsibility can work together. Army Vet's Trauma Recovery and Message: He Speaks About PTSD, Sexual Assault, Faith, and Life. Military trauma does not always begin on a battlefield. Recovery may require survivors to use every healthy resource available. Pastor Jeff encourages people to speak, seek support, and stop treating emotional pain as a private failure. His willingness to discuss military sexual assault also helps challenge the silence that has historically surrounded the issue. He Speaks So Others Can Find Their Voice There is power in a survivor telling the truth. Every time Pastor Jeff speaks about what happened, he may reach another veteran who has never told anyone. His words may connect with a man who believes sexual assault is something he must endure silently. They may help a woman who fears she will not be believed or a family struggling to understand why someone they love has changed. His story also carries an important message for military leaders: rank must never become a shield for abuse. Survivors need to know that the assault was not their fault, that PTSD is not a character defect, and that seeking help does not diminish their service. By speaking openly, Pastor Jeff transforms a deeply painful part of his life into a source of hope for others. Sharing His Message Across Every Platform Pastor Jeff's complete interview can be heard on the Law Enforcement Talk Radio Show and Podcast. The episode is available through the show's website and across major digital and social media platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeartradio and more. These platforms allow his message to reach people wherever they are, at home, in a car, at work, or searching late at night for proof that someone understands. The Podcast gives Pastor Jeff the space to discuss his military career, sexual assault, PTSD diagnosis, struggles, recovery, faith, books, and the work he continues to do today. His story is difficult, but it is not without hope. A Life That Became Larger Than the Trauma Pastor Jeff cannot change what was done to him. He can, however, determine what he does with the life that followed. He became an author, pastor, mentor, international speaker, grief consultant, relationship facilitator, investor, videographer, and advocate for people searching for healing. He turned private pain into a public mission, not because the trauma was good, but because his future still had value. Army Vet's Trauma Recovery and Message: He Speaks About PTSD, Sexual Assault, Faith, and Life. Military trauma does not always begin on a battlefield. That may be the most important part of this Army vet's trauma recovery and message. He speaks because silence protects pain. He writes because someone may discover hope inside a Book. He helps people pray because faith can provide strength when answers remain out of reach. He discusses PTSD because veterans and other survivors should not have to struggle alone. He talks about gratitude because grief can isolate even the strongest person. Most of all, Pastor Jeff reminds people that what happened to them does not have to be the final definition of their Life. His journey continues, from trauma to triumph, from broken to builder, and from abused to affirming others. For anyone living with the aftermath of assault, grief, or PTSD, his message is clear: Healing is possible. A voice can be reclaimed. A life can be rebuilt. And even after profound pain, a person can still become a source of hope for someone else. The Law Enforcement Talk Radio Show and Podcast social media like their Facebook , Instagram , LinkedIn , Medium and other social media platforms. You can contact John J. “Jay” Wiley by email at Jay@letradio.com , or learn more about him on their website . Find a wide variety of great podcasts online at The Podcast Zone Facebook Page , look for the one with the bright green logo. Be sure to check out our website . Be sure to follow us on X , Instagram , Facebook, Pinterest, Linkedin and other social media platforms for the latest episodes and news. Listeners can find the show across Apple, Spotify, YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, and other podcast and social media platforms. Learn and get access to money saving tips and how to increase your net worth at www.LetSavings.com For a community of like minded individuals from all over the planet that want to improve their lives, relationships and business. Learn what they need, and develop the life that they've always wanted. We host weekly rooms on the Clubhouse Drop In Social Audio App. The App and Your Confident Life rooms are free of charge. You can get more information about Clubhouse and Your Confident Life for free here. Download the Free Ebook about ways and tips to improve your health. You can get the ebook for free at www.LetHealthy.com Listen to the Law Enforcement Talk Radio Show and Podcast on their website, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeartRadio, and most major podcast platforms. Get the Free Clubhouse App, it is Drop In Social Audio. Think of it as your own talk radio show on your phone, and best of all it is free. Be sure to look for me and follow me, that's John J Wiley or @letradioshow you can do all that here. Army Vet's Trauma Recovery and Message: He Speaks About PTSD, Sexual Assault, Faith, and Life. Military trauma does not always begin on a battlefield. Attributions Pastor Jeff Speaks Clubhouse Social Audio App Amazon Facebook Facebook Group Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Operation Midnight Hammer through the eyes of the people who flew it. CMSgt. Hilliard was the senior enlisted leader for maintenance in the 55th Fighter Squadron, the Wild Weasels who flew Suppression of Enemy Air Defenses ahead of the B-2 strike on Iran. Watch the three-part documentary series on Afterburn Defense: Part I: https://youtu.be/MgQ_X3Td8a4 Part II: https://youtu.be/GzdL6NMYDso Part III: https://youtu.be/Xc22-2RaGSY This is the full interview. No jet flies without the people who fix it. In this conversation he talks about how the squadron decided which specific aircraft would fly the Iran mission, what it takes to generate a sortie that most people never think about, running a maintenance unit where many of the airmen had never deployed before, and the eighteen hours he waited after the jets taxied out. Before Iran, the 55th Fighter Squadron fought over Yemen in Operation Rough Rider, a sustained air campaign against Houthi surface-to-air threats. What they learned there is the reason the F-16 Block 50 and the AGM-88 HARM were part of the strike package on June 21st, 2025. These interviews were recorded between December 2025 and January 2026 and preserve firsthand accounts from pilots, maintainers, intelligence officers, and logistics airmen who were there. 0:00 From a One-Stoplight Town to the Viper 5:18 What It Actually Takes to Launch One Sortie 8:16 Spinning Up a Maintenance Unit for Combat 11:42 Leading Airmen Who Had Never Deployed 17:22 Flying With Fewer Jets Than You Need 21:16 A Week Out From Operation Midnight Hammer 23:27 Eighteen Hours of Waiting 26:06 A Different Kind of Battlefield 33:59 The Empty Break Rooms 39:05 How We Chose Which Jets Would Go Have a story? Want to Connect? Advertise? https://theafterburnpodcast.com/contact/

