Podcasts about Fall in Love

She turned $1,000 and a table at a local market into a multimillion-dollar jewelry empire. What started as a creative outlet for Lisa Valenzuela nearly 20 years ago has grown into Truly Blessed Jewels, a brand known for its timeless designs and bold identity.  From her earliest days selling jewelry in farmers' markets, Lisa understood that people weren't just buying a product. They were buying into how the brand made them feel. That mindset, combined with her relentless work ethic and faith, created loyalty that no trend could ever replicate.  Today, Truly Blessed Jewels has grown beyond jewelry pieces into signature services like permanent jewelry and customized experiences that keep customers coming back. At its core, the brand remains what it has always been: a vision rooted in service, a business grounded in faith, and proof that branding built on authenticity will always outlive every trend. What You'll Learn: Why authenticity and consistency are more powerful than following trends The service model that makes customers fall in love with a brand The lessons Lisa learned while scaling her business and culture Why copying trends is a recipe for failure How faith anchored Lisa through rejection, setbacks, and growth Timestamps: (03:00) - From $1,000 to a multimillion-dollar jewelry brand (09:35) - Why details matter: the branding lesson hidden in a market stall (13:05) - Opening the first Truly Blessed storefront (18:21) - When bad press could sometimes be good press (21:46) - Building a business rooted in faith and service (24:52) - Strategies for building culture and onboarding a team (30:07) - Sobriety, confidence, and finding identity in Christ (36:48) - What most entrepreneurs get wrong about scaling a business (40:43) - Why customer experience is part of your brand (45:29) - The content playbook that sets Truly Blessed Jewels apart (51:00) - Standing firm against pressure to compromise (53:10) - Tunnel vision, creativity, and brand originality (54:57) - Why most entrepreneurs fail before they start Discover Truly Blessed Jewels: Shop now at trulyblessedjewels.com. Use code EMILY25 for 25% off your order. Instagram | https://www.instagram.com/trulyblessedjewels  Tiktok | https://www.tiktok.com/@trulyblessedjewels  Facebook | https://www.facebook.com/TrulyBlessedJewels  Pinterest | https://www.pinterest.com/trulyblessedjewels/  Connect with Lisa: Instagram | https://www.instagram.com/lisa_marie_valenzuela_az LinkedIn | https://www.linkedin.com/in/lisa-valenzuela-801071264/   More from Emily & FORDIVINE: Website |  https://meetemilyford.com   Instagram | https://www.instagram.com/itsemily         Facebook | https://www.facebook.com/itsemilymethod    YouTube | https://www.youtube.com/c/ITSEMILYFORD  Called & Crowned Podcast | https://www.instagram.com/calledandcrowned/  FORDIVINE | https://www.fordivine.com/ 

Dr. Caroline Arbuckle MacLeod, an Egyptologist and professor of Classical and Near Eastern Archaeology at the University of Saskatchewan, joins Lexie to discuss her path through near Eastern archeology, and how the Syrian conflict led her to fall in love with ancient Egypt, the unique interest in daily life, beliefs, and preservation of ancient Egyptian sites, her focus on woodworking in ancient Egypt and the practical and the spiritual significance of various woods used in Egyptian coffins. So tuck in your togas and hop aboard Trireme Transit for this week's exciting odyssey! Don't forget to follow us on Twitter, Facebook & Instagram or visit our website www.theozymandiasproject.com! Originally recorded February 24, 2025. Learn more about Dr. Arbuckle MacLeod: https://stmcollege.ca/contacts/caroline-arbuckle.php?_gl=1*p96iqh*_ga*MTk1NDY2MDgxNC4xNzU3MTc1NjA4*_ga_7P8QY8C9QK*czE3NTcxNzU2MDckbzEkZzEkdDE3NTcxNzU2MzIkajM1JGwwJGgw#topCheck out her personal website: https://carriearbuckle.wordpress.com/Check out her publications on Academia: https://usask.academia.edu/CarolineArbuckleMacLeodFind her on Women Know History: https://womenalsoknowhistory.com/individual-scholar-page/?pdb=7591Support us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/TheOzymandiasProject Custom music by Brent Arehart of Arehart Sounds and edited by Dan Maday. Want a transcript of the episode? Email us at theozymandiasprojectpodcast@gmail.com and we can provide one. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, I talk about why comparison is a thief of peace and progress, how to cultivate devotion to your unique lane, the freedom that comes from building at your own pace, why your lane isn't just different… it's designed and more.CONNECT WITH ME…→ Instagram — @mattgottesman→ My Substack — mattgottesman.substack.com → Apparel — thenicheisyou.comRESOURCES…→ Recommended Book List — CLICK HERE→ Workshops — CLICK HERE→ Masterclass — CLICK HEREWORKSHOPS + MASTERCLASS:→ Need MORE clarity? - Here's the FREE… 6 Days to Clarity Workshop - clarity for your time, energy, money, creativity, work & play→ Write, Design, Build: Content Creator Studio & OS - Growing the niche of you, your audience, reach, voice, passion & incomeOTHER RELATED EPISODES:Answered Prayers Are Often Disguised As Uncomfortable BlessingsApple: https://apple.co/3HTDsjGSpotify: https://bit.ly/3JYc4l7

Does the changing of the leaves bring fresh dating opportunities...and relationship challenges? The gang from "Secrets of a Sugar Daddy" drops by to take on a feisty batch of listener letters in our annual Autumn Mailbag! Back-to-school issues, Thanksgiving messes, Halloween fetishes, temperature tirades, and much, much more!

Welcome back to Stay on Course! In this episode, Julie Riga sits down with Omazing Rashad—a multidisciplinary healer and martial arts trainer with over 20 years of experience and the creator of Empower Caravan. Rashad's story is one of profound transformation that exemplifies authentic leadership. From personal struggles to a life of mind–body–spirit and financial empowerment, he now dedicates his work to helping business leaders and entrepreneurs reclaim their own power.This uplifting conversation explores how leaders can create full-spectrum alignment—with yourself, with your team, and in your leadership approach—so you can truly fall in love with leading and inspire others to follow.What You'll Discover in This EpisodeThe Leadership Secret of Alignment: Why personal alignment is the most powerful foundation for executive presence, team performance, and organizational culture.Leading Through Transitions: How to release leadership patterns or team relationships that no longer resonate—and lovingly create space for new, empowering leadership dynamics.From Rejection to Executive Resilience: Practical ways business leaders can process disappointment and setbacks so you can bounce back stronger and model resilient leadership for your organization.Fall in Love with Leading: The mic-drop leadership mindset that turns everyday business challenges, difficult conversations, and strategic decisions into moments of conscious leadership.The Power of Curious Leadership & Unlearning: Why adaptive leaders empty their cup of assumptions and ask deeper questions to spark organizational transformation.Memorable Quotes“How about just falling in love with your life, no matter what's in it or who's in it?” – Julie Riga“Empty the vessel so you can fill it with abundance.” – Omazing Rashad“You can't be who you are and not get sick; alignment is the best medicine.” – Julie RigaConnect with Omazing RashadWebsite & Programs: EmpowerCaravan.comInstagram | YouTube | TikTok: @EmpowerCaravanEmail: empowercaravan@gmail.comIf this conversation inspired you to embrace aligned leadership, share this episode with a fellow business leader and subscribe so you never miss a dose of leadership development wisdom and practical guidance.Stay aligned. Stay inspired. Stay on Course.For more business leadership development resources, visit julieriga.com

My guest today on the Online for Authors podcast is Twila Mason, author of the book Piece by Piece.  Twila is an award-winning romance author. She has been writing her own stories since she learned how to read. She is a writer of romance, women's fiction, poetry, and short stories. Her work explores raw emotions and the complexities of life while finding the hope within every obstacle.   After obtaining a PhD in Cell and Developmental Biology, she switched gears to follow her lifelong dream of putting her fictional stories out into the world. She lives the rural, small-town life in Missouri with her husband, two kids, and menagerie of animals. When she's not reading or writing, Twila can be found crafting, farming, doing home improvement projects, or going on adventures with her family.   In my book review, I stated Piece by Piece is a friends-to-lovers contemporary romance that takes a hard look at the drug culture - and what it does to families. Aria spends her childhood looking after her baby brother, Ben, because her mother simple cannot. As a drug addict, she is often high, always unreliable, and rarely offers motherly support. When her mother spends the rent money, Aria arrives home to find the family is now on the street. She turns to an old friend, Luke, who found a way out of the old neighborhood.   Although there is an immediate spark between them, Luke and Aria dance around the attraction because neither is ready to commit. We get front row seats as we watch them battle their demons and navigate a new world where peace, hope, and love have a chance to exist. As completely foreign concepts, neither one really knows what to do when life isn't a battlefield.   That's not to say everything is easy. Moving past trauma and finding the right path is not easy. Nor is forgiveness - of others or of self. And what to do when the ones you should love are the ones that keep hurting you?   This story is sweet as two young people fall in love. But it is also edgy as we see what happens when drugs and alcohol cause childhood trauma and can easily create a family cycle of abuse.   Subscribe to Online for Authors to learn about more great books! https://www.youtube.com/@onlineforauthors?sub_confirmation=1   Join the Novels N Latte Book Club community to discuss this and other books with like-minded readers: https://www.facebook.com/groups/3576519880426290   You can follow Author Twila Mason Website: https://www.twilamason.com FB:@twilamasonauthor IG: @twilamason_author X: @twilamasona LinkedIn: @twila-mason-phd-3b824330   Purchase Piece by Piece on Amazon: Paperback: https://amzn.to/4lhAvHY Ebook: https://amzn.to/4kq9XDg   Teri M Brown, Author and Podcast Host: https://www.terimbrown.com FB: @TeriMBrownAuthor IG: @terimbrown_author X: @terimbrown1   Want to be a guest on Online for Authors? Send Teri M Brown a message on PodMatch, here: https://www.podmatch.com/member/onlineforauthors   #twilamason #piecebypiece #contemporaryromance #friendstolovers #terimbrownauthor #authorpodcast #onlineforauthors #characterdriven #researchjunkie #awardwinningauthor #podcasthost #podcast #readerpodcast #bookpodcast #writerpodcast #author #books #goodreads #bookclub #fiction #writer #bookreview *As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

"Good entrepreneurs fall in love with their solution and their platform, but great entrepreneurs fall in love with the problem." - Matt ScovilMatt Scovil and Nathan Gilchrist of Medefy Health, have fallen in love with one of the biggest problems in benefits: nobody wants to engage with them. They joined the show to discuss their journey of building a platform designed to solve the engagement crisis and simplify the healthcare experience for everyone.Matt and Nathan break down their "bottoms-up" approach to this problem, which focuses on engaging members when they need help through a high-touch, live support model delivered via mobile app. We discuss how they use the psychology of "loss aversion" and constant communication to drive engagement rates over 90%.We also explore how Medefy acts as the "quarterback" for a health plan, removing friction by navigating members to the right solutions. This is all part of their vision for the future of healthcare, where the experience is "heavily, heavily individualized" for each person.Chapters:(00:00:00) Why Employees Would Rather Clean a Toilet Than Use Their Benefits (00:04:18) Cleaning a Toilet vs. Learning Your Benefits (00:08:46) Falling in Love with the Problem, Not the Solution (00:14:23) The Power of Live, Human Support (00:19:08) Using "Loss Aversion" to Drive Engagement (00:34:54) The Quarterback for Your Health Plan (00:47:57) How AI is Augmenting the Human Touch (01:00:01) The Future of Healthcare is "Individualized"Key Links for Social:@SelfFunded on YouTube for video versions of the podcast and much more - https://www.youtube.com/@SelfFundedListen/watch on Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/1TjmrMrkIj0qSmlwAIevKA?si=068a389925474f02Listen on Apple Podcasts - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/self-funded-with-spencer/id1566182286Follow Spencer on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/spencer-smith-self-funded/Follow Spencer on Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/selffundedwithspencer/

Jim is joined by paranormal investigators and real-life couple Cody Ray DesBiens and Satori Hawes — known from Ghost Hunters, TAPS, and their paranormal investigations. Together, they share how their paths crossed through the world of the unexplained and how their relationship has become inseparable from their paranormal work. Cody and Satori take us inside The Paranormal Couple's Haunted Museum of Objects, Oddities, and Curiosities, where they curate hundreds of items linked to strange, eerie, and sometimes heartwarming experiences. From dolls that move on their own, to cursed artifacts like a monkey's paw, to objects infused with love and intention, they explain how ordinary antiques can hold extraordinary stories. We also discuss their book, Archives of the Paranormal: Case Files from The Paranormal Couple's Haunted Museum, which collects some of their most fascinating cases and experiences with haunted relics. Along the way, we explore: -The story of the doll that wouldn't stay gone. -Why not everything “haunted” is negative. -What it's like to fall in love while ghost hunting. -How haunted objects can sometimes comfort rather than terrify. -Why respect — not provocation — is the key to investigating the unknown. Whether you're fascinated by cursed relics, intrigued by haunted love stories, or curious about the reality behind Ghost Hunters and TAPS, this conversation offers a unique peek into the lives of two investigators whose passion for the paranormal is matched only by their love for each other. You can find their book on Amazon at https://amzn.to/4nsMIdn Cody & Satori even have more appearances than we discussed at time of recording. Check them out here: https://paranormalcouple.com/events Thanks Cody & Satori! -- Note: Thumbnail artwork was created with the help of generative AI tools. All video/audio content is original. – Join Jim's Spooky Studio Plus Club for exclusive content and 20 years of show archives: ⁠⁠⁠https://jimharold.com/plus⁠⁠⁠ – Get Your Spooky Merch at our Mausoleum of Merch at ⁠⁠https://jimharold.com/merch⁠⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

269. Questions for More Connection and Laughter in Marriage with Casey and Meygan Caston   *Disclaimer* This episode contains some mature themes and listener discretion is advised.   2 Corinthians 1:4 NIRV "He comforts us in all our troubles. Now we can comfort others when they are in trouble. We ourselves receive comfort from God."   *Transcript Below*   Questions and Topics We Cover: Will you share three of the questions from your most recent book, specifically the ones people have told you unlocked the best conversations in their own marriage? You say you're an unlikely couple to help support marriages. Will you share a glimpse of your own backstory? What are a handful of ideas for ways couples can strengthen their connection with one another?   Casey and Meygan Caston are the Co-Founders of Marriage365. Casey and Meygan were perfect examples of what not to do in marriage. Three years into marriage, they found themselves having racked up more than $250,000 in debt, fighting constantly, and were ready to call it quits. Despite the 12 failed marriages between their parents, they knew this wasn't the legacy they wanted for themselves or their children. They began reading and educating themselves on how to do marriage the right way. The result of their journey is Marriage365, where they millions of people worldwide through their books, social media, retreats, and their online streaming service, Marriage365.   Marriage 365 Website Marriage 365 App Marriage 365 Books Marriage 365 Coaching   Thank You to Our Sponsor: WinShape Marriage   Sample of Previous Episodes on Sexual Intimacy on The Savvy Sauce: 4 Fostering a Fun, Healthy Sex Life With Your Spouse With Certified Sex Therapist and Author, Dr. Jennifer Konzen 5 Ways to Deepen Your Intimacy in Marriage with Dr. Douglas Rosenau  6 Ten Common Questions About Sex, Shared Through a Biblical Worldview with Dr. Michael Sytsma 89 Passion Pursuit with Dr. Juli Slattery 108 Anatomy of an Affair with Dave Carder 135 Healthy Ways for Females to Increase Sexual Enjoyment with Tracey LeGrand 155 Sex in Marriage and Its Positive Effects with Francie Winslow, Part 1 156 Science and Art of Sexual Intimacy in Marriage, Part 2 158 Making Love in Marriage with Debra Fileta 165 Mutually Pleasing Sex in Marriage with Gary Thomas 186 Sex Series: Enhancing Female Pleasure and Enjoyment of Sex: An Interview with Dr. Jennifer Degler 218 Secrets of Sex and Marriage: An Interview with Dr. Michael Sytsma Special Patreon Release: Protecting Your Marriage Against Unfaithfulness with Dave Carder 252 Maximizing Sexual Connection as Newlyweds to Long Term Marriages and Recovering from a Sexless Marriage with Dr. Clifford & Joyce Penner   Connect with The Savvy Sauce on Facebook, Instagram or Our Website   Please help us out by sharing this episode with a friend, leaving a 5-star rating and review, and subscribing to this podcast!   Gospel Scripture: (all NIV)   Romans 3:23 “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,”   Romans 3:24 “and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.”   Romans 3:25 (a) “God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood.”    Hebrews 9:22 (b) “without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.”    Romans 5:8 “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”    Romans 5:11 “Not only is this so, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.”    John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”   Romans 10:9 “That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”    Luke 15:10 says “In the same way, I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”   Romans 8:1 “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus”   Ephesians 1:13–14 “And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God's possession- to the praise of his glory.”   Ephesians 1:15–23 “For this reason, ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers. I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is like the working of his mighty strength, which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.”   Ephesians 2:8–10 “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God – not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God‘s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.“   Ephesians 2:13 “But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ.“   Philippians 1:6 “being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”   *Transcript*   Music: (0:00 – 0:11)   Laura Dugger: (0:12 - 1:15)  Welcome to The Savvy Sauce, where we have practical chats for intentional living. I'm your host, Laura Dugger, and I'm so glad you're here.    Today's message is not intended for little ears. We'll be discussing some adult themes, and I want you to be aware before you listen to this message.    I'm thrilled to introduce you to our sponsor, WinShape Marriage. Their weekend marriage retreats will strengthen your marriage while you enjoy the gorgeous setting, delicious food, and quality time with your spouse.   To find out more, visit them online at winshapemarriage.org.    Welcome to The Savvy Sauce, Casey and Meygan.   Casey Caston:  Thanks for having us. Excited to be here.   Laura Dugger: So, thrilled to have both of you, and let's just dive right into one of your sweet spots. How can open-ended questions change a marriage?   Casey Caston: (1:16 - 2:33)  Yeah, well, if you think about when we first met somebody that we fell in love with, fell attracted to that first date, as you're sitting across the table, you are looking at that person with so much curiosity. Like, who is this person? What are their hopes and their dreams and their life experiences?   What are they afraid of? Where are they going in life? And that curiosity drove us to ask really good open-ended questions.   Like, tell me more about yourself. It's funny because we were just reading in Proverbs this morning that in a man's heart, he has a purpose, but a man of understanding draws from the deep wells to pull that out. And I just, I always think about how a great question plums the deep wells of a man's heart or woman's heart.   And that attraction, that energy we feel, helps us with asking great questions. But then what happens is when we get married and we move into the wash, rinse, repeat of childcare and chores and, you know, the mundaneness of going to work, coming home, dinner, like, it can really sap all of the romance out of a relationship. And so, what happens is we fall into asking really boring questions.   Meygan Caston: (2:33 - 2:34)  Like, how was your day?   Casey Caston: (2:34 - 2:36)  What's picking up the kids?   Meygan Caston: (2:36 - 2:37)  What's for dinner? Yeah.   Casey Caston: (2:38 - 3:18)  So, we realize that when the well is dry, so to speak, you're not asking those great questions. We need prompts. We need an outside prompt because I don't think naturally we would ask great questions to spark this, you know, connecting conversation.   And I will tell you too, that if you just dropped in and, you know, just ask your spouse, like, “Hey, so, tell me some boundaries we need to set up with your parents.” People are going to be like, “Excuse me, where did that question come from? And what's the question behind the question?   What's your motivation here?” But those are conversations we need to have. We just need prompts.   So, yeah.   Laura Dugger: (3:19 - 3:32)  Well, I love that response. And I'm also curious after working with so many married couples, what have you seen as that connection between these amazing prompts for open-ended questions and emotional intimacy?   Meygan Caston: (3:34 - 4:20)  Yeah. Well, kind of like what Casey was mentioning about, um, just that curiosity of getting to know each other. I think the other part of asking those open-ended questions and having these deeper conversations is really about intentionality.   Like you still care about me. You still want to know about my heart. Well, for us, 25 years later, I still care about you.   I still love you. And I think that of course, as women, we long for that emotional connection. And I don't think that men realize it, but they actually long for that too.   And it's creating a safe place for spouses to share, to cry, to even, um, dream together about their future. And I think, again, if we don't give ourselves those opportunities and we're not intentional with that, we get stuck in the mundaneness of marriage.   Casey Caston: (4:20 - 5:03)  But, uh, and I would add to that, that curiosity, Meygan, I've talked about how curiosity is the pursuit of something. Right. And we all long to be desired to be pursued.   I mean, that is, that underlying communication is so powerful in relationships, because if you think about it, if you're not being pursued and your spouse isn't curious, I mean, that's like the, the heart of apathy. It's like, I don't care. And I know that people aren't intentionally trying to communicate that, but when you feel that, like my spouse doesn't really care about what I dream about or what I'm hoping to achieve this year, they just come home and they just watch TV or they're on their phone.   Meygan Caston: (5:04 - 5:18)  Right. That communicates a lot non-verbally. And so, that's why these open-ended questions are something that we should never stop being a learner of each other and of ourselves.   And that will provide that emotional intimacy.   Laura Dugger: (5:19 - 5:45)  That's so good. And obviously your resources are amazing. I would love, because you have these 365 Connecting Questions for Couples.   And so, I want to just hear maybe three of these questions that come to mind for you guys, especially as you've heard, these are the ones that tend to unlock something deeper in the conversation.   Meygan Caston: (5:46 - 6:07)  Absolutely. So, August 3rd is, are you someone who spends a lot of time in deep thought, processing things before making a decision, or do you tend to make quick decisions? Why or why not?   That question has genuinely sparked so much conversation between us and even like with our kids and other couples. Maybe you can explain why.   Casey Caston: (6:07 - 6:11)  Yeah. Well, I'm Mr. Impulsivity, so.   Meygan Caston: (6:11 - 6:29)  Yeah, you are. Where I, I don't, I wouldn't consider myself a deep thinker, but I definitely like to make pros and cons lists and think through things. But if you think about a dynamic between a husband and a wife, you know, there are so many decisions that you make together, small and large, your whole life, every day.   Casey Caston: (6:29 - 6:30)  Decision-making is huge in relationships.   Meygan Caston: (6:31 - 6:57)  And it's an everyday thing that couples are tackling. And it's important to know that no one is better than the other. It's not that a deep thinker is better than a more impulsive person. It's kind of more just naturally how you are. Have you always been this way? Do you like that about yourself?   Wow. You know, well, when it comes to these bigger decisions, I do spend, make more time, you know, thinking through and pros and cons. Oh, well, with small decisions, I'm more impulsive. I mean, you could just talk about that for hours and hours.   Casey Caston: (6:57 - 7:01) Yeah. But what's interesting is I tend to think more futuristic and big picture.   Meygan Caston: (7:01 - 7:01)  Yes.   Casey Caston: (7:01 - 7:03)  Even though I'm impulsive in the moment.   Meygan Caston: (7:03 - 7:05)  And I cannot, I can't do that.   Casey Caston: (7:05 - 7:06)  You are Ms. Realist.   Meygan Caston: (7:06 - 7:08)  Just tell me today, tell me this week.   Casey Caston: (7:09 - 7:10)  I can't think about this fun sponge.   Meygan Caston: (7:11 - 7:11)  Yes. Yeah.   Casey Caston: (7:12 - 7:15)  Because I'm like, let's dream big. And she's like, yeah, but what's happening today?   Meygan Caston: (7:16 - 7:49)  Yeah. Yeah. Another great question is January 18th.   How can we romance each other during the day in anticipation of sex? Because as we all know, us ladies, we need the foreplay. But again, I think that husbands also enjoy the foreplay.   But I don't think that couples are having these conversations. I think they think a foreplay is, well, once we enter into the bedroom, you know, and what we like to say is it's anything positive is foreplay. So, a thoughtful text, you know, a flirty I'm going to grab your hand to empty out the dishwasher.   Casey Caston: (7:49 - 7:50)  Amen.   Meygan Caston: (7:50 - 7:55)  Yeah. You know, it's those kinds of conversations. But like, I would never think of asking you that.   Casey Caston: (7:56 - 7:56)  Right.   Meygan Caston: (7:56 - 7:58)  Right. Thankfully for those.   Casey Caston: (7:58 - 8:10)  But as you know, Laura, like couples that need to talk about their sex life. And if you don't talk about your sex life, most oftentimes there's a lot of assumptions. And that leads to, you know, dysfunction.   Meygan Caston: (8:11 - 9:14)  Well, and missed expectations. Totally. Yeah. And then I have another question. April 25th is how do our differences help complement each other?   Oh, so, kind of another one of those things, like with making decisions. Every single couple has differences. And we always tell people Casey, and I are more different than alike.   I think people see us online and whatnot. And they hear, oh, we're both extroverts. We are. So, we have some similarities. We're both stubborn, very competitive, both competitive. But in the day-to-day operations of who Casey and Meygan are, we make decisions, we run our lives, run our business, run our business.   We are completely opposite. And what I think it's good to do for couples is to actually own your differences rather than shy away from them or make yourselves feel bad, like, oh, I wish we were the same. I get it.   You know, we actually are attracted to those things when we're dating. That's why opposites attract. But then when we get married, it's like, why doesn't he do everything the same way? I do it because I do it the right way. That's what we think. Right.   Casey Caston: (9:15 - 9:21)  Well, you heard the joke that marriage is about becoming one. And in the earlier years, it's about which one.   Meygan Caston: (9:21 - 10:14)  Yeah. Which one? Which figure out?   Yeah. And so, that question really allows you to identify your differences, but then go, how do they balance each other out? And I think for me, as someone who is organized, type A Casey's very spontaneous.   If we were both type A and structured, we wouldn't have a lot of fun. We really wouldn't. His spontaneity really brings out that side of me.   But if we were both spontaneous, our bills would never be paid, and we'd be broke. So, you know, I'm a I'm a saver. He's a spender.   You can see the balance in that. It's good that we're both those things. Right.   I'm on time. He's late. We could continue going on and on and on and on.   But I think that he's a risk taker. I'm a complete play it safer. And so, those really draw out a beautiful balance in our marriage versus trying to change one another.   So, I hope that question sparks listeners to really ask your spouse that and have fun with the conversation.   Laura Dugger: (10:15 - 11:03)  Well, you chose three great ones. I love it. And they draw out such different parts of our personality.   You highlighted where Casey's more futuristic. Meygan, you're more present. Some people will connect with questions that direct them more past oriented.   And so, our orientation to time comes out and the meta conversations, the talking like having the conversation about your conversation. Just so much goodness. And yes, especially with sexual intimacy.   So, many couples report that it is much harder to engage in conversation about sex rather than just have sex. And like you said, missed expectations can be one of the blow ups there, among many other things. So, you have questions that don't shy away from all forms of intimacy.   Meygan Caston: (11:04 - 11:10)  Yeah. And to also say we have a lot of fun questions, too. Like, tell me about what your bedroom looked like when you were a teenager.   Casey Caston: (11:11 - 11:12)  That's a great one. I love that one.   Meygan Caston: (11:12 - 11:47)  Let's talk couples. If you had a really hard day with the kids or at work, pick a fun question. You don't have to go by the date.   If you don't like the question, it's triggering, then flip to the next one. But going back to that emotional intimacy and connection that you were talking about, Laura, is you have to have those deep questions and those conversations. And you did when you were dating, because if you went on a date with your husband and you were like, hey, tell me, you know, what do you want to do when you retire?   And he was like, I don't know. Yeah, you'd be like snooze fest. This guy's boring, right?   Or if he was on his phone the whole time, there was something intriguing about your spouse.   Casey Caston: (11:47 - 11:48)  I don't know. I don't know.   Meygan Caston: (11:48 - 12:01)  Yeah, there was something intriguing about your spouse when you were dating and you were asking those questions that should never stop. Just like we hear that quote, never stop dating your spouse. Well, never stop learning about your spouse.   It's the same thing. Absolutely.   Laura Dugger: (12:02 - 12:16)  And I love how you two have such a humble approach because you say that you're a very unlikely couple to help support marriages. So, will you let us in on your own backstory?   Meygan Caston: (12:17 - 12:46)  Yeah, well, can I just start off by saying this? We live in a county that has one of the highest divorce rates in the nation. So, it's 72 percent divorce rate where we live.   We also come from there's 12 marriages between our parents. So, we come from so much divorce and trauma. And then we also got married very, very, very young.   So, all those statistics were against us on top of that. I'm just going to start off by saying that. Casey Caston: (12:46 - 13:18)  Yeah, my mom's been married six times. So, when by the time I hit junior high, I had probably like nine different iterations of home life and different dads and step siblings and half brothers. And all of that between both of our parents.   There's just there's some mental illness. There's affairs. There's all this trauma that was really unprocessed.   But then when Meygan and I saw each other, it was like we knew the wounds that we shared. It was like almost like a trauma bond.   Meygan Caston: (13:19 - 13:19)  Yeah.   Casey Caston: (13:19 - 14:08)  Like, oh, I've got abandonment. So, do you. And, you know, let's do it's like, wow.   So, let's make each other happy. And dating was just all the fun stuff, right? It was long walks along the beach.   It was going to street fairs or, you know, going out and having fun. And then we're like, if this is what life could be like, then we should do this forever and ever and ever. And just, you know, we were so doe eyed of like and optimistic about how marriage life would look like.   So, then once we did get married, done, done, done, we had to like work through stuff. Now, I was so conflict avoidant because I was afraid if there was conflict, then that means that there's going to be distance between Meygan and I and she might leave me.   Meygan Caston: (14:08 - 14:24)  Oh, there's another there's another difference. I'm a fighter. He's a fighter.   So, anytime we would have conflict triggers, you know, emotional regulation, I was like, we're going to go for it. Now, of course, my fighting tactics were not healthy. I yelled. I blamed. I was very aggressive, assertive.   Casey Caston: (14:24 - 14:37)  Conflict was very scary for me. Now. Now, Meygan, she's like wanting to deal with issues. And here I am, like trying to run for the hills. And she's like, he doesn't care about me. And I'm like, I'm trying to protect the marriage by not dealing with it.   Meygan Caston: (14:37 - 14:49)  So, you never really resolved anything. We would fight really bad. We broke all the fighting rules.   And then there was no true resolve, no apologies, no remorse. And you just kind of move forward.   Casey Caston: (14:49 - 15:06)  And so, then we piled ourselves like we had over two hundred fifty thousand dollars of debt when we started to try to work on getting pregnant. We we dealt with infertility. We I have ADHD, so that creates a lot of that's fun.   A lot of fun for the marriage.   Meygan Caston: (15:06 - 15:08)  The divorce rate is very high with ADHD.   Casey Caston: (15:08 - 15:10)  My life gets to teach you patience.   Meygan Caston: (15:11 - 15:11)  Yeah.   Casey Caston: (15:12 - 16:44)  But and then we have a child with special needs as well. So, we we had like if there's something that could go wrong, it it went wrong. We had you know, once we got married, there was toxic in-laws that boundaries that were crossed.   So, it just nothing for us came easy. And so, that's why we were the least likely to succeed in marriage. I mean, if we there was a couple doomed from the get go, it was Meygan and I believe a hundred percent that God used those trials, those hardships to create marriage.   Three sixty five. He gave us the strength to, you know, have the courage to say we're not going to follow in our parents footsteps. We're going to change that.    You know, it ends with us literally like we are going to change and break this generational sin because it goes back many, many generations for both of us. Our whole family is littered with divorce. And now like when we approach marriage, it because of where we've come from, it wasn't all flowery.   It was really tough. We have to be practical and very tactical with our advice, because when you're sitting across from a couple that's angry and resentful. We have to sit there and go, we know what that's like.   And here's exactly what you need to do next. I'm not going to give you a platitude. I'm not going to give you some flowery statement or we're not going to just talk through it.    No, we're going to give you a tool and an action step that's going to help you. Laura Dugger: (16:46 - 18:56)  Let's take a quick break to hear a message from our sponsor. Friends, I'm excited to share with you today's sponsor, WinShape Marriage. Do you feel like you need a weekend away with your spouse and a chance to grow in your relationship together at the same time?    WinShape Marriage is a fantastic ministry that provides weekend marriage retreats to help couples grow closer together in every season and stage of life from premarital to parenting to the emptiness phase. There is an opportunity for you. WinShape Marriage is grounded on the belief that the strongest marriages are the ones that are nurtured, even when it seems things are going smoothly so that they're stronger if they do hit a bump along their marital journey.   These weekend retreats are hosted within the beautiful refuge of WinShape Retreat, perched in the mountains of Rome, Georgia, which is a short drive from Atlanta, Birmingham and Chattanooga. While you're there, you will be well fed, well nurtured and well cared for. During your time away in this beautiful place, you and your spouse will learn from expert speakers and explore topics related to intimacy, overcoming challenges, improving communication and more.   I've stayed on site at WinShape before, and I can attest to their generosity, food and content. You will be so grateful you went to find an experience that's right for you and your spouse. Head to their website, winshapemarriage.org/savvy. That's W-I-N-S-H-A-P-E marriage dot org slash S-A-V-V-Y. Thanks for your sponsorship.   I'd love to hear even more into the redemption part of it, because Marriage 365, you had shared before we had recorded that you launched that in 2013. So, just to get the timeline straight, had you already done some work and some counseling before you launched that?   Meygan Caston: (18:56 - 19:26)  Or what was that journey? Yeah, so, we always say we it took us two years to fall in love and get married. It took us three years to destroy our marriage, and it took about four or five years to repair our marriage.   It was, as you know, Laura, it is not a quick fix when your marriage is as bad as ours. And so, our story is unique in the sense where we were both not wanting to get help for our marriage. I love you, babe, but he was resistant.   He didn't want to go to therapy. His family didn't go to therapy. That wasn't normalized.   Casey Caston: (19:26 - 19:31)  Well, my faith background said that therapy is bad from the from the devil.   Meygan Caston: (19:31 - 19:38)  It was specifically your parents. But from the devil. Yeah, because I have a faith background, too. And my parents went to therapy. But that's what I was saying.   Casey Caston: (19:38 - 19:40)  My background was that you don't do that.   Meygan Caston: (19:40 - 21:16)  Yeah. So, I was wanting to get divorced and he wouldn't divorce me. He was like, no.   So, if you're going to do it, you got to do it. And so, I got help for myself. And I had the most amazing woman who a therapist who just walked me through basically how to save my marriage by myself.   And she goes, listen, you know, at the end of the day, if you want to make a better marriage, it starts by making a better you. You have zero control over Casey. You have 100 percent control over you.   He's not here. You are. I can show you how to communicate, how to forgive him even without getting an apology.   I can show you how to bring to his defenses down. I can show you how to create boundaries so he doesn't yell at you anymore. I mean, and that's literally for 13 months I worked on myself. And I believe that that is what genuinely changed everything. And that's really the message behind Marriage 365 is if you want to make a better marriage, it starts by making a better you. Stop waiting around for your husband or your wife to get on board.   They may never. Then you're only going to build resentment while you sit there and wait. At the end of the day, you're responsible for how you show up.   And so, in that 13 months, the hope was, of course, that I would positively influence Casey, which I did. And he saw the change in me. Everything changed.   I mean, like we both used to be yellers, right? We would both yell and scream. And I was like, I'm not going to yell anymore.   Like, I just I don't want to be a yeller of a mom. I don't want to be a yeller of a wife. Like, I don't like this part of me. My mom was a yeller. I mean, oh, yeah, I hate this. And I just remember like one day he came walking in and he was all heated and frustrated and he started yelling at me. And do you remember what I did, babe?   Casey Caston: (21:17 - 21:33)  Yeah. She looked at me and calmly said, you know, I can tell that you're very upset. I really want to have to listen to what you want to share with me.   Why don't you go outside, take a break, come back in? We're going to sit back on the couch. We can talk about it. I'm here for you. And I was like, what a change.   Meygan Caston: (21:33 - 22:07)  Who is this person? I changed the way that we did marriage. I did that.   And I tell people that I didn't do that once. I didn't do it twice. I did that for months because we had habits we had created.   But I was like, that was like a new boundary. I'm like, I'm not going to engage with him when he's angry. It's been triggered.   Nothing good is coming from this. So, it was all of that we started to really adopt and learn together because he's like, you're a different person. Like, it was obvious we were doing the tango.   And now I was doing the rumba and he was over there doing the tango. And I'm like, come join me in the healthy rumba over here because it's way better.   Casey Caston: (22:07 - 22:09)  And so, for toxic tango.   Meygan Caston: (22:09 - 23:20)  Yeah, we went to a marriage. Yeah, we went to a marriage intensive. And we did some therapy.   We did a lot of self-help. But through that journey, this is kind of where we started Marriage 365 is. First off, we couldn't afford therapy.   We needed to pay off all that debt that we had with a lot of student loan debt, a lot of stupid debt. What do you do if you can't afford therapy? What do you do if you don't have a good therapist?   What do you do if you have a bad experience with therapy? What do you do if the books aren't enough? And that was there was a really big hole and missing part in the marriage.   I don't say industry, but in the marriage space, where were all the online resources? Because this was back again in like 2010 when like podcasts weren't even around, social media was just becoming a thing. And it was really hard.   We were really disappointed with the lack of resources there were for marriage. And it felt like every church you go to, there was, you know, the missions ministry and the children's ministry and the youth groups. And all those are great.   Where in the world are all the marriage ministries? Then we found out only 3% of churches have actual paid marriage ministries. And I thought, that's messed up.   That's reverse. It's supposed to be the opposite, because then everything else will work itself out, as we know, with what research shows.   Casey Caston: (23:20 - 23:21)  Same with men's ministry, by the way.   Meygan Caston: (23:21 - 23:22)  Yes, same with men's ministry.   Casey Caston: (23:22 - 23:23)  Men's and marriage.   Meygan Caston: (23:23 - 23:26)  That's like the stepchild.   Casey Caston: (23:26 - 23:33)  Tech guy slash men's guy slash, you know. Children's persons can also do marriage.   Meygan Caston: (23:33 - 23:40)  So, we really just started helping our friends out. Obviously, people could see the change. Then people would come to us. We started helping couples at our church.   Casey Caston: (23:40 - 23:48)  And we had a ghoul pool. Like people were like, we give you guys another like ten months and then we're expecting you.   Meygan Caston: (23:48 - 23:51)  Yeah, everyone that knew us thought we'd get divorced.   Casey Caston: (23:51 - 23:52)  We were messy.   Meygan Caston: (23:52 - 23:58)  We were bad. Yeah. So, to see the complete transformation. And again, I go back to that work we did was on ourselves.   Casey Caston: (23:58 - 25:31)  And I just have to say that if you want to make a better marriage, it starts by making a better you. If you're hearing that. And you're kind of in a one sided marriage right now, I got to just say, I know that message sucks because it's a message that says you have to go first.   And that's not fair. In a marriage, you're supposed to be a team. But I do want to say there's so many couples that are stuck. Waiting for their spouse to join them on the let's get healthy train. So, their spouse doesn't join them. And then what they do is they kind of lean back, fold their arms and go, well, I guess we're stuck.   