When everything feels urgent, meaningful work rarely gets the attention it deserves. In episode 631 of the Lawyerist Podcast, Zack Glaser talks with leadership researcher and author Shawn Vanderhoven about how law firm leaders can create the clarity their teams need to focus and perform at their best.  Drawing from his book, Pause: How to Lead Brilliant Work in a Busy World, Shawn explains why effective leadership sometimes requires slowing down before moving forward. He shares what his research revealed about the behaviors that improve focus, the leadership habits that amplify distraction, and why teams struggle when every project is treated like a top priority.  Together, they explore how to make realistic tradeoffs, involve your team in prioritization, delegate without derailing someone's entire day, and create systems that make difficult conversations easier. Shawn also explains why asking, “What will it take to do this well?” can lead to better decisions than simply asking whether the work can get done.  If your law firm is juggling too many priorities, this episode offers practical ways to reduce distraction, lead with greater clarity, and create space for work your team can be proud of.  Listen to our previous episodes on Law Firm Leadership & Building Stronger Teams.  #627: Building Stronger Law Firm Teams Through Better Communication, with Zeina Baydoun Apple | Spotify | LTN  #615: How to Stop Being the Bottleneck and Build Stronger Teams, with Debbie Foster and Stephanie Everett Apple | Spotify | LTN  #604: From Practice to Business: Scaling Beyond Yourself, with Andy Hays Apple | Spotify | LTN  #592: Client Care, Culture, and Character: A Framework for Great Leaders, with William O'Neal Apple | Spotify | LTN  #541: Why the Best Teams Have Keystone Conversations, with Michael Bungay Stanier Apple | Spotify | LTN  Links from the episode:  https://www.pausebook.co/  Have thoughts about today's episode? Join the conversation on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, and X!   If today's podcast resonates with you and you haven't read The Small Firm Roadmap Revisited yet, get the first chapter right now for free! Looking for help beyond the book? See if our coaching community is right for you.   Access more resources from Lawyerist at lawyerist.com.   Chapters / Timestamps  00:00 – Introduction  00:25 – A Different Kind of Law Firm Conference  03:10 – LabCon for Law Firm Leaders  07:05 – What Is Broken About Law Firm Intake  11:30 – How to Secret Shop Your Firm  15:15 – The Role of AI in Client Intake  20:45 – Why Clients Still Want Access to Humans  26:30 – Meet Shawn Vanderhoven  29:15 – Why Leaders Need to Pause  30:25 – How Leadership Can Improve Focus  33:25 – When Everything Feels Important  37:15 – Making Prioritization a Team Sport  40:20 – Choosing Your Majors and Minors  42:45 – A Better Way to Delegate Work  46:10 – Navigating Competing Priorities  49:10 – Making Difficult Conversations Easier  54:45 – Creating Clarity Around What Matters  56:10 – Pausing to Help Your Team Move Faster  59:05 – Closing Thoughts 

A New Mexico judge ordered Meta to pay $942M over harms to kids, with a trillion-dollar trial next. ByteDance started pretraining a 10T-parameter model, AMD bought Taalas to etch weights into silicon, and OpenAI's 2027 gadget leaked. Links Meta Ordered to Pay $942 Million to Address Harm to Kids From Social Media (The Wall Street Journal) Sources: ByteDance is pretraining an AI model with up to 10T parameters, roughly 3x larger than Kimi K3 and larger than the 8T estimate for Anthropic's Mythos 5 (Financial Times) AMD acquires Toronto-based Taalas, which integrates model weights directly into silicon with the promise to boost inference performance, for an undisclosed sum (The Register) Sources: OpenAI's new device, slated for 2027, is a hockey puck-sized smart speaker with moving parts that help give it personality and will likely cost $300+ (Bloomberg) Longreads Scientists trained AI on genetic sequences to design viruses not found in nature, yielding 16 viable viruses that can infect bacteria but don't threaten humans (The New York Times) David Imel: you could be taking way better photos on your phone (The Verge) Subscribe to the ad-free feed.

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.splitzoneduo.comIn our preseason mailbag, Alex and Richard take a bunch of questions from Split Zone Duo subscribers. Here's what we're talking about: - 0:27: Richard's recruiting symposium report, including the G6 team that's spending money like nobody else in its conference's history - 8:56: What is the point of conferences, really? - 17:33: Your guide to picking a G6 team, tailored for a Washington fan but meant for anyone who'd like to care about more football teams - 21:57: Could the NFL weaken its college farm system? Does it care? - 25:31: What if Notre Dame bumps a P4 from the Playoff by being ranked 12th? - 31:28: How could college football get a real salary cap?- 34:38: Did COVID money fuel Miami's ascent?- 38:34: What would make the “We're So Back 12” successful this year? - 43:58: Which G6 team could win a Playoff game?- 45:47: How do you rediscover joy in college football?- 51:57: Which unvisited FBS stadiums top our lists?- 53:39: How many titles make Indiana a football school?- 54:15: Video game dynasty report - 54:48: How did we choose the intro soundbites?- 56:47: Akron, you better take your fan drive-scripting exercise seriously Producer: Anthony Vito

In this episode, we see Jesus riding in to Jerusalem on a donkey and we are reminded that the Kingdom of God is Different than the Kingdoms of this world!

Non-monogamy is one of the topics I get asked about more than almost anything else, so in this episode I sit down with Susan Bratton and Karl Eberhardt to dig into what open relationships, polyamory, and relationship anarchy actually look like day to day — not the theory, the lived experience. We talk about how to know you're ready to open a relationship, the STI screening protocol that makes it work, how jealousy and compersion actually show up, and the moment a 35-year marriage nearly ended over what gets called "husband thievery." We also get into how an adult daughter found out her parents were non-monogamous in one short conversation, and how a "summer boy toy" earned a promotion to full-time boyfriend. Whether you're curious, skeptical, or already living this life, this conversation is going to challenge some assumptions.Mentioned in this episode: Testing before getting physical is non-negotiable for me — ProDx Health makes it easy. First PASS-certified at-home STI kit, herpes testing included. 15% off: http://prodxhealth.com/discount/tabooIn This Episode:0:00 – Redefining Relationships in Midlife0:28 – Welcome to Taboo to Truth0:52 – Meet Susan Bratton & Karl Eberhardt2:25 – Defining Non-Monogamy vs. Cheating: The Relationship Tree7:29 – How Susan Knew She Was Ready to Open Her Marriage8:25 – How Karl and Susan Met (The Pool Story)12:02 – Why Karl Is "Well-Suited" for Polyamory14:34 – The Non-Negotiable: STI Testing & Screening In15:39 – "Polyamory Means Love Many": Susan's Two Love Relationships17:27 – Karl's San Diego Girlfriend & Traveling as a Throuple19:59 – What Is a "Bambi"? A Different Kind of Intimacy21:26 – Susan's Young Lover & the Jealousy That Followed23:57 – Karl's Turn: Facing Jealousy Over an Old Flame26:29 – Compersion, Husband Thievery & Almost Losing Tim29:44 – Telling Their Daughter Taylor31:11 – From "Summer Boy Toy" to Full-Time Boyfriend34:05 – OutroTo watch the video version of this episode, head over to YouTube!About The Guest:Susan is a champion and advocate for all those who desire ageless intimacy.She is a best-selling author and publisher of 44 books and programs including S*xual Soulmates, Relationship Magic, Revive Her Drive, Ravish Him and many more. She's the official company spokesperson for GAINSWave® and The Dr. Joel Kaplan Company. She serves as Chief Advocacy Officer of ProDxHealth.org STI testing.Susan has been a featured guest on over 1,000 podcasts and TV shows, including Diary of a CEO, You Are Not Broken, S*x with Emily, The Human Upgrade with Dave Asprey, Good Moms Bad Choices, Heal Thyself, IDIOT with Laura Clery, The Infamous “Clit Camp” Music Video, LuvBites with Dr. Tara, and The Chalene Show.Her books and interviews have helped millions take control of their s*xual joy.Her message resonates across gender and age because it's rooted in agency, body literacy, and connection.Connect with Susan Bratton:Website: https://susanbratton.comMentioned in this episode: https://tenintimacy.comInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/susanbrattonKarl Eberhardt is a nationally recognized New Car Owner Trainer on correct care of modern car paint finishes. Karl has a life long passion for design and is the brewer of beer//Cicerone CBS, and custom jewelry. He has built surfboards for 25+ years.Connect with Karl Ebhardt:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/karleberhardt_/About The Host:Karen Bigman, a Sexual Health Alliance Certified Sex Educator, Life, and Menopause Coach, tackles the often-taboo subject of sexuality with a straightforward and candid approach. We explore the intricacies of sex during perimenopause, post-menopause, and andropause, offering insights and support for all those experiencing these transformative phases.This podcast is not intended to give medical advice. Karen Bigman is not a medical professional. For any medical questions or issues, please visit your licensed medical provider.Looking for some fresh perspective on sex in midlife? You can find me here:Email: karen@taboototruth.comWebsite: https://www.taboototruth.com/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/taboototruthYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@taboototruthpodcastSubstack: https://karenbigman.substack.com