But I want to say that that's there is a message of empowerment to say you do have influence and the ability to steer your marriage in a healthy way. I have lots of regret that I did not join that train much sooner. But the story is that Meygan, you know, became the hero of our journey.   And that is something that I work actively so that I'm never in that place again, that I am the one that's always actively trying to improve myself, that I'm a better communicator, that I'm not a yeller, which we've ditched that a long time ago, that that I'm considered of Meygan's needs. And I'm even like attuned to like, what is she feeling? And how do I meet her where she's at?   Laura Dugger: (25:32 - 25:54)  Which is amazing that watching Meygan, it was compelling enough for you to join in. And it's admirable on both sides, the work that you've done. And are there any specific areas that you grew in that now you teach couples? I'm thinking specifically under conflict and repair or communication.   Casey Caston: (25:55 - 27:42)  Yeah. So, I remember those early years and every single week was chaos to chaos. Like coming home, it'd be like, what's for dinner?   I'm hungry and we need to make a decision now. Or, you know, it's Friday night or Saturday morning. What's going on this weekend?   Or where's all our money going? It was very, it was very reactionary. And I remember reading through Stephen Covey's, you know, Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.   And the first habit is be proactive. You cannot be intentional with your life. You cannot create purpose and meaning unless you are proactive with your life.   So, Meygan and I, you know, I'm working in a company and every single week we get together and we go through what are everyone's goals? What do we need to accomplish this week? We find alignment and the week goes really well.   We've got KPIs. We've got all these like, hey, as a team, you know, work team, here's what we're trying to accomplish this week. And it just kind of dawned on us like, well, why don't we do that in marriage?   Why don't we do that for a family? You got a family of six. You got six people running around the house. All have agendas. And you are trying to find alignment so that, hey, this is what the family is all about this week, right? We've got tournaments.   We've got parties. We've got projects. We've got meals.   And I think for so many couples we talk to, they live. Life with purpose on like building their career or their business or purpose with other areas of their life. And then when it comes to family, they wing it.   Meygan Caston: (27:42 - 27:43)  They just wing it.   Casey Caston: (27:43 - 28:31)  Yeah. And it's like, well, if it's meant to be, it's meant to be. It's the winging attitude creates chaos.   And so, Meygan and I love to teach this tool called the Weekly Marriage Business Meeting. And it is all of the logistics of our relationship schedules, meal plans, budgets, connection time, sexy time, alone time, self-care time. Yeah.   And and we kind of set with intention the week ahead for us. And we go through all the decisions of who's going, what, where, when. And all of that's done.   So, when you walk into the day, you're not like stressed about what's supposed to be happening. There is alignment and there's no missed expectations.   Meygan Caston: (28:31 - 29:27)  Yeah, there's no fights anymore about, well, you said you'd be home at six. No, I didn't. I said I'd be home at seven.   We sync our calendars. And I think, too, a big thing with this is we've noticed we fight when we don't do this now. It's one of those tools that it's prevented most of conflict.   I mean, we say it will on average for the most couples that use it. We have at least over 10,000 couples we know right now currently using it that are our members that they say it cuts conflict in half in half, because what you're doing is you're even scheduling that connection time or date night time where you're like, no matter how busy we are, when are Casey and Meygan going to get to be Casey and Meygan?   And that's so important, because again, if you're winging it and you're just trying to find time to connect, well, you've got four kids, we've got two teenagers. It's never going to happen. Right. And so, the weekly marriage business meeting is definitely one of the amazing and favorite worksheets and tools that we've taught and that we use ourselves because it works.   Casey Caston: (29:28 - 29:28)  Yeah.   Laura Dugger: (29:28 - 29:59)  What a game changer. That is awesome and so practical, so intentional, which we're all about. But then also we had talked about emotional intimacy earlier and emotional intimacy is interconnected with sexual intimacy and communication is the root issue.   And that's what you teach couples. So, what are some conversations that couples can begin so that they can grow in both of those types of intimacy and enjoyment?   Casey Caston: (30:01 - 31:34)  Yeah, so, I feel like I have to start off by saying I got this so wrong when we were first married. It's OK. I forgive you now.   Yeah, because, you know. Let's just let's be we'll be we'll be completely transparent. So, Meygan and I waited to have sex until we were married.   So, now I actually waited till I was married to have sex. And I thought that under that purity guideline, I was promised maybe by a youth group, maybe by a convention, that if you withhold sex and remain pure, God is going to bless you with the best sex life when you're married. And that just simply did not happen.   Like when we first got married, I really got went into the bedroom thinking. I don't know what foreplay is, but let's have intercourse until I come and then we're done. And that's sex. That's our sexual intimacy. And we missed out on so many intimate ways of knowing each other and sex being an obligation and something like I just was demanding of it from Meygan. And. What I've come to discover and what I love to teach other men is that sex is so much more broader than just having intercourse. I mean, there was this total understanding like, well, I feel good during intercourse. This feels very stimulating, which means that Meygan must feel the exact same way while we're having intercourse.   Meygan Caston: (31:35 - 31:35)  Nope.   Casey Caston: (31:36 - 32:35)  Because that's because listen, I never had sex before. But anytime I watched a rom com, you know, the guy threw up, you know, against the wall or they're having intercourse and she's going and he's going and they're having a great time. Like this must be what sex is all about.   And what I've discovered now and I get to teach other men is that emotional intimacy is kind of the birthplace of sexual expression of love, right? That we we create safe places for our wives to to open up. And because of that, they become more willing and wanting that that sexual expression rather than us just coming in and saying, OK, it's time for sex.   Let's go. And so, when we talk about just this book, this 365 Connecting Questions for Couples, I tell my guys, I'm like, hey, if you want to have great sex, start here because that is foreplay.   Meygan Caston: (32:35 - 33:48)  That's start here. It's good to know my heart, not just use me for my body, which can feel like that for a lot of people. And I think going back to the emotional intimacy, I think that, again, you had that when you were dating or you wouldn't have gotten married.   There was no way you were. If the person was boring, closed off, if, you know, your spouse was just completely on their phone every time, you wouldn't have had that second, third, fourth date. So, there was emotional intimacy at some point, which means you can't ever say we never had it.    You can always get it back, but you can have to be intentional. And I think a great way is we call it connection time. I think date night scares a lot of people.    I think it's the idea of. We have to go to a restaurant, we have to spend money, we have to find a babysitter, all these hurdles that you have to go through to make it happen, so then couples just don't even do it. So, we're like, listen, if you if that's overwhelming to you, then try connection time.    And really what that is, it's still undivided, you know, attention and time with you and your spouse. Maybe it's smaller, maybe it's 15 minutes, 30 minutes. And I know for when our kids were little, we played board games and card games and they'd go to bed, you know, at 7:30 or 8:00 PM.    And we would bring out Yahtzee.   Casey Caston: (33:48 - 33:51)  There'd be a lot of trash talking over chutes and ladders.   Meygan Caston: (33:52 - 34:29)  But we would play. We would play games. And it was our time to connect.    And when we didn't talk about the kids, you know, we just chatted about our day and again, going through some of these connecting questions that didn't even really exist yet, but they were in our heads. Taking a walk with the dog and, you know, going to a little local coffee shop, even if it's just 30 minutes and sharing and talking and exploring that emotional intimacy should never stop again. And that's going to give people opportunities to then go into the bedroom, like Casey mentioned, more willing and more excited to be intimate to each other because it's like, oh, that's right.    We like each other. We're still married. We're still friends.   Casey Caston: (34:29 - 35:15)  You bring up a great point. Like I said, I think sitting down over the table, staring at each other can be intimidating for a lot of guys, because especially if this is not a regular habit in your relationship and taking a walk for guys when we're doing something and maybe it's less intimidating because we're not even staring at each other. But that kind of like getting the, you know, oxytocin going, like getting moving, like that kind of adrenaline can actually stimulate guys for good conversations and processing things.    And so, what we hear from a lot of couples that take our book, maybe they'll take a picture of the question and they'll go, Hey, let's take a walk. And then they'll use the question on their walk.   Meygan Caston: (35:15 - 35:15)  Yeah.   Casey Caston: (35:15 - 35:24)  And that gets conversations going. So, if that's like a on ramp onto this, that's a that's a great starting point for a lot of people.   Laura Dugger: (35:24 - 36:48)  Oh, that's so good. And I love how you say just an on ramp, because the goal is more intimacy overall together to know one another, be known. And I love that you're showing this is not a manipulation factor.    This isn't ask these questions so we can be more active in the bedroom, regardless of whichever spouse is the higher desire one. But this is to really enhance all levels of your relationship. And as you talk about oxytocin, it just makes me think such an interesting cycle that the Lord created where I will speak more stereotypically that where women require the emotional connection and then they open up and enjoy sex more.    But then men, once they've had sex and they just have this like 500 percent increase of oxytocin in this neurochemical bath that opens them up emotionally. And we could see it even as we view our differences. You could be upset because they're opposite or we can see it as a gift that they can fuel one another.    And then we get more of a holistic picture of overall intimacy. So, I'll also link to quite a few episodes because we do about one per month where we dive deeper into sexual intimacy. S   o, I can link all of those in the show notes.    But Casey, were you going to say something?   Meygan Caston: (36:49 - 36:50)  I want to say something to it.   Casey Caston: (36:51 - 37:16)  He loves. Well, so, we're talking chicken and egg, right? Like who gets the emotional intimacy, who gets the physical intimacy first?    And I just think that there's if we approach our relationship with selfishness, well, then neither people get satisfied. But if we are in an approach to serve one another and be selfless lovers. So, men would be like, you know what?    I want to meet my wife's emotional needs.   Meygan Caston: (37:16 - 37:16)  Yeah.   Casey Caston: (37:17 - 37:38)  Like and I do believe that men are the spark of initiation. If you're a husband out there listening to this, like that one of your greatest gifts to marriage is initiation. You were the one who asked for the first date.    You were the one who got down one the knee. You are the spark of initiation. And I believe that God's created women as nurturers of that initiation.   Meygan Caston: (37:39 - 37:41)  And to clarify, you're not talking just about initiating sex.   Casey Caston: (37:41 - 37:43)  Well, yes. Just everything.   Meygan Caston: (37:43 - 37:55)  Initiating, just initiating, initiating a weekly marriage business meeting. Women are so turned on by when a husband's like, hey, I don't necessarily know what we want to do for a date night, but I want to take you on a date. Can I get an amen, Laura?   Laura Dugger: (37:55 - 37:56)  Right, sister?   Meygan Caston: (37:57 - 38:14)  Hey, women are turned on. Listen, men, women are turned on. If you say, you know what?    I know that like this has been an issue with my parents and I don't even know how to handle it, but I really want to have that conversation. Oh, my gosh. Just initiating the conversation is all we're looking for.    It's OK that you don't have all the answers.   Casey Caston: (38:14 - 38:14)  Yeah.   Meygan Caston: (38:14 - 38:23)  But for men that avoid stonewall, escape, numb out, busy themselves, it is such a turnoff. It is so not what we want.   Laura Dugger: (38:23 - 39:55)  I want to make sure that you're up to date with our latest news. We have a new website. You can visit theSavvySauce.com and see all of the latest updates. You may remember Francie Heinrichsen from episode 132, where we talked about pursuing our God given dreams. She is the amazing businesswoman who has carefully designed a brand-new website for Savvy Sauce Charities. And we are thrilled with the final product.    So, I hope you check it out there. You're going to find all of our podcasts now with show notes and transcriptions listed a scrapbook of various previous guests and an easy place to join our email list to receive monthly encouragement and questions to ask your loved ones so that you can have your own practical chats for intentional living. You will also be able to access our donation button or our mailing address for sending checks that are tax deductible so that you can support the work of Savvy Sauce Charities and help us continue to reach the nation with the good news of Jesus Christ.    So, make sure you visit theSavvySauce.com.    Okay, so, then continue the conversation with just overall intimacy. What are some examples of de-escalation techniques that you recommend to couples who are in conflict, ones that can maybe help the strained relationships so that they can be repaired?  Yeah.   Meygan Caston: (39:55 - 42:19)  Yeah. So, a big thing that I've learned as someone who's very direct, I can tend to be on that, like I mentioned, fighter side. And I know a lot of women, studies have shown 75 percent of us ladies are the ones that typically bring up the issues.    So, just be aware that there is a gender difference there. And if you're a dude, there's nothing wrong with you if you're in, you know, that 75 percent or 25 percent. But I think the biggest thing I've recognized is to remind your spouse in the very beginning of the conversation, why you're having the conversation.    You know, I love you. I love us. I want to see us be the best people that we can be.    I want to see us enjoy marriage and enjoy life. I love you. Like bring the positivity and the reminder that you're better together than apart.    And really, that's part of what we call a soft startup, right? There's a lot of different soft startups you've heard of. You know, I feel when you I need those work to but I like to take it a little bit deeper to say, remind your spouse how much that you love being married to them.    Or again, whatever the issue is like we have the most. Let's say it's parenting. Casey and I are very different in our parenting styles.    Last night would have been a great difference of how that happened. But like reminder that like we both love our children. We both want the best for our kids.    No one doubts that. We both have made we made two beautiful, wonderful, quirky children. Right.    And so, even you can start the conversation with that. But I wish that more people did that because I think people are are, you know, I'm really upset about something. OK, well, the second you say that defenses, sorry, but defenses are going to go up.    We want to keep the conversations defenses low, guards low, right, de-escalation. And so, use soft startups, use kind, positive language. But I think another thing behind that would be come to the conversation processed.    Do not have these conversations 11 o'clock at night when you're tired or when you're hungry. Do not have these conversations when it just happened and you haven't had the time to just like stop. Think about what do I really need?    Why did that trigger me? What am I hoping to achieve? Why is my husband acting this way?    Oh, is he under a lot of stress? Yeah, we got to give ourselves time to sit and process before we even use those soft startups. So, that would be my advice for de-escalation.   Casey Caston: (42:20 - 43:04)  And mine actually would be an apology. I think that we all make mistakes. And when you think about a couple that's maybe living reactively, just winging it, I doubt that there's ever an apology that's given on either side because it takes a little it takes awareness to recognize, gosh, you know what?    My that little comment I just made that probably had a little zing to it. Or, you know, I really let my spouse down by not parenting the children the way she would want me to. Or, you know, I said I was going to do something and I didn't.    And I let my partner down. You want to de-escalate a tense situation. Apologize.   Meygan Caston: (43:04 - 43:04)  Yeah. Own it.   Casey Caston: (43:05 - 43:12)  When you apologize, you know, you're taking all of the heat out of the fire. They really are.   Meygan Caston: (43:12 - 43:16)  And you're validating your spouse's feelings. Who doesn't want to be validated and seen? Everybody does.   Casey Caston: (43:16 - 43:38)  And then you're taking responsibility and accountability for your actions, which is the trust builder for relationships. So, that's why when you talk about high conflict relationships, there aren't a lot of there's not a lot of trust there. It's not a safe place anymore.    So, to create that safety, we want to we want to build trust back into the relationship.   Laura Dugger: (43:39 - 43:50)  Those are fantastic. And do you guys just have maybe a handful of ideas for ways that couples can strengthen their marriage with one another?   Meygan Caston: (43:51 - 44:09)  Absolutely. I would say, obviously, the weekly marriage business meeting. I mean, I know we talked about it, but the important thing is to schedule it, put it in the calendar because you don't want to wing it.    And that way it's showing, oh, you're prioritizing us. Taking walks has been a big one for us. Playing games is a big one.   Casey Caston: (44:09 - 45:18)  The 60 second blessing is where we intentionally spend time. 60 seconds reminding our partner of how much we love them, using our words to say, like, I saw how hard you work for the family. I love how you take care of the kids and kind of reminding your partner, like I see the goodness in each other.    I think it's really important because. Day to day life, we can just be very transactional, and if we again, we have any sort of criticism or, you know, our words just are not flavored with life, well, proverb says, you know, our words have the power to give life or to give death. Right.    So, the words that we speak, if we evaluate. Are we producing what I call weed seeds? Or are we planting fruit trees?    Because weed seeds choke out the garden. Those sharp, critical words can leave your garden looking pretty shabby, whereas being intentional by speaking positive over each other. It's like planting fruit trees.    And who doesn't like a good, juicy orange? Right.   Meygan Caston: (45:18 - 47:15)  Well, and the 60 second blessing, you know, you start off by writing five to seven positive things you love about your spouse. And so, one spouse shares their list for 60 seconds and then the second spouse shares their list. And it's this habit that we actually started doing after our marriage intensive that we did as we were repairing our marriage because we had yeah, we had we had spoken such mean and harsh words or just a lot of roommate stuff.    And we needed that positivity. And it's a great foreplay tip, by the way, just to sit, sometimes sit down and go, I just need to tell you how wonderful you are. Like, who doesn't want to hear that about themselves?    I think another thing that Casey and I have recognized it is the only thing, by the way, Laura, in our marriage, the only thing that has ever stayed consistent. That's we have fun together. We laugh a lot, even in hard times.    Yeah, it wasn't as enjoyable, but we still had fun. And, you know, again, fun is different for everybody. We don't ever want to judge someone else's fun.    But we are constantly like we we are sarcastic. But that's for us because we have high trust levels. I usually tell couples if you're, you know, in a fair recovery or you have low trust levels, sarcasm is probably not great.    But we're very playful. We have again, we play a lot of fun games and we play ping pong and cornhole and we take our dogs on our dog on a walk. And we, you know, we're going to try to go ax throwing in April.    We've never done that before. Like there are fun that we've taken dance lessons. So, we like to think out of the box and do new things or things that we know that like how many games of Yahtzee have we played?    I don't even know. I mean, we've lost count. Or gin rummy, you know, I mean, we just play Sequence or Rummikub like we play them all.    And for that for us, that's really fun. We dance a lot. We love the 90's music.    Like get out your favorite playlist and just dance and sing and be goofy. Like I think if couples were to laugh and enjoy each other more and be able to laugh with themselves, I think that there would be more marriages that would stay together. Laura Dugger: (47:16 - 47:39)  That is something that I've even experienced in this time together. You guys are so fun to be around. And that's very life giving to others.    But I can see where it starts in that secret place between just the two of you, your best friend. And you share a lot of this goodness with Marriage 365. So, can you let us know all the different things that you have to offer?   Casey Caston: (47:40 - 48:48)  Yeah, I would probably say the number one way that people experience all of the resources that we've created over the years is through our mobile app. So, we have an app that has over a thousand pieces of videos, workshop, worksheet, excuse me, courses, challenges. We even have a checkup so you can actually rate kind of your marriage.    And that is a great way for people to be able to have access, you know, on the spot if they're dealing with an issue, they don't know how to get through and they're looking for a tool or a conversation to help them work through that. That our app provides such a valuable resource. I mean, beyond that, you know, some couples need a little bit more hands on approach.    So, we do coaching. We have a coaching staff actually to handle all the incoming couples that are saying, hey, can you can you help us out? And again, I just want to say coaching is really, really focused on giving action plans and homework and accountability to our clients.    And coaching is really, really helpful if you're like, I just need to know what to do next.   Meygan Caston: (48:48 - 49:17)  Yeah. We do intensives for couples that are in crisis, you know, there that are seriously considering separation or divorce or an affair recovery and that we have an over 90 percent success rate because we went through an intensive when we were struggling and it was something we knew we wanted to get trained on and do. And it's a full two days with Casey and I.    I mean, two days back-to-back. We know you. We get Christmas cards from all of our couples, you know, every year.    We love it. And it's they become almost I mean, yes, they're our clients, but they almost become like our friends.   Casey Caston: (49:17 - 49:45)  Yeah. And then probably personally, one of my favorite things that we do is we host our own couple's getaway. And this is a four-day experience.    It's not your it's not like a typical retreat where you're sitting in a conference room, you're just getting lectured all day. We're actually facilitating tools and then giving couples opportunities to work on them. Then some free time to really spend some time making great memories.    We have a dance party. It is a ton of fun.   Meygan Caston: (49:45 - 49:55)  We make sure. Yeah, we make sure it's fun. It's more it's definitely more for couples who are doing OK or want to do better, not they're not ideal for couples in crisis because it's going to be very uncomfortable.   Casey Caston: (49:55 - 49:56)  I love our retreats.   Meygan Caston: (49:56 - 49:57)  I know.   Casey Caston: (49:57 - 49:58)  I love interacting with her.   Meygan Caston: (49:58 - 50:05)  And of course, we have our social media. You can just search Marriage 365 and then we have our website, too. And we have our books, of course.   Casey Caston: (50:05 - 50:09)  Oh, and I have a men's group. I know I launched a five-week men's reset. . Meygan Caston: (50:09 - 50:34)  Needless to say, Laura, we're really busy. I do a lot. I think that's what's funny, right?    I think that people see us online and they think that we just have an Instagram, or we just have Facebook. And I'm like, we've been doing this for 12 years and we have a staff of 12 people. So, we reach a lot of people.    And we because marriage is never a one stop, you know, one size fits all. It's it's true. There are so many different dynamics, and we want to be able to help as many people as we can.   Laura Dugger: (50:35 - 50:59)  Wow. Thank you for sharing that. We will add all of those links.    I love all these different offerings that you have and that will meet people in whatever phase they're in. But you two already know we are called The Savvy Sauce because savvy is synonymous with practical knowledge. And so, as my final question for both of you, what is your Savvy Sauce?   Meygan Caston: (51:00 - 51:47)  Mine would be I would want every single person to think about becoming more confident. And that starts with becoming more self-aware. I think that that is completely changed who I am.   And I'm we're raising two kids, and I see the confidence that they have. And we're modeling that but also walking them through how to be self-aware. And really, that starts with having to be one with your thoughts, turning off the phone, sorry, turning off the podcast, sometimes turning off the music and just actually sitting and really going.    Do I really know my thoughts, my feelings, my values, my personality, my good, my bad, my ugly? And we don't do this enough. We are busy ourselves.    We're distracted constantly. And I think that it's really harming our mental health. And so, that would be my savvy sauce.   Casey Caston: (51:47 - 52:30)  Hmm. I love that, babe. It's kind of hard because we find so much alignment.    I mean, I would that's exactly what I would say, too. Um, I, you know, my focus in twenty, twenty-five has really been turned towards helping husbands. And there's a quote that Henry David Thoreau says that many men live lives of quiet desperation and they die with their songs still inside them.    And most guys are terrified of stopping and evaluating. And so, for me, creating space too. Listen, I do a 10, 10, 10 practice in the morning.   Meygan Caston: (52:30 - 52:32)  That's what I thought you were going to say.   Casey Caston: (52:32 - 52:32)  Yeah, yeah.   Meygan Caston: (52:32 - 52:36)  Well, I was like, I bet you he's going to talk about it because it's been life changing for you.   Casey Caston: (52:36 - 53:01)  Yeah. So, I spend 10 minutes of scripture reading. So, that's input.    Then I spend 10 minutes of quiet meditation where I'm sitting and I'm in a listening posture. And I mean, I think about everything from lasagna to the last wave I serve to. But there's intentionality about just opening myself like here I am.    I'm ready to be downloaded on like what you have for me today.   Meygan Caston: (53:01 - 53:02)  God be one with your thoughts.   Casey Caston: (53:03 - 53:18)  Yeah. And all sorts of things come up. And then I spent 10 minutes journaling.    And that process is just and that's like the output. Right. So, now I've got input.    I've been listening and now I get to write stuff out. And that's been a huge game changer for me.   Laura Dugger: (53:19 - 53:43)  Wow, I love both of those. You two are just refreshingly vulnerable and such an incredible mixture of intentional and lighthearted. And it has been so great just to sit under your teaching today.    So, thank you for sharing your story and for helping all of us. And thank you just for being my guests.   Meygan Caston: (53:43 - 53:45)  Oh, you're welcome. It was a pleasure to be here.   Casey Caston: (53:45 - 53:49)  Yes, you asked great questions that plumb the deep wells of Casey Meygan.   Laura Dugger: (53:52 - 57:35)  One more thing before you go. Have you heard the term gospel before?   It simply means good news. And I want to share the best news with you. But it starts with the bad news.   Every single one of us were born sinners, but Christ desires to rescue us from our sin, which is something we cannot do for ourselves. This means there is absolutely no chance we can make it to heaven on our own. So, for you and for me, it means we deserve death, and we can never pay back the sacrifice we owe to be saved.   We need a savior. But God loved us so much, he made a way for his only son to willingly die in our place as the perfect substitute. This gives us hope of life forever in right relationship with him.   That is good news. Jesus lived the perfect life we could never live and died in our place for our sin. This was God's plan to make a way to reconcile with us so that God can look at us and see Jesus.

Are you stuck in the grind of business where every day feels the same? Do you find yourself doing all the right things but missing the spark you once had?In this episode of The Jen Keller Show, we're talking about what it really means to reinvent yourself in business.Reinvention doesn't always mean starting over. It's not about tearing down your systems or processes. More often, it's about shifting your mindset—seeing the beauty in what feels ordinary, reconnecting with your why, and recommitting with fresh energy.I'll share lessons from nearly two decades in business, along with three practical steps—Reframe, Rediscover, and Recommit—to help you fall in love with your work again, elevate your leadership, and remember that success isn't just about what you do, but about who you're becoming.This episode is for every business owner, leader, or professional—men and women—who's ready to spark new passion in the work they've been doing for years.In a world where being perfect seems to be the goal- - it's important that we know who's we are & who we are. We aren't called to be perfect - we are called to be better today than yesterday! - that's it. It doesn't have to be quantum leaps, in fact I believe that in the day to day -our little steps in the right directions! I am on a mission to help women become more of who they were created to be and less of who they were told to be. And, that takes intention, that takes action : My goal is to drop some wisdom, bring you resources and that takes community. The real unlock is the Inner Work, and that's what we do here! If you enjoyed today's episode, please: • Post a screenshot & key takeaway on your IG story and tag me @thejenkeller or @projectyou so we can repost you. • Leave a positive review or rating For more ways to do the inner work you can find me on @thejenkeller on instagram and Jennifer Keller on Facebook and to join our exclusive Facebook community Project YOU To do the inner work visit jenkeller.net