For decades, the kitchen was the centerpiece of Yewande Komolafe's life. She spent long hours there, first as a restaurant cook and later as a recipe developer. But though she loved the often-intense culinary world, she had to navigate it with certain limitations: She was born with sickle cell disease, an inherited blood disorder, which required her to carefully manage her working life. She did so successfully, becoming a celebrated cookbook author and food writer for The Times. A medical crisis in December 2023 changed all of that. Komolafe ended up in a coma for six weeks, and after emerging learned that both her legs and her fingers would need to be amputated. In this episode of “The Sunday Daily,” Komolafe tells Rachel Abrams about what happened and how, after everything, she made her way back into the kitchen. On Today's Episode: Yewande Komolafe is a cooking columnist for The New York Times. Background Reading: How Losing My Limbs Turned Me Into a Different Kind of Cook The Chef Imagining a More Accessible World, One Meal at a Time Photo credit: Lanna Apisukh. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Could the search for aliens actually tell us more about ourselves than life beyond Earth?In this episode of Capability Amplifier, Dan Sullivan and Mike Koenigs take on one of their most unusual conversations yet.Starting with a simple question - Do aliens exist? - the discussion quickly expands into science, human intelligence, Ai, consciousness, space exploration, and the remarkable abilities already found throughout nature.Drawing on NASA's Webb Telescope, SpaceX, psychology, philosophy, and emerging Ai research, Dan and Mike explore why humans are fascinated by extraterrestrial life and what that curiosity reveals about our own potential.Whether you're interested in entrepreneurship, technology, science, or simply enjoy exploring big ideas, this conversation offers a thoughtful perspective on one of humanity's oldest questions.In this episode, Dan and I break down:Why Dan remains skeptical about extraterrestrial visitorsWhat NASA and the Webb Space Telescope have - and haven't - discoveredWhy people naturally search for something greater than themselvesThe surprising intelligence found in animals and natureHow Ai is helping us better understand human thinkingConsciousness, psychedelics, and the limits of current scienceWhy curiosity may be humanity's greatest competitive advantageThe future of robotics and space explorationDan and I may not have solved the mystery of extraterrestrial life, but the conversation raises a bigger question:How much intelligence already surrounds us that we have not learned to recognize?TIME STAMPS[00:00:00] The Capability Amplifier Alien Edition[00:02:09] Dan's answer on extraterrestrial life[00:03:31] What the Webb Telescope has revealed[00:05:16] Why people want advanced beings to exist[00:09:02] Mike's childhood fascination with aliens[00:14:06] A SpaceX perspective on the evidence[00:17:08] Imagination, belief, and the afterlife[00:19:26] Psychedelics and expanded consciousness[00:22:22] Intelligence in animals and nature[00:34:09] Ai and the expansion of human intelligence[00:40:36] Beliefs Dan has abandoned[00:47:43] Robots, space exploration, and future alienPS – When you're ready, here's how I can help: Want to find the hidden revenue in your business? Grab a Cup of Coffee with me: AiAccelerator.com/1kReady to reinvent yourself, your business, and your brand, and create “Your Next Act”? Watch this.Discover More

Carina Hamel, co-founder of Bivo, joins Bicycle Retail Radio to share her journey from elite Nordic skiing and athletic product development into building one of cycling's most recognizable emerging brands.Carina talks about creating a woman-led business rooted in thoughtful design, sustainability, and inclusivity, along with lessons learned working closely with specialty retailers and building authentic community in the cycling industry.Support the show

The Enlightened Family Business Podcast Ep. 165: Rethinking Succession in Family Business with Josh Baron   In this episode of the Enlightened Family Business Podcast, host Chris Yonker sits down with Josh Baron — Harvard Business School faculty member, co-founder of Banyan Global, and co-author of multiple Harvard Business Review works on family enterprise — for a rich, deeply practical conversation on the topic that never gets old: succession. Josh has spent 20 years advising family businesses and teaching at Columbia and Harvard, and what he keeps finding is that families don't fail at succession because they chose the wrong person. They fail because they never built the right process. Together Chris and Josh explore why a family business CEO who's been in the seat for 30 years is not facing a job change — they're facing an identity crisis; why the how of succession is more important than the what; the critical difference between conquerors and rulers and why the next generation doesn't need to look like the founder to be the right fit; how to use the arc of succession — assets, roles, and capabilities — as a planning framework; what happens when the founding generation leaves and the next generation discovers they have no one to resolve their disputes; and why working backwards from the far future is one of the most effective tools for getting a reluctant founder to engage. They also dig into the four ownership models used by successful multi-generational family businesses and why the question isn't just who should run the business — it's whether the family should have a business at all. Episode Chapters ·       3:56   Meet Josh Baron ·       5:13   From Bain to Banyan: How Josh Found His Way Into Family Business ·       8:00   Why Succession Is an Evergreen Problem — and Always Will Be ·       10:12  What the Rising Generation Is Really Feeling ·       13:12  Why G1 and G2 Struggle to See Each Other Clearly ·       15:39  When Is the Right Time to Start Succession Planning? ·       16:05  The Arc of Succession: Assets, Roles, and Capabilities ·       20:48  Succession Is a Process, Not an Event ·       22:11  The Danger of the One-Winner Moment ·       24:33  Why Every Generation Needs a Different Kind of Leader ·       27:50  How to Help a Founder Embrace What Got Us Here Won't Get Us There ·       30:00  Grafting: How the Next Gen Should Introduce New Ideas ·       31:30  Working Backwards: The Most Effective Tool for Reluctant Founders ·       35:35  What Happens When the Founder Leaves and the Glue Disappears ·       38:00  Should We Even Have a Family Business? The Question Nobody Asks ·       40:19  The Four Ownership Models and When Each One Works ·       46:09  The How Is Greater Than the What ·       49:06  When to Get Outside Help — and Why You Always Need It ·       53:31  Resources and Farewell   Websites ·       hbs.edu (search Josh Baron) ·       banyanglobal.com ·       chrisyonker.com   Book & Articles ·       The Founder's Final Act — Harvard Business Review, September–October 2025 ·       Search "Josh Baron HBS" for the full catalog of published work   About Josh Baron Josh Baron is a Senior Lecturer at Harvard Business School, coauthor of the Harvard Business Review Family Business Handbook, and a cofounder of BanyanGlobal Family Business Advisors.