Met interieurarchitect Casper Schwarz (Casper Schwarz Architects) en Martijn Buijtels (Akoestiek.nl). Presentatie: Mark Timo.Waar gaat het over?Akoestiek is geen afterthought. We verkennen hoe je geluid, materialen en ruimteprogrammering samenbrengt zodat mensen zich thuis voelen op de werkvloer (belonging), in hospitality en in woonomgevingen. Inclusief valkuilen, quick wins en maatwerkoplossingen die esthetiek versterken.HoofdlijnenDe shift: van numerieke kantoren naar mensgerichte werkomgevingenBeleving vs. belonging en wat dat betekent voor materiaal- & meubelkeuzesAkoestiek-basics: absorptie, reflectie, isolatie (tussen ruimten)Ontwerpproces: waarom vroeg betrekken loont (meten, modelleren, voorkomen)Cases:Jones Day, Amsterdam – onzichtbaar spanplafond in monumentale halLincoln International, WTC Amsterdam – akoestische “parasols”: karakter + kabelmanagementMaterialen & technieken: gerecycled PET-felt, stoffen, span- en spuitplafondsHoreca & wonen: wat werkt wél (en waarom je niet “onder de tafel” oplost)Toekomst werkplek: balans tussen ontmoeting en focus, menselijkheid + techQuotes uit de aflevering“Je kunt een ontwerp nog zo mooi maken; als je niet prettig kunt communiceren, kom je niet terug.”“Belonging is misschien wel breder dan beleving—mensen willen ergens écht bij horen.”“Achteraf akoestiek toevoegen? Dan kom je aan het ontwerp en aan het budget.”GastenCasper Schwarz – Founder, Casper Schwarz ArchitectsMartijn Buijtels – Oprichter, Akoestiek.nl (AMB)VermeldingenWorkspace Design Show – speakers corner ontwerp door CSA; sessie “Habitour: a workspace to fall in love with”: https://workspaceshow.nl/home-dutch-2025CreditsHost: Mark TimoMuziek/producent: Music from #Uppbeathttps://uppbeat.io/t/hartzmann/sunnyLicense code: TUXOJDHYFVJS1TBH