Many reduce the Christian life to belief, discipline, and obedience, only to find it hollow. But 1 John 4:16 reveals something deeper: God is not just loving - He is love. His love is always present, inviting us not to earn it but to receive it and abide in it. This love cannot remain private. We cannot love God while rejecting others, because loving people is loving God. Real transformation happens not in isolation, but in the messy, beautiful reality of community.

Today, we're doing something a little different.For years, this podcast has been a place where I've had the privilege of sharing the stories of incredible people living with endometriosis and chronic illness. Today, I thought I'd turn the microphone around and answer some of the questions you've been asking me.In this episode, I'm sharing the story behind my new memoir, Grateful Anyway: A Memoir of Small Wins and Chronic Illness.We'll talk about why I wrote it, who it's for, the chapters that were the hardest to write, and why the title Grateful Anyway has become so meaningful to me.This community has been such an important part of my journey, and I'd love to invite you to be part of this next chapter.If you know (email me: podcastthecycle@gmail.com)

How can organic writing and leaning into the pivot help your stories stand out? And how can you pitch a story as a discovery writer if you genuinely don't know what's going to happen next. Steven James gives his writing tips after more than 20 years as an author. In the intro, Better Than Free in an Age of AI [Kevin Kelly on Tim Ferriss; Kevin Kelly on The Creative Penn]; Future Vision XPrize; A Different Kind of Bucket List. Today's show is sponsored by Draft2Digital, self-publishing with support, where you can get free formatting, free distribution to multiple stores, and a host of other benefits. Just go to www.draft2digital.com to get started. This show is also supported by my Patrons. Join my Community at Patreon.com/thecreativepenn Steven James is the multi-award-winning and international bestselling author of 21 novels across thrillers, YA, and science fiction, with more than a million copies sold, as well as the author of non-fiction craft books for writers, a writing teacher, and the host of The Story Blender podcast. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes How to lean into organic writing, and what to focus on instead of plot How characters unfold on the page, and why an attitude beats a background Producing an outline for an agent or publisher when you genuinely don't know what happens next Don't pitch the plot, pitch the pivot The four choices you have in every scene, and why logic plus surprise is the engine of story Faith, moral clarity and big questions You can find Steven at StevenJames.net. Transcript of the interview with Steven James Jo: Steven James is the multi-award-winning and international bestselling author of 21 novels across thrillers, YA, and science fiction, with more than a million copies sold, as well as the author of non-fiction craft books for writers, a writing teacher, and the host of The Story Blender Podcast. So welcome to the show, Steven. Steven: Thanks for having me, Jo. Good to be here. Jo: Great to have you on the show. First up— Tell us a bit more about you and how you got into writing and publishing. Steven: Oh, gosh. Well, the thing is, when I was a kid, I fell in love with stories. My uncle would always, whenever we got together for the holidays—Christmas, New Year's and so on—he would take my sister, my brother and myself into a corner of the room while the other adults had coffee, and we would just sit there, and he would get this look in his eye and he'd say, “I'm going to tell you a story.” We were transported to another world. We were swashbuckling with pirates, or facing down a grizzly bear in Alaska, or flying over the desert on a flying carpet, or whatever. I fell in love with imagination and stories and everything. So I started reading as much as I could, mostly short stories. They had a programme at our library called the paperback book exchange, where you bring a paperback book and you leave it, and you can take any one of the paperback books that they had. You could keep it as long as you wanted. If you wanted it for your life, that's fine, or you could just bring it back as soon as you finished reading it. Anyway, I went crazy over the summers reading short stories, mainly. As I got older, I was like, “I think I want to be a storyteller.” So I actually got my master's degree in storytelling. Then I started to travel and tell stories, but I had three little daughters at home, and I was like, “I don't want to be gone 300 days a year when they are growing up.” So I ended up starting to write stories instead of travel, and then it just kind of shifted in that direction. That was in '97. Oh my goodness, that's long. '97, '98. So then I started to write books, and then eventually in 2007, I think, my first novel came out. Now, mainly, I've been writing novels ever since. Jo: It's so interesting. Was it a job, storytelling? Is that what you did before you became a book writer? Or did you have a different job? Steven: I mostly would go to events, conferences, schools and so on, and do a family-friendly storytelling show. So I would tell personal stories, some folktales reimagined. I would go to different events around the country. Mostly it was that. Then I started to shift. I wrote for magazines for a while—80 different magazines I wrote for over those years, a couple of hundred different articles, stories. I was like, “I'm just going to try to make a living telling stories.” So the shift has gone back and forth between actually telling stories and writing stories, but these days, I don't know. I'm still speaking. I'm still out there teaching. Jo: That's so interesting, because it's obviously a completely different thing to tell a story in person than it is to write a story. So when you decided to shift that way, what did you have to learn and unlearn? Because your thoughts on the page are so different to when you can make eye contact with an audience. Steven: That's a good point. I kind of started by telling stories back when I was in college, so I sort of moved from telling to writing. And you're right, there's so much that's lost, whether it's eye contact or pauses. On a printed page, there's always the same amount of space between every word—a space. But when you tell stories, obviously you pause for effect in different places, different areas, and so it's quite different. So if I have an idea for a story, I usually have to decide, is this going to be written or told? And then I do it in that medium. Then if I want to, let's say, tell a written story, I almost have to relearn it, or retell it very differently. You have gestures, body language. All of those things are obviously lost in text, so they are very different. I think for me it's been good, because when I tell stories, I hear different characters speaking, so that when I write, usually dialogue comes fast to me. I can hear what people are saying. I don't always know where they are. I don't always know the setting. I don't even know the scene necessarily, but I can hear the dialogue. Then it also helps me to step into the characters, like when I'm writing different points of view, so that I think I can do a good job of getting into that character's mind, as if I were that person. I think some of that comes from just telling stories. Jo: You've taught so many writers over the years, and it's interesting you said that you hear characters' dialogue. I see visual film in my mind. I don't hear any voice at all. It's all silent. I struggle with dialogue, but I do great world building. Do you find that this really is different by the author? I feel like we fall into these different groups. Steven: Yes, I do. I kind of feel like that's very true as far as what comes first, whether it's a description of a place, whether it's the action. I mean, basically a story has dialogue, narration—or we call it sometimes exposition—and description. Those three things. Every story has those three things, and those are the three that we use to tell a story, a novel. So some people tend to drift into