Join me in Episode 65 for a conversation with the amazing Kristina Mascher-Turner!  Episode Highlights Early inspirations, musical and otherwise Early training on the horn Attending the University of Wisconsin-Madison and studying with Douglas Hill “You have to fall in love with fundamentals.” Studying/Working/Living in Europe Advice for horn players looking to study/work abroad Gustav Mahler Youth Orchestra Work with the American Horn Quartet (hornquartet.com), chamber music AHQ Music Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sBz4drOokaM New teaching position in Ghent, Belgium: KASK & Conservatorium School of Arts in Ghent schoolofartsgent.be Favorite exercises for the horn, teaching philosophy, etc.

SHOW NOTES: Welcome back to The Money Pit, where this week's topics include the housing market forecast for buyers and sellers, bright ideas for outdoor lighting upgrades, and the revival of wallpaper to style your home. Plus, we've got expert answers for all your home improvement questions. - 2026 Housing Market Forecast: We'll break down the latest projections on easing mortgage rates, slowing home price growth, and what this means for home buyers, sellers, and those planning to stay put. - Weekend Outdoor Lighting Upgrades: Discover smart, stylish, and affordable lighting solutions, from solar path lights to dramatic uplighting, that you can tackle in a single weekend to boost curb appeal and home safety after dark. - Wallpaper's Grand Comeback: Think again if you believe wallpaper is old-school! We're exploring fall's biggest interior design trends, including bold colors, cozy patterns, and easy peel-and-stick styles, to help you fall in love with wallpaper all over again.   Q & A: - Ryan from California called in with a problem with yellow jackets around his cat food. We suggest using Rescue TrapStiks to depopulate the area, plus increasing airflow with landscaping changes or an oscillating fan, as bees struggle to fly in the wind. - Lorie from Tennessee had questions about repairing cracks in her concrete floor. We explain that concrete cracks are typical and recommend specific concrete repair products like Quickrete Recap for larger areas or fillers for smaller cracks. - Chandler in Kentucky asked for advice on insulating a new home with total spray foam encapsulation without damaging roof shingles. We reassure him that spray foam will not significantly shorten shingle life and is an excellent insulation choice for attics. - Valerie from Arkansas was looking for a way to repair hairline cracks in her ceramic floor tiles. Unfortunately, cracked ceramic tiles can't truly be repaired and usually need to be replaced; we advise checking for subfloor movement and offer tips for finding replacement tiles or creating a new design. - Tom emailed us about leaky outdoor spigots that are over 20 years old. We suggest using PEX kits to replace old hose bibs and stress the critical importance of turning off and draining exterior faucets in winter to prevent freezing and bursting.   ASK A QUESTION: Need help with your own home improvement or décor question? We'd love to help! Call the show 24/7 at 888-MONEY-PIT (888-666-3974) or post your question here: https://www.moneypit.com/ask. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome back to The Deep Talk! This episode is for anyone who feels "behind in life." Maybe that's in your love life, career, finding your purpose or " things," or whatever else. Let's get out of comparison mode and fall in love with the life that is beautiful and ours.If you liked this episode, share on your IG story and tag me @thedeeptalkpod. I'd love to hear what you learned! And, don't forget to hit that follow button so you never miss a future episode, and leave a review so I can reach more listeners just like you who are looking to connect deeper.

Celebrating his latest smash w R2, Sonny Wern joins us for the first time on America's Dance 30 to talk all things "Echoes"!  He shares how the song was born, how long ago they started working on it, and why it took so long to release. Sonny also answers a question he has never been asked before!And we get to know Sonny Wern better w #FinkysFirsts!!Find out about:if music was the first thing he wanted to get into growing upif 'Sonny Wern' was his first choice for an artist project name, and where the name came fromhis first time performing for a crowdthe first dance song that made him fall in love w EDMthe first thing he would hide in his walls for people to find in the futureFollow: @AmericasDance30 on all socials!Count down the biggest dance songs in the country every week with Brian Fink on America's Dance 30; listen on stations around the world!

In this episode, we dive into a hot topic that many speakers, trainers, and coaches grapple with: Should you put prices on your website? Of course, there are many pros and cons of displaying prices, so we unpack various strategies that can help you make the best decision for your business. Whether you're leaning towards transparency or prefer to keep things under wraps, the key is to make a decision that aligns with your business model and audience expectations. So grab your favorite beverage, tune in, and let's figure out together if listing prices is the right move for you!

How do you truly fall in love — not just with another person, but with life itself? In this inspiring talk, Rev. Lee Wolak explores the spiritual truth that every relationship is a mirror, reflecting what we already believe about ourselves. If you want to attract deeper love, a soulmate, or a more fulfilling partnership, it starts by falling in love with you. Discover how to shift limiting beliefs, open your heart, and embody self-worth so that love flows naturally into every area of your life. This video will help you uncover how your inner dialogue shapes your outer relationships, and how conscious awareness can transform loneliness, self-doubt, and fear into connection, joy, and intimacy. Sign up for my daily thought and weekly newsletter by clicking this link: https://www.agapespiritualcenter.com/free-affirmations If you find value in what Agape offers—spiritually, emotionally, and in community—consider becoming a supporting member. Your recurring contribution helps us continue to share truth, healing, and transformation with the world. Click here to become a supporter: https://www.agapespiritualcenter.com/recurring-contributions/

Send us a textThe sweetest victories sometimes come when we least expect them and have nothing to do with winning ribbons. After months of heartbreak watching my mare struggle with a mysterious lameness and facing my own impending surgery, I found myself  feeling defeated. But an unexpected act of kindness changed my mind set.For a competitive rider like myself who typically spends weeks meticulously preparing for shows—perfecting patterns, glitzing show clothes, and mentally rehearsing every transition— I was suddenly given an opportunity that  challenged everything about my approach. Could I simply show up, swing into the saddle after months without riding, and enjoy the experience without my usual intensity? This mental pivot proved more challenging than expected as my "tiger stripes" of competitiveness initially refused to fade.But something magical happened when I finally mounted Mercedes after not riding her for two and a half years. The moment my boots settled into the stirrups, competition fell away ,replaced by gratitude. Despite an antsy horse in a hectic arena and even completely botching a pattern in my second class, I experienced perhaps my happiest show ever. This unexpected day delivered a powerful reminder about why we fall in love with horses in the first place—the connection, the partnership, and the simple joy of being together. In our quest for ribbons and perfection, we sometimes forget to enjoy the ride itself, both in horsemanship and in life. When was the last time you reconnected with the pure joy that drew you to your passion? Subscribe to The Horse Fix for more insights about horses, horsemanship, and the lessons they teach us about ourselves.Support the showMay all your blues be ribbons

“Do you have to open graves to find girls to fall in love with?” The Mummy (1932) directed by Karl Freund and starring Boris Karloff, Zita Johann and Noble Johnson  Next Time: 1970 Little Big Man

Do you have a question about birds? BirdNote's Content Director Jonese Franklin says that when people bring her bird queries, she often finds the answer in a BirdNote Daily episode. Over the last 20 years, BirdNote has produced more than 2,400 episodes covering tons of topics – and there are still more stories to tell! BirdNote is an independent nonprofit that relies on the generosity of its listeners. Your support allows us to continue to make informative and immersive shows that hopefully inspire folks to fall in love with birds.More info and transcript at BirdNote.org.Want more BirdNote? Subscribe to our weekly newsletter. Sign up for BirdNote+ to get ad-free listening and other perks. BirdNote is a nonprofit. Your tax-deductible gift makes these shows possible. 

This week, Ali sits down with Savannah Bisby, who shares her infertility story on IG @infertilityfriends, to talk about Savannah's journey so far. She's still in the thick of it, battling endometriosis, doing five IUIs (including double inseminations), a laparoscopy, and taking a deep dive into reproductive immunology. Savannah talks about the emotional whiplash of infertility, including embryo transfer decisions and finding herself on a bachelorette party while waiting for beta results, suspended between hope and dread. Savannah also talks about how Inito, an at-home fertility monitor that tracks your hormones, has helped on her journey, how she finally became pregnant and navigated a devastating loss, and why the summer of 2025 became a heartbreak she and her husband will never forget. Her story is still unfolding, and we are rooting so hard for our sweet friend. Follow Savannah on IG: @infertilityfriendsEPISODE SPONSORS: BEAUTIFUL BIRD AND WORK OF ARTAli's Children's Book Series about IVF, IUI and Family Building Through Assisted Reproductive Technology https://www.infertileafgroup.com/booksThe latest book in the Work of ART series, “Beautiful Bird” tells the story of three parents, one incredible boy and a family built with love—and a little bit of science.Pre-orders are available now! The first 150 copies will be Personalized, Signed and Numbered! Don't miss out on this limited edition! Tap the link in bio and stories to order your copy today.When Helen decides to have a baby on her own, she welcomes Jack Bird into the world through IUI with the help of her friend, Aaron. But when Jack is born and needs extra care in the NICU, Aaron and his partner, Blake, fall in love with Jack, too. Together, the three join forces to raise Jack, proving that family isn't about how you start—it's about how you grow.Order yours now at https://www.infertileafgroup.com/booksFor bulk orders of 10 or more books at 20% off, go to https://www.infertileafgroup.com/bulk-order-requestFERTILITY RALLYIG: @fertilityrallywww.fertilityrally.comNo one should go through infertility alone. Join the Worst Club with the Best Members at fertilityrally.com. We offer 5 to 6 support groups per week, three private Facebook groups, tons of curated IRL and virtual events, and an entire community of more than 500 women available to support you, no matter where you are in your journey.Join today at link in bio on IG @fertilityrally or at www.fertilityrally.com/membershipINITOhttps://try.inito.com/hormone-tracking/inf/?discount=INFERTILEAF&utm_source=social_media&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=podcast&utm_content=INFERTILEAFIG: @initofertiilityFor years, clinical labs were the only way to get a clear view of your hormone levels and ovulation patterns. But for many people in the trying to conceive community—especially those with hormone imbalances or conditions like PCOS—frequent lab visits can be costly, inconvenient, and take up a ton of time. This is why I'm excited to tell you about Inito, which is unlike anything else out there. Inito is an at-home fertility monitor that tracks all four key hormones—Estrogen, LH, FSH, and PdG—on a single test strip. Instead of piecing together fragments of info, Inito offers a full, clear picture of your hormone health through a data chart and clear insights that are unique to your body and your cycle.The Inito Starter Pack is available for just $89 with the code INFERTILEAF at ihttps://try.inito.com/hormone-tracking/inf/?discount=INFERTILEAF&utm_source=social_media&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=podcast&utm_content=INFERTILEAFEXTEND FERTILITY IG: @extendfertilitywww.extendfertility.comFertility shouldn't be dictated by a timeline. Extend Fertility offers cutting-edge egg and embryo freezing, infertility care, and IVF—all designed to put you in control. Their approach? Research driven, transparent, and personalized. With a world-class lab, exceptional verified success rates backed by nearly a decade of egg freezing results, and pricing lower than the national average, Extend Fertility is making reproductive care more accessible and effective than ever. Whether you're preserving fertility for the future or actively trying to conceive, they're here with expert support every step of the way. Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/infertile-af-infertility-and-modern-family-building-through-art/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacySupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/infertile-af-infertility-and-modern-family-building-through-art/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

1999 was a great year for movies. Almost too great. It didn't help that I found myself so busy with work that my focus on film couldn't be what it used to be. So while I am a big fan of “The Iron Giant,” I was also one of those people who didn't go to see it in the theater and contributed to its “flop” status. That summer was stacked with films like “The Sixth Sense” and “The Blair Witch Project,” and it was easy for something quieter and more thoughtful to get lost. While that is bad, the good news is that I was also one of the people who took to it on home video and picked it up on DVD as soon as it was available. I can still remember watching it for the first time at home and being floored by how much heart it had. I start the episode talking about my experiences with the film before moving onto the film itself. I discuss the people who made the film, its source material, other adaptations, the people who lent their voices to the film, its reception, music, and much more. It's worth noting that the director, Brad Bird, would later go on to make “The Incredibles” and “Ratatouille,” which shows just how much talent was already on display in this debut. Unfortunately, Warner Bros. had no idea how to market the film at the time, which didn't help its chances at the box office. The Iron Giant has become a cult hit and is well loved, but it's not enough. A surprising number of people have never seen the film, and I think that's a shame. It's a thoughtful film, filled with wonder and spectacle, that will capture the imagination of kids and adults alike. Its story of fear, empathy, and the power of choice feels even more relevant today. So if you haven't seen it, prepare to fall in love with a giant robot.

Episode 118: Better Autumn Running It's time to... wait for it... fall in love with running in the fall. Get it? Pretty great, right? I know. I just got whatever that thing is. Anyway, this episode is a few of my favorite tip and even a few rules for better Autumn running. So, fall back in your favorite chair or hit your favorite trail (or treadmill or road) and enjoy the latest episode. Cheers and thank you for listening!Coach BennettSend us a messageBe sure to send any and all questions and comments to the mailbag: Coach Bennett's Podcast 9220 SW Barbur Blvd STE 119, #322 Portland, Oregon 97219 Be sure to check out the Two Coach Bennetts Merch Store for t-shirts, hoodies, coffee mugs, pint glasses and more! - https://twocoachbennetts.com/merchAnd if you need even more Coach Bennett in your life you can scratch that itch by subscribing to the Coach Bennett's Newsletter.You can also listen to the Two Coach Bennetts Talking podcast on Apple Podcasts or on Spotify Podcasts Or you can follow on Instagram: @coachbennett TikTok: @CoachBennett Check out Coach Bennett on Cameo for any messages of inspiration or motivation or birthday wished or pep talk for you or friends or family or teammates: Coach BennettThreads: @CoachBennettBluesky: ...

This week on Life's A Beach, Alan Carr is joined by actor, writer and all-round talent Richard Armitage. From his early holiday memories in Anglesey to skiing adventures, to living in New York, and even bumping into Lady Gaga on a flight, Richard shares some amazing travel tales from his acting career. He opens up about writing his new book (and how his stories are getting optioned!), how filming The Hobbit made him fall in love with New Zealand, and we find out where he'd like to be at 100 years old. Plus, Alan has some classic confessions of his own along the way… ⏰ Timestamps  00:00 Intro  00:15 Make up for dogs  00:50 Rich's first holiday memories of Anglesey  01:56 Richard's writing a new book and how writing started  03:07 His books getting optioned  03:30 The Cut: story and inspiration  05:05 How scary Weapons is  06:01 Why Richard loves skiing  08:24 Lionel Blair is Alan's dad  09:10 Has Richard ever had a holiday romance?  10:14 Richard in Beijing and the Great Wall of China  13:02 Richard and the superstar on the flight (Lady Gaga)  16:18 Is Richard adventurous with food?  17:30 How filming The Hobbit made Richard fall in love with New Zealand and Alan's New Zealand hidden gem  19:30 Richard's New York hidden gem: Carnitos  21:03 Broadway stories  22:50 Richard wanted to ski down Mount Ruapehu as a dwarf  23:57 Does Richard complain?  25:19 Richard's love of Berlin  26:15 Richard returning to the stage  27:00 Where does Richard want to be when he's 100 years old?  28:20 Starting our descent – the quick fire quiz ✨ Don't forget to like, subscribe and join Alan every week as he chats to celebrity guests about their dream holidays and travel stories.  #LifesABeach #AlanCarr #RichardArmitage #LadyGaga #HolidayPodcast #TravelStories #Skiing #Berlin #NewZealand #Broadway #FunnyPodcast Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Frank Schaeffer In Conversation with Rev. Dr. Liz Theoharis and Dr. Charon Hribar, exploring their work and the themes of their book, We Pray Freedom: Liturgies and Rituals from the Freedom Church of the Poor._____LINKShttps://kairoscenter.org/https://www.lovechildrenplanet.com/events/it-has-to-be-read-we-pray-freedom-by-rev-dr-liz-theoharis-and-dr-charon-hribarhttps://bookshop.org/a/99692/9798889830344_____I have had the pleasure of talking to some of the leading authors, artists, activists, and change-makers of our time on this podcast, and I want to personally thank you for subscribing, listening, and sharing 100-plus episodes over 100,000 times.Please subscribe to this Podcast, In Conversation… with Frank Schaeffer, on your favorite platform, and to my Substack, It Has to Be Said. Thanks! Every subscription helps create, build, sustain and put voice to this movement for truth. Subscribe to It Has to Be Said. Support the show_____In Conversation… with Frank Schaeffer is a production of the George Bailey Morality in Public Life Fellowship. It is hosted by Frank Schaeffer, author of Fall In Love, Have Children, Stay Put, Save the Planet, Be Happy. Learn more at https://www.lovechildrenplanet.comFollow Frank on Substack, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Threads, TikTok, and YouTube. https://frankschaeffer.substack.comhttps://www.facebook.com/frank.schaeffer.16https://twitter.com/Frank_Schaefferhttps://www.instagram.com/frank_schaeffer_arthttps://www.threads.net/@frank_schaeffer_arthttps://www.tiktok.com/@frank_schaefferhttps://www.youtube.com/c/FrankSchaefferYouTube In Conversation… with Frank Schaeffer Podcast