one or the other as sort of their default setting: dialogue, description, or action. That's true. I think also something else that's interesting about writers is they tend to fall into either the camp of being a wordsmith or a storyteller. Not everyone, but I feel like some people are wordsmiths, where I read what they're writing, and I'm like, “Man, this is so powerful, evocative,” whatever. Maybe there's no story there. It's just really interesting writing. Other people just are natural storytellers, and they have to really work on the wordsmithing. I think that's me. I'm more naturally just a storyteller, but it takes me a long time to get the descriptions to where I want them, to choose exactly the right word. That takes me more effort. Some people have to build up the storytelling muscles. I have to build up the wordsmithing muscles. Jo: Well, part of the reason I wanted to talk to you is because you talk about this thing called organic writing in your book Story Trumps Structure, which is out now in a second edition. I call it discovery writing, so similar to you. But most people in the writing community seem to obsess about plotting and planning. So talk about your process of organic writing. You say in the book, “Trust the fluidity of the process.” Tell us more about that. Steven: Well, I remember in high school even, when my teacher got up front and he kind of got this very almost wise look on his face, and he goes, “A story is something with a beginning, a middle, and an end.” I'm sitting there in high school like, “Well, so does a bratwurst. What are you talking about here?” A description of a chair has a beginning, a middle, and an end. The sentence, “Preheat the oven to 450 degrees,” has a beginning, a middle, and an end. My view is that saying a story is something that has three acts is like saying that a pizza is something with three toppings. It might have three. It might have one. It might have five. So the idea for me is not to worry about structure, trying to tick off the boxes of a template, a formula you find online, a fill-in-the-blanks kind of a thing. But instead, to actually look at what lies at the heart of the story—the character, the tension, the struggle, the pursuit, the pivots and plot twists, and the payoff at the end. As you develop those aspects of the story, I feel like you need to worry less and less about following a formula. The more you understand what lies at the heart of a story, I feel like the less you need to plot and the less you need to write by the seat of your pants. A lot of people say, “Oh, you write by the seat of…” No, I don't write by the seat of my pants, because I know what a story contains, so I know that in a certain scene a character will make certain choices that are unpredictable but that escalate the tension, and different things like that. I'm a huge proponent of discovery, as you say, or organic writing. I won't get the quote exactly right, but Ray Bradbury said something along the lines of, “Plot is the tracks left in the snow after your characters have run by on their incredible destinations. It cannot precede action. It is the chart that remains when an action is through.” So he's saying plot is not what precedes action. After the action, you have plot. So the whole idea of trying to plot out a story before you write it is going about writing exactly backwards. Plot doesn't precede action. It's the result. So I always tell people, “Don't worry so much about the plot. I want you to look at the pursuit.” A plotter might say, “Well, what should happen?” And they'll just come up with something. But an organic writer—a pursuit-based question would be, what does the character want? Now, when I know what the character wants, I will know what should happen. So literally, it will lead me to the story. Focusing on plot will not necessarily lead you to the story. It might lead you down the wrong track. Jo: Then in terms of your actual writing process— Do you start writing without knowing the ending? Do you write in order? Is the organic side also in the process? Steven: I've never started a book where I know how it will end. So I usually start with either a character that's fascinating or, in some cases, a premise, a question. Then as I write, I explore the possibilities of where it might go. I've tried to outline a scene—like one scene, not a whole book—and it never works. I can't even outline one scene. I've tried, and I'm like, okay, that's… What I end up with is completely different from it, so it's just a waste of time and effort for me to try to outline or plot out a story. I'm much more interested in the pathway the characters will take as they face obstacles and setbacks in their pursuit. As the struggles and the tension develop, what choices will they make? That's how the story will unfold for me. Jo: I'm similar. Then I also wonder— Do you do character sheets and character bios, or do the characters also unfold organically? Steven: Absolutely, I don't do any of the sheets and bios and stuff. The characters really come to me as I write. I begin to get to know them. I always tell people, a character with an attitude is more interesting than a character with a background. So a lot of people will spend a lot of time on, like, where's this character gone to college, and what's their first pet's name, all that stuff. I'm not trying to dump on that idea. I get that that can be helpful. But I'm like, how would I know that until I've spent time with them? Then once I begin to spend time with them, I'm writing and I'm like, “Nah, this doesn't seem like what that character would really say or do,” so I have to go back and rejigger the story to hopefully make it fit with that character. Then I like to give the characters some sort of attitude. I'm not talking about a negative or judgy attitude, but an attitude about something that is unique or different, and that makes them not a template character, not an archetype or whatever, but unique. Sort of this constellation of unique traits, characteristics, maybe wounds, flaws and so on, that create a character where you're like, “This is a character like none I've ever seen before. I want to spend time with this character.” Jo: Then you're spending time with the character by writing what's happening, as opposed to writing loads of stuff beforehand and then starting to write. You're actually finding all of this out during the process of writing. Steven: Yes, and I think it's kind of like getting to know someone. If I were to say, “Okay, I'm going to write down Jo's bio,” or whatever—okay, I'm making stuff up, because I don't know you super well. If we were to spend time together, hang out, whatever, talk, over the course of time I would start to know, oh, she likes this, she doesn't like that. This is important to her. This is what she would weep or pound the table over—whatever, all of the things that come with time. It's like a friendship in real life to me. So I can't sit down and tell you what a character in real life would think and say and do if I don't know them, but the more time I spend with them, then the more I'm able to predict that accurately. I think the mistake a lot of people make is they think, “I'm going to get to know this character with a background,” and then they start writing it, and instead of looking at the context, they look back at the—I don't know what you call it—the background or something like that. I always feel like what you mentioned earlier is, like, hold it loosely in your hand. Trust the fluidity of the process. As you're writing, you have an instinct. “Ah, I think this character would say this or do this.” So trust that. Trust that instinct. Trust that moment in the story, instead of trying to go back to an outline, back to a character description, or whatever it might be. So I'm a big proponent of looking at the context—not just what happened, but what is the result? So looking at the impetus and the implication of the choices and the activities. When something occurs, what would the character naturally say or do or think or respond? Then what would that cause? What's the implication that that would have on the rest of the story, on the rest of the characters? So, really trying to keep your finger on the pulse of the story, and adapt as you move forward through it. Jo: I love all of that, but I also am very aware that you've been in traditional publishing for over 20 years, and one of the things with agents and publishers is that they often ask for an outline. So how do you manage that? Or how did you more earlier in your career, because I imagine they just trust you now. Earlier in your career, or people listening who want to pitch but they write in this organic way, how do we deal with that kind of thing? Steven: Well, okay, so there's two good questions. One is about producing an outline for an agent or editor or publisher and so on. The other is how to pitch a story. So the first: I would write the premise down, and maybe a paragraph or two, and then where I think it might go. Basically, I would focus on the questions that the characters will face, maybe the moral dilemmas, the sacrifices they have to make, the world they live in. I kind of know that stuff, and I can write a couple of paragraphs about that. But beyond that, I just don't know what's going to happen, so I can't really provide more. I'm looking at my shelf at the books that I've done, and mostly that's what I've done is kind of a couple of paragraphs focusing on the premise and the problem, the struggle, and so on like that. As far as pitching a story, I always tell people, “Don't pitch the plot, pitch the pivot.” I think that there's a screenwriter—I think that he talks about this a little bit. I've not read the book Save the Cat, but people have told me, “Oh, he kind of brings this up in that book.” The idea is to pitch the irony instead of what occurs. So sometimes when I tell people to pitch, or I give them ideas, one process that you can use is: when, must, before, or else. So, when this occurs, this character must do something before this, or else. So you have the character, you have the struggle, you have the inciting incident, you have the stakes, and you have the countdown. It works well for thrillers. So for instance, like Jaws. When a man-eating shark starts eating people in a small seaside village, the sheriff must stop him before more people die and the town loses its economy. So there you have when, must, before, or else. Now, no one's going to buy the story based on that, because there's no irony, there's no pivot. It's just a description of the plot, and that's what most people pitch. So I always tell people, pitch the part of the story that you wouldn't expect. So for instance, in there you might pitch: when a shark starts eating people in a small seaside village, the only one who can stop him is afraid of the water. Now you're like, “Oh, well, that's interesting. How does that happen? What happens there?” With my book Broker of Lies, the pitch was something like, when a high-level Pentagon redactor ends up on the run, he must stop a terrorist attack before he's neutralised by the people he trusts the most. So the pivot is that the people he trusts at the Pentagon the most are actually trying to neutralise him because he's on the run, and all that kind of stuff. So why would they be trying to do that? Well, that's interesting. So it's always looking for the irony, the pivot. Why is this character the last one in the world who would ever be equipped to tackle this problem or face this issue? So that's one way to do a pitch. Obviously there's lots of them, but I think your goal with a pitch is to get them to say, “Tell me more.” It's not necessarily to summarise the whole story. Jo: That's great advice. So you teach writers—I first saw you at ThrillerFest, I think it was 2012—and you do events, you run writing retreats. So you work with a lot of authors, and I wondered, what are the challenges that you see from authors with, say, five books? So not the beginner authors, because obviously there's a lot of challenges. But those who, let's say they've got the three to five books, things are going all right, but they're like, “How do I get to the next level?” What are the craft issues, or the business issues as well, that mid-list authors face? Steven: Well, business, I'm not the guy to ask. I could try to answer that, but I mean, basically: meet your deadlines and write something amazing. Try to be easy to work with, but also stand up for what you wrote as far as working with editors. It's sort of a fine line you have to walk. The one thing that over the last few years I've really noticed in a lot of writers who are in that space is that they don't have many pivots. They tend to write predictable stories, and that's why they tend to stay where they're at—whether it's because they're following an outline or a plot formula or whatever it is. So when I talk about a pivot, I mean a moment in the story where something happens that's both unexpected and inevitable. For instance, if you're reading a story, you want things to make sense. You want them to be logical. That's one thing. But you don't want them to be too predictable. If it's too predictable, it's boring. It's like, I'm not interested. So we also want surprises. We want these two things. We want logic, and we want surprise. When those two things meet and you have a moment in the story where it's like, “I didn't see that coming, but that totally makes sense,” that's what we want, and we want that in every scene. I feel like a lot of authors don't have that in every scene. Now, you might say, “Well, every scene?” Well, yes, because basically those two factors, logic and surprise, can only meet in four different ways. You could have something that's very logical but has no surprises. That's going to be boring. It's going to be too predictable. We don't want that. You could have something that is very surprising but not logical. It makes no sense. A lot of stuff is surprising, but that's not what we want, because it's unbelievable, and it's like, what is going on here? You could have something that has neither logic nor surprise, which obviously we don't want that. The only other option is to have a moment that is both logical and surprising. So you have a choice in every scene. You have four choices, actually. You can have it be predictable and boring. You can have it be nonsensical. You can have it be unbelievable. Or you can have a pivot. So I find myself trying to really coach people on pivots. They'll say, “Oh, well, do I need it in every scene?” I'm like, “You can choose, but do you want it to be predictable or boring or nonsensical, or do you want it to really drive the story forward?” I think it's because people have been taught structure and plot and three acts and all this kind of stuff, but they haven't been taught this idea—even though it's not something I made up. Aristotle, in Poetics, thousands of years ago, put it a little bit differently, but he said, “The reversal of the situation”—what I call the pivot—”is the moment at which the action veers around to its opposite”—that would be what I call surprise—”subject always to a rule of probability or necessity”—which is the logic. So he's basically saying the same thing in just a little bit different language, but you have these three factors. You have logic, you have surprise, and you have them come together in a specific moment. I don't know why it's not taught more. I have never found anyone who teaches pivots. I have not found any books, so I wrote a book recently about how to use pivots. It's so central, and I think great storytellers naturally do it. You'll read a book, or you'll maybe watch a show, and you're like, “Oh, I didn't see that coming. That totally makes sense.” I don't see anyone else out there really focusing on teaching that. So that's a huge thing for me, really, to help people move up in their writing, elevate it to a different level. Jo: Is that Delve, Pivot, Propel? Steven: Yes. That book came out a couple years ago. We just re-released it. I updated it some, but it talks pretty much in depth about pivots and how to actually use those to propel the stories forward. Jo: Maybe you could just give us one tip on how to do that, because going back to the organic writing—let's say I've been organically writing, and every time a character has a decision to make, I think at that point about what I want to write and I write it. Are you suggesting that we go back in the edit and look at the end of every scene and redo it? Because I can't imagine that I would get this right every time. I would need to do that in an edit, I think. Steven: I think for me, when I'm writing, I'm always asking myself a series of questions. One is, what would the character naturally do? I want to make it believable and natural. Let them do it. I want to escalate the tension, so I'll ask myself, “How can I make things worse?” Then I'll always ask myself, how can I add a pivot to this scene? So as I'm writing a scene—again, I don't know how it will end when I start it—but if I use the first idea that comes to mind, probably a lot of readers would guess that as well, because it's the first idea that comes to mind. It's probably logical and probably predictable. That's why most stories end up being too predictable. It's because we go with the first idea that maybe we had. So I try to discard that. Maybe the second idea, just discard it. Then I start thinking, okay, now if I've discarded the obvious, what is going on? What's below the surface? So to answer your question, I'm looking for what isn't what it appears to be, or who isn't who they appear to be, or a surprising way to bring together plot threads that I didn't see related before. So it's always looking for the unexpected, the surprise, because most of the time that is what we're missing. Now, if you have a great surprise, then you have to lean into making it believable. So you've got to move into that idea of, well, what would the character naturally do? You can't just have him do something ridiculous and then say, “Oh, it's for my twist.” No, you can't do that. You've got to play fair. So it has to be believable, causally related, logical, and surprising. That's what you're shooting for. Those are the questions going through my mind. So as I'm working on a scene, I'm like, “How could I end this?” Or include something that people won't see coming right away. The best ideas always come to me then. It's so interesting. A lot of people will say, “Oh, don't write organically,” or, quote, “by the seat of your pants,” whatever they'll say, “because then you might write yourself into a corner.” I'm like, “Yes, absolutely write yourself into a corner. That's what I'm trying to do in every scene.” And then you write yourself out of a corner in a way that's logical and surprising. The best twists I've ever come up with have been when I'm in a corner. So why would I warn people against going to the place where the best ideas await them? That just seems mean. Why would I do that? No, I want you to have the best possible ideas. So yes, look for corners, write yourself into them, and then write yourself out of them in a way that's both logical and surprising. Jo: I guess also it needs to be genre specific. We write mainly thrillers, and there is this fine line, isn't there? I love Stephen King, but one of the most unbelievable endings is Under the Dome. I still remember feeling betrayed. I don't know if you've read that one, but— Steven: Oh, no. Jo: I was like, “I'm sorry, you've just changed genre in the last chapter of the book. What is going on here?” Steven: That's actually interesting. The fourth question I ask… So I ask, what would the character naturally do? How can I make things worse? How can I add a pivot? But the fourth question is, what promises have I made that I have not yet kept? So genre, to me, is a promise. You build up a promise in your writing at the beginning of the book, and then I feel like as we write, we have to honour that. So if we bring something up that's super interesting, bring it back or whatever. Keep your promises. Keep your narrative promises. It's true of really any genre. Let's say you're writing a romance. You want to respect the conventions, but not fall into the clichés. So there's going to be a moment where the lovers meet, right? They haven't met before. I don't know what they call it, a meet cute or a cute meet. I think they call it a meet cute, I guess. Jo: Yes. They do. Steven: Anyway. So they're going to meet, right? And you're like, “Oh, I'll just have them meet.” Well, try to do it in a way we haven't seen before. Add something else to the scene. Add a third element, as my friend Bob Dugoni likes to say. Add something a little bit that we're like, “Huh, I've never seen that before.” We know they're going to meet, but let them meet in a way that we don't anticipate, that we can't predict right away, that isn't exactly by the numbers, and then you're going to be on the right track. Jo: So then, talking about reader expectations and genre, I wondered if I could also ask you about your Christian faith, because many people listening are people of faith, and some people want to write a Christian book. Other people want to bring their faith into, say, a mainstream type thriller in an authentic way. So how do you balance your faith and your writing? Because I think you have some series that are more sort of Christian than others. Steven: It's interesting. When my first novel came out—The Pawn, like a chess piece, The Pawn—back almost 20 years ago. Gosh, 20 years ago. Nineteen. But anyway, when it came out, someone wrote to me and said, “Is this a Christian book?” I'm like, “What would make a book not Christian?” I'm like, maybe if it has a lot of idolatry, or witchcraft, or maybe sexuality or graphic violence. Then I'm like, oh, wait, that's… No, that's the Old Testament. So it's interesting, because people have asked me similar questions over the years. My books are not sermons in disguise. I'm trying to write great stories that anyone of any background or faith will enjoy. I always ask big questions. I let my characters wrestle with questions that matter, I think. Do my choices matter? Is there hope? Is there a God? Is there no God? Do I have free will? Can I find forgiveness? Can I offer forgiveness? Can I extend it, or whatever? So I always try to base the stories on something deeper. I do believe that there is good and there's evil in the world. That's part of my worldview. So when people talk about moral ambiguity, I don't want to write or read something that's morally ambiguous. I want moral complexity, but I also want moral clarity. So whenever you write, the question is, what are you justifying and what are you condemning? And if you're justifying something that's morally—I would say wrong, actually—then I don't feel like that's the kind of book I would want to write. So I want to write stories that explore good and evil, that explore our world, human nature, in an honest way. I feel like when you write honest stories, people, no matter what their background or whatever faith, then they will connect with it. I think a lot of people, if they start off with an agenda—whatever that agenda might be, let's say it is a Christian agenda, like I want people to trust in Jesus, let's say—so they write a story. Well, what you're doing, you're actually starting your story with an answer, and drama is not built on answers, it's built on questions. So you're actually diminishing the amount of tension. You're also diminishing the possibility of a pivot, because we all get where you're going. It's predictable, but there's probably no surprise. You're diminishing the payoff at the end, because we're like, “I saw that coming. I exactly knew where you were going with this.” So instead, I don't start with an answer. I always start with a question, or in some cases a moral dilemma, like, what's more important, protecting the innocent or telling the truth? That's interesting to me. If I had to choose between the two, would I tell the truth or would I protect the innocent? It's interesting, because people might come down on different sides of it. They might say, “Oh, you should always tell the truth,” or they say, “You always should protect the innocent.” I'm like, okay, well, let's explore it. Let's literally ask the question. So I come from a certain worldview, but I've written characters who have very different worldviews from me. I'm always just trying to be honest with the character, ask big questions, tell a story that examines human nature and sort of the paradoxes of the human condition in a way that will resonate with really whoever the readers might be. Jo: And of course that worldview is part of your author voice and part of what readers come to you for. I also notice that you have some pretty diverse different series. How do you manage that diversity of series under your one brand? Do you find your readers move from one to the other, or do you have different readerships? Steven: You mentioned the B word—brand. That's what publishers are always telling me: “What's your brand?” I'm like, “I don't know. You tell me what my brand is.” I've done fantasy, science fiction, conspiracy. I've done spies and police procedurals and crime and suspense, thrills, whatever. So I would say the one thing that really ties all my stories together is probably just suspense. They are stories with suspense. Some are more high concept thrillers, some are more dark fantasy, but they're built around suspense. So I guess that would be intelligent suspense, maybe, if I was trying to come up with a brand. Something like that. Because I don't want them to be dumbed down. They're not dumbed down stories, so they're a little bit more complex than you might find in other places, but always built around the idea of suspense. Suspense to me is basically—my definition is apprehension born of concern. So we're concerned about a character, and we're apprehensive because there's peril around the bend, or right in front of them. So I want the readers to really care about a character, and then try to build the story and the suspense around that empathy or sympathy that we have for the character. Jo: I think it's really interesting, because again, you mentioned 2007—we're coming up on 20 years since first published. The publishing industry has changed a lot. So what do you think has changed most in publishing for you, and what are your thoughts on routes to market for new authors these days? Or even established authors who are finding that things have changed, which they obviously have. Steven: Well, I'm not a marketer, I'm not a businessman. I'm just a storyteller at heart. So I just keep writing stories that I would be intrigued with reading, stories that I feel like are resonant. Then I look for publishers for those. I've been to a variety of different publishers over the last decade. I've done some different types of stories. I feel like you have to just write the story instead of trying to write for a specific market trend or something like that. So I might not make as much as some of my friends, I might not sell as many books, but I feel like I have to write certain stories if they grab ahold of me. There's a Native American—I think the Pawnee tribe, anyway, in the United States—but they were saying that all the stories that exist are out there already, and when one finds you, it's your job to share it with the world. I think that's kind of interesting. Sometimes—maybe it's just true for you, I don't know, Jo—but it's like a story will grab hold of me, or an idea, and I'm like, “I can't shake it.” That's a story that I want to tell the world. I would say that stories are becoming shorter, dumber. People are trying to write faster. They're trying to write several books a year, and as a result of that, some of the quality has gone down. This is all unfortunate. I'm still sort of a dinosaur. I still tend to write longer, complex stories. But people have shorter attention spans and whatever, and they're not reading as much. The structure of stories, I think, is changing slightly, where people will have to spend more time on a hook to really grab the attention of the readers. Then there might be a longer slow period, or more info dumping, which I'm not a fan of. So they kind of look like, “I want to get readers hooked at the beginning, and then get them to flip pages.” So I tend to set up my stories a little bit differently than that. So I'm not the best guy to ask about marketing and sales and stuff like that. I feel like, write a story that will not let you go. And if you do that, I feel like that's the kind of story that will resonate with readers, because there's a deep honesty to it. You care, you're passionate about it. It's not just something you're trying to spin out just to sell books. That's my view. Jo: I guess I also feel that writers are doing other things. So you have non-fiction, you have your podcast, you do events. I see you sell books direct from your website. It's like the business expands into multiple streams of income, so that the art doesn't have to pay all the bills. Steven: That's interesting. I do love to teach writing at conferences, events, and speak at different things. So I guess if you think about it that way, my brand might be just story, or storytelling, or something like that. Really trying to get out there, and whether it's speaking or writing, just tell a great story. So it's so interesting when I work with publishers and they'll ask, “What's your brand?” Basically it's like, “What's your box?” is really what they're asking. What box can we stick you in that will make it easy for us to package you and sell you? I know myself, and just a lot of authors that I know, we don't think in a box. Every one of my stories is not boxy. It's not the same. They're different. I know a lot of authors like that too. So it's unfortunate. I get it, that it's part of them trying to market and sell the books. I understand that, but I think being honest, genuine with the story, doing the very best you can, writing a worthy book, and then letting them come up with a way to categorise it, is probably the best bet. I don't know. Jo: We're almost out of time, but this is obviously a podcast, and you have a podcast. So tell us about The Story Blender Podcast and what people might find over there. Steven: Yes, I appreciate it. Basically, I interview some of the leading writers and storytellers in the world every week, and the goal is for great storytellers to share the secrets of great storytelling. So I basically pick their brains, kind of like what you were doing with me today, and find out what projects they're working on, and really just try to get insights into storytelling. So it's tons of fun. I've been doing it now for a number of years, and I guess I've interviewed over 250 different authors and writers from around the world, and so I always enjoy it. It's a ton of fun. It's The Story Blender, and people can find it anywhere. Jo: So where can people find you and your books and everything you do online? Steven: Probably the best place is StevenJames.net. I think I'm on different socials @readstevenjames, so you can look me up there—Facebook, Instagram, X, and so on. I think they're all under readstevenjames. Check out the website, drop me a note. I always enjoy hearing from readers. Jo: Well, thanks so much for your time, Steven. That was great. Steven: Thanks, Jo. I appreciate it. Good luck. The post Organic Writing And The Power Of The Pivot In Fiction With Steven James first appeared on The Creative Penn.

During her two terms as PM, Jacinda gained global attention for her response to the terror attack in Christchurch and for giving birth at the same time as running the country.Jacinda grew up as a good Mormon girl who planned on making a difference behind the scenes.But when she unexpectedly became head of the Labor Party, only weeks away from a federal election, Jacinda discovered she had a talent for leadership.Jacinda's memoir about her time as PM and her life before and after is called A Different Kind of Power.This episode of Conversations was produced by Jen Leake and Nicola Harrison is the Executive Producer.Further InformationA Different Kind of Power is published by Penguin.For more information, Penguin authors Jacinda Ardern

The hosts are back at it, breaking down war, peace, and the terms of Trump's Iran peace deal. Vice President Vance's bestseller "Communion" stirs up a fiery debate over theology and the econometrics of Japanese strawberries. New host Mat Nuclear previews "The Nuclear Reaction" ahead of its Daily Wire premiere. And Biden insider Michael LaRosa mourns the miserable plight of moderate Democrats at the hands of radical socialists. Friendly Fire Ep. 17