Matt Forbeck is all that and so much more. He grew up in Wisconsin as what he describes as a wimpy kid, too short and not overly healthy. He took to gaming at a pretty early age and has grown to be a game creator, author and award-winning storyteller.   Matt has been designing games now for over 35 years. He tells us how he believes that many of the most successful games today have stories to tell, and he loves to create some of the most successful ones. What I find most intriguing about Matt is that he clearly is absolutely totally happy in his work. For most of Matt's career he has worked for himself and continues today to be an independent freelancer.   Matt and his wife have five children, including a set of quadruplets. The quadruplets are 23 and Matt's oldest son is 28 and is following in his father's footsteps.   During our conversation we touch on interesting topics such as trust and work ethics. I know you will find this episode stimulating and worth listening to more than once.     About the Guest:   Matt Forbeck is an award-winning and New York Times-bestselling author and game designer of over thirty-five novels and countless other books and games. His projects have won a Peabody Award, a Scribe Award, and numerous ENnies and Origins Awards. He is also the president of the Diana Jones Award Foundation, which celebrates excellence in gaming.    Matt has made a living full-time on games and fiction since 1989, when he graduated from the Residential College at the University of Michigan with a degree in Creative Writing. With the exception of a four-year stint as the president of Pinnacle Entertainment Group and a year and a half as the director of the adventure games division of Human Head Studios, he has spent his career as an independent freelancer.   Matt has designed collectible card games, roleplaying games, miniatures games, board games, interactive fiction, interactive audiobooks, games for museum installations, and logic systems for toys. He has directed voiceover work and written short fiction, comic books, novels, screenplays, and video game scripts and stories. His work has been translated into at least 15 languages.   His latest work includes the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game Core Rulebook, the Spider-Verse Expansion, Monster Academy (novels and board game), the Shotguns & Sorcery 5E Sourcebook based on his novels, and the Minecraft: Roll for Adventure game books. He is the father of five, including a set of quadruplets. He lives in Beloit, Wisconsin, with his wife and a rotating cast of college-age children. For more about him and his work, visit Forbeck.com.   Ways to connect with Matt:   Twitter: https://twitter.com/mforbeck Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/forbeck Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/forbeck.com Threads: https://www.threads.net/@mforbeck Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mforbeck/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/forbeck/ Website: https://www.forbeck.com/     About the Host:   Michael Hingson is a New York Times best-selling author, international lecturer, and Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe. Michael, blind since birth, survived the 9/11 attacks with the help of his guide dog Roselle. This story is the subject of his best-selling book, Thunder Dog.   Michael gives over 100 presentations around the world each year speaking to influential groups such as Exxon Mobile, AT&T, Federal Express, Scripps College, Rutgers University, Children's Hospital, and the American Red Cross just to name a few. He is Ambassador for the National Braille Literacy Campaign for the National Federation of the Blind and also serves as Ambassador for the American Humane Association's 2012 Hero Dog Awards.   https://michaelhingson.com https://www.facebook.com/michael.hingson.author.speaker/ https://twitter.com/mhingson https://www.youtube.com/user/mhingson https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelhingson/   accessiBe Links https://accessibe.com/ https://www.youtube.com/c/accessiBe https://www.linkedin.com/company/accessibe/mycompany/ https://www.facebook.com/accessibe/       Thanks for listening!   Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page. Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!   Subscribe to the podcast   If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher. You can subscribe in your favorite podcast app. You can also support our podcast through our tip jar https://tips.pinecast.com/jar/unstoppable-mindset .   Leave us an Apple Podcasts review   Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you have a minute, please leave an honest review on Apple Podcasts.       Transcription Notes:   Michael Hingson ** 00:00 Access Cast and accessiBe Initiative presents Unstoppable Mindset. The podcast where inclusion, diversity and the unexpected meet. Hi, I'm Michael Hingson, Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe and the author of the number one New York Times bestselling book, Thunder dog, the story of a blind man, his guide dog and the triumph of trust. Thanks for joining me on my podcast as we explore our own blinding fears of inclusion unacceptance and our resistance to change. We will discover the idea that no matter the situation, or the people we encounter, our own fears, and prejudices often are our strongest barriers to moving forward. The unstoppable mindset podcast is sponsored by accessiBe, that's a c c e s s i capital B e. Visit www.accessibe.com to learn how you can make your website accessible for persons with disabilities. And to help make the internet fully inclusive by the year 2025. Glad you dropped by we're happy to meet you and to have you here with us.   Michael Hingson ** 01:21 Hi everyone, and welcome to another episode of unstoppable mindset today. We get to play games. Well, not really, but we'll try. Our guest is Matt Forbeck, who is an award winning author. He is a game designer and all sorts of other kinds of things that I'm sure he's going to tell us about, and we actually just before we started the the episode, we were talking about how one might explore making more games accessible for blind and persons with other disabilities. It's, it's a challenge, and there, there are a lot of tricks. But anyway, Matt, I want to welcome you to unstoppable mindset. We're glad you're here.   Matt Forbeck ** 02:02 Well, thank you, Michael for inviting me and having me on. I appreciate it.   Speaker 1 ** 02:06 I think we're going to have a lot of fun, and I think it'll work out really well. I'm I am sure of that. So why don't we start just out of curiosity, why don't you tell us kind of about the early Matt, growing up?   Matt Forbeck ** 02:18 Uh, well, I grew up. I was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. I grew up in a little town called Beloit, Wisconsin, which actually live in now, despite having moved away for 13 years at one point, and I had terrible asthma, I was a sick and short kid, and with the advent of medication, I finally started to be healthy when I was around nine, and Part of that, I started getting into playing games, right? Because when you're sick, you do a lot of sitting around rather than running around. So I did a lot of reading and playing games and things like that. I happen to grow up in the part of the world where Dungeons and Dragons was invented, which is in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, about 30 miles from where I live. And because of that I was I started going to conventions and playing games and such, when I was about 12 or 13 years old. I started doing it when I was a little bit older. I started doing it professionally, and started doing it when I was in college. And amazingly enough, even to my own astonishment, I've made a career out of it.   Speaker 1 ** 03:17 Where did you go to college? I went to the University   Matt Forbeck ** 03:21 of Michigan over in Ann Arbor. I had a great time there. There's a wonderful little college, Beloit College, in my hometown here, and most of my family has gone to UW Milwaukee over the years. My parents met at Marquette in Milwaukee, but I wanted to get the heck out of the area, so I went to Michigan, and then found myself coming back as soon as we started having   Speaker 1 ** 03:42 kids well, and of course, I would presume that when you were at the University of Michigan, you rooted for them and against Ohio State. That was   Matt Forbeck ** 03:50 kind of, you know, if you did it the other way around, they back out of town. So, yeah, I was always kind of astonished, though, because having grown up in Wisconsin, where every sports team was a losing team when I was growing up, including the Packers, for decades. You know, we were just happy to be playing. They were more excuse to have beers than they were to cheer on teams. And I went to Michigan where they were, they were angry if the team wasn't up by two touchdowns. You know, at any point, I'm like, You guys are silly. This is we're here for fun.   Speaker 1 ** 04:17 But it is amazing how seriously some people take sports. I remember being in New Zealand helping the Royal New Zealand Foundation for the Blind. Well now 22 years ago, it's 2003 and the America's Cup had just finished before we got there, and in America beat New Zealand, and the people in New Zealand were just irate. They were complaining that the government didn't put enough money into the design of the boat and helping with the with the yacht and all that. It was just amazing how seriously people take it, yeah,   Matt Forbeck ** 04:58 once, I mean, it becomes a part of your. Identity in a lot of ways, right for many people, and I've never had to worry about that too much. I've got other things on my mind, but there you go.   Speaker 1 ** 05:08 Well, I do like it when the Dodgers win, and my wife did her graduate work at USC, and so I like it when the Trojans win, but it's not the end of the world, and you do need to keep it in perspective. I I do wish more people would I know once I delivered a speech in brether County, Kentucky, and I was told that when I started the speech had to end no later than preferably exactly at 6:30pm not a minute later, because it was the night of the NCAA Basketball Championship, and the Kentucky Wildcats were in the championship, and at 630 everyone was going to get up and leave and go home to watch the game. So I ended at 630 and literally, by 631 I timed it. The gym was empty and it was full to start with.   Matt Forbeck ** 06:02 People were probably, you know, counting down on their watches, just to make sure, right?   Speaker 1 ** 06:06 Oh, I'm sure they were. What do you do? It's, it is kind of fun. Well, so why did you decide to get started in games? What? What? What attracted to you, to it as a young person, much less later on?   Matt Forbeck ** 06:21 Well, I was, yeah, I was an awkward kid, kind of nerdy and, you know, glasses and asthma and all that kind of stuff. And games were the kind of thing where, if you didn't know how to interact with people, you could sit down at a table across them and you could practice. You can say, okay, we're all here. We've got this kind of a magic circle around us where we've agreed to take this one silly activity seriously for a short period of time, right? And it may be that you're having fun during that activity, but you know, there's, there's no reason that rolling dice or moving things around on a table should be taken seriously. It's all just for fun, right? But for that moment, you actually just like Las Vegas Exactly, right? When there's money on the line, it's different, but if you're just doing it for grins. You know, it was a good way for me to learn how to interact with people of all sorts and of different ages. And I really enjoyed playing the games, and I really wanted to be a writer, too. And a lot of these things interacted with story at a very basic level. So breaking in as a writer is tough, but it turned out breaking as a game designer, wasn't nearly his stuff, so I started out over there instead, because it was a very young field at the time, right? D and D is now 50 years old, so I've been doing this 35 years, which means I started around professionally and even doing it before that, I started in the period when the game and that industry were only like 10 or 15 years old, so yeah, weren't quite as much competition in those   Speaker 1 ** 07:43 days. I remember some of the early games that I did play, that I could play, were DOS based games, adventure. You're familiar with adventure? Yeah, oh, yeah. Then later, Zork and all that. And I still think those are fun games. And I the reason I like a lot of those kinds of games is they really make you think, which I think most games do, even though the video even the video games and so on, they they help your or can help your reactions, but they're designed by people who do try to make you think,   Matt Forbeck ** 08:15 yeah. I mean, we basically are designing puzzles for people to solve, even if they're story puzzles or graphic puzzles or sound puzzles or whatever, you know, even spatial puzzles. There the idea is to give somebody something fun that is intriguing to play with, then you end up coming with story and after that, because after a while, even the most most exciting mechanics get dull, right? I mean, you start out shooting spaceships, but you can only shoot spaceships for so long, or you start out playing Tetris, and you only put shapes together for so long before it doesn't mean anything that then you start adding in story to give people a reason to keep playing right and a reason to keep going through these things. And I've written a lot of video games over the years, basically with that kind of a philosophy, is give people nuggets of story, give them a plot to work their way through, and reward them for getting through different stages, and they will pretty much follow you through anything. It's amazing.   Michael Hingson ** 09:09 Is that true Dungeons and Dragons too?   Matt Forbeck ** 09:13 It is. All of the stories are less structured there. If you're doing a video game, you know you the team has a lot of control over you. Give the player a limited amount of control to do things, but if you're playing around a table with people, it's more of a cooperative kind of experience, where we're all kind of coming up with a story, the narrator or the Game Master, the Dungeon Master, sets the stage for everything, but then the players have a lot of leeway doing that, and they will always screw things up for you, too. No matter what you think is going to happen, the players will do something different, because they're individuals, and they're all amazing people. That's actually to me, one of the fun things about doing tabletop games is that, you know, the computer can only react in a limited number of ways, whereas a human narrator and actually change things quite drastically and roll. With whatever people come up with, and that makes it tremendous fun.   Speaker 1 ** 10:04 Do you think AI is going to enter into all that and maybe improve some of the   Matt Forbeck ** 10:09 old stuff? It's going to add your end to it, whether it's an ad, it's going to approve it as a large question. Yeah. So I've been ranting about AI quite a bit lately with my friends and family. But, you know, I think the problem with AI, it can be very helpful a lot of ways, but I think it's being oversold. And I think it's especially when it's being oversold for thing, for ways for people to replace writers and creative thinking, Yeah, you know, you're taking the fun out of everything. I mean, the one thing I like to say is if, if you can't be bothered to write this thing that you want to communicate to me, I'm not sure why I should be bothered to read this thing well.   Speaker 1 ** 10:48 And I think that AI will will evolve in whatever way it does. But the fact of the matter is, So do people. And I think that, in fact, people are always going to be necessary to make the process really work? AI can only do and computers can only do so much. I mean, even Ray Kurzweil talks about the singularity when people and computer brains are married, but that still means that you're going to have the human element. So it's not all going to be the computer. And I'm not ready to totally buy into to what Ray says. And I used to work for Ray, so I mean, I know Ray Well, but, but the but the bottom line is, I think that, in fact, people are always going to be able to be kind of the, the mainstay of it, as long as we allow that, if we, if we give AI too much power, then over time, it'll take more power, and that's a problem, but that's up to us to deal with?   Matt Forbeck ** 11:41 No, I totally agree with that. I just think right now, there's a very large faction of people who it's in their economic interest to oversell these things. You know, people are making chips. They're building server farms. A lot of them are being transferred from people are doing blockchain just a few years ago, and they see it as the hot new thing. The difference is that AI actually has a lot of good uses. There's some amazing things will come out of llms and such. But I again, people are over the people are selling this to us. Are often over promising things, right?   Speaker 1 ** 12:11 Yeah, well, they're not only over promising but they're they're really misdirecting people. But the other side of it is that, that, in fact, AI as a concept and as a technology is here, and we have control over how we use it. I've said a couple times on this this podcast, and I've said to others, I remember when I first started hearing about AI, I heard about the the fact that teachers were bemoaning the pack, that kids were writing their papers just using AI and turning them in, and it wasn't always easy to tell whether it was something that was written by AI or was written by the student. And I come from a little bit different view than I think a lot of people do. And my view basically is, let the kids write it if with AI, if that's what they're going to do, but then what the teacher needs to do is to take one period, for example, and give every student in that class the opportunity to come up and defend whatever paper they have. And the real question is, can they defend the paper? Which means, have they really learned the subject, or are they just relying on AI,   Matt Forbeck ** 13:18 yeah, I agree with that. I think the trouble is, a lot of people, children, you know, who are developing their abilities and their morals about this stuff, they use it as just a way to complete the assignment, right? And many of them don't even read what they turn in, right, right? Just know that they've got something here that will so again, if you can't be bothered to read the thing that you manufactured, you're not learning anything about it,   Speaker 1 ** 13:39 which is why, if you are forced to defend it, it's going to become pretty obvious pretty fast, whether you really know it or not. Now, I've used AI on a number of occasions in various ways, but I use it to maybe give me ideas or prepare something that I then modify and shape. And I may even interact with AI a couple of times, but I'm definitely involved with the process all the way down the line, because it still has to be something that I'm responsible for.   Matt Forbeck ** 14:09 I agree. I mean, the whole point of doing these things is for people to connect with each other, right? I want to learn about the ideas you have in your head. I want to see how they jive with ones in my head. But if I'm just getting something that's being spit out by a machine and not you, and not being curated by you at any point, that doesn't seem very useful, right? So if you're the more involved people are in it, the more useful it is.   Speaker 1 ** 14:31 Well, I agree, and you know, I think again, it's a tool, and we have to decide how the tool is going to be used, which is always the way it ought to be. Right?   Matt Forbeck ** 14:42 Exactly, although sometimes it's large corporations deciding,   Speaker 1 ** 14:45 yeah, well, there's that too. Well, individuals,   Matt Forbeck ** 14:49 we get to make our own choices. Though you're right,   Speaker 1 ** 14:51 yes, and should Well, so, so when did you start bringing writing into what you. Did, and make that a really significant part of what you did?   Matt Forbeck ** 15:03 Well, pretty early on, I mean, I started doing one of the first things I did was a gaming zine, which was basically just a print magazine that was like, you know, 32 pages, black and white, about the different tabletop games. So we were writing those in the days, design and writing are very closely linked when it comes to tabletop games and even in video games. The trick of course is that designing a game and writing the rules are actually two separate sets of skills. So one of the first professional gig I ever had during writing was in games was some friends of mine had designed a game for a company called Mayfair games, which went on to do sellers of contain, which is a big, uh, entry level game, and but they needed somebody to write the rules, so they called me over, showed me how to play the game. I took notes and I I wrote it down in an easy to understand, clear way that people had just picked up the box. Could then pick it up and teach themselves how to play, right? So that was early on how I did it. But the neat thing about that is it also taught me to think about game design. I'm like, when I work on games, I think about, who is this game going to be for, and how are we going to teach it to them? Because if they can't learn the game, there's no point of the game at all, right?   Speaker 1 ** 16:18 And and so I'm right? I'm a firm believer that a lot of technical writers don't do a very good job of technical writing, and they write way over people's heads. I remember the first time I had to write, well, actually, I mentioned I worked for Kurzweil. I was involved with a project where Ray Kurzweil had developed his original omniprent optical character recognition system. And I and the National Federation of the Blind created with him a project to put machines around the country so that blind people could use them and give back to Ray by the time we were all done, recommendations as to what needed to go in the final first production model of the machine. So I had to write a training manual to teach people how to use it. And I wrote this manual, and I was always of the opinion that it had to be pretty readable and usable by people who didn't have a lot of technical knowledge. So I wrote the manual, gave it to somebody to read, and said, Follow the directions and and work with the machine and all that. And they did, and I was in another room, and they were playing with it for a couple of hours, and they came in and they said, I'm having a problem. I can't figure out how to turn off the machine. And it turns out that I had forgotten to put in the instruction to turn off the machine. And it wasn't totally trivial. There were steps you had to go through. It was a Data General Nova two computer, and you had to turn it off the right way and the whole system off the appropriate way, or you could, could mess everything up. So there was a process to doing it. So I wrote it in, and it was fine. But, you know, I've always been a believer that the textbooks are way too boring. Having a master's degree in physics, I am of the opinion that physics textbook writers, who are usually pretty famous and knowledgeable scientists, ought to include with all the text and the technical stuff they want to put in, they should put in stories about what they did in you bring people in, draw them into the whole thing, rather than just spewing out a bunch of technical facts.   Matt Forbeck ** 18:23 No, I agree. My my first calculus professor was a guy who actually explained how Newton and Leipzig actually came up with calculus, and then he would, you know, draw everything on the board and turn around say, and isn't that amazing? And you were, like, just absolutely enamored with the idea of how they had done these things, right? Yeah. And what you're doing there, when you, when you, when you give the instructions to somebody and say, try this out. That's a very big part of gaming, actually, because what we do this thing called play testing, where we take something before it's ready to be shown to the public, and we give it to other people and say, try this out. See how it works. Let me know when you're starting out of your first playing you play with like your family and friends and people will be brutal with you and give you hints about how you can improve things. But then, even when you get to the rules you're you send those out cold to people, or, you know, if you're a big company, you watch them through a two way mirror or one way mirror, and say, Hey, let's see how they react to everything. And then you take notes, and you try to make it better every time you go through. And when I'm teaching people to play games at conventions, for instance, I will often say to them, please ask questions if you don't understand anything, that doesn't mean you're dumb. Means I didn't explain it well enough, right? And my job as a person writing these rules is to explain it as well as I humanly can so it can't be misconstrued or misinterpreted. Now that doesn't mean you can correct everything. Somebody's always got like, Oh, I missed that sentence, you know, whatever. But you do that over and over so you can try to make it as clear and concise as possible, yeah.   Speaker 1 ** 19:52 Well, you have somewhat of a built in group of people to help if you let your kids get involved. Involved. So how old are your kids?   Matt Forbeck ** 20:03 My eldest is 26 he'll be 27 in January. Marty is a game designer, actually works with me on the marble tabletop role playing game, and we have a new book coming out, game book for Minecraft, called Minecraft role for adventure, that's coming out on July 7, I think, and the rest of the kids are 23 we have 423 year olds instead of quadruplets, one of whom is actually going into game design as well, and the other says two are still in college, and one has moved off to the work in the woods. He's a very woodsy boy. Likes to do environmental education with people.   Speaker 1 ** 20:39 Wow. Well, see, but you, but you still have a good group of potential game designers or game critics anyway.   Matt Forbeck ** 20:47 Oh, we all play games together. We have a great time. We do weekly game nights here. Sometimes they're movie nights, sometimes they're just pizza nights, but we shoot for game and pizza   Speaker 1 ** 20:56 if we get lucky and your wife goes along with all this too.   Matt Forbeck ** 21:00 She does. She doesn't go to the game conventions and stuff as much, and she's not as hardcore of a gamer, but she likes hanging out with the kids and doing everything with us. We have a great time.   Speaker 1 ** 21:10 That's that's pretty cool. Well, you, you've got, you've got to build an audience of some sorts, and that's neat that a couple of them are involved in it as well. So they really like what dad does, yeah,   Matt Forbeck ** 21:23 yeah. We, I started taking them each to conventions, which are, you know, large gatherings gamers in real life. The biggest one is Gen Con, which happens in Indianapolis in August. And last year, I think, we had 72,000 people show up. And I started taking the kids when they were 10 years old, and my wife would come up with them then. And, you know, 10 years old is a lot. 72,000 people is a lot for a 10 year old. So she can mention one day and then to a park the next day, you know, decompress a lot, and then come back on Saturday and then leave on Sunday or whatever, so that we didn't have them too over stimulated. But they really grown to love it. I mean, it's part of our annual family traditions in the summer, is to go do these conventions and play lots of games with each other and meet new people too well.   Speaker 1 ** 22:08 And I like the way you put it. The games are really puzzles, which they are, and it's and it's fun. If people would approach it that way, no matter what the game is, they're, they're aspects of puzzles involved in most everything that has to do with the game, and that's what makes it so fun.   Matt Forbeck ** 22:25 Exactly, no. The interesting thing is, when you're playing with other people, the other people are changing the puzzles from their end that you have to solve on your end. And sometimes the puzzle is, how do I beat this person, or how do I defeat their strategy, or how do I make an alliance with somebody else so we can win? And it's really always very intriguing. There's so many different types of games. There's nowadays, there's like something like 50 to 100 new board games that come out and tabletop games every month, right? It's just like a fire hose. It's almost like, when I was starting out as a novelist, I would go into Barnes and Noble or borders and go, Oh my gosh, look at all these books. And now I do the same thing about games. It's just, it's incredible. Nobody, no one person, could keep up with all of them.   Speaker 1 ** 23:06 Yeah, yeah, yeah, way too much. I would love to explore playing more video games, but I don't. I don't own a lot of the technology, although I'm sure that there are any number of them that can be played on a computer, but we'll have to really explore and see if we can find some. I know there are some that are accessible for like blind people with screen readers. I know that some people have written a few, which is kind of cool. Yeah.   Matt Forbeck ** 23:36 And Xbox has got a new controller out that's meant to be accessible to large amount of people. I'm not sure, all the different aspects of it, but that's done pretty well, too   Speaker 1 ** 23:44 well. And again, it comes down to making it a priority to put all of that stuff in. It's not like it's magic to do. It's just that people don't know how to do it. But I also think something else, which is, if you really make the products more usable, let's say by blind people with screen readers. You may be especially if it's well promoted, surprised. I'm not you necessarily, but people might well be surprised as to how many others might take advantage of it so that they don't necessarily have to look at the screen, or that you're forced to listen as well as look in order to figure out what's going on or take actions.   Matt Forbeck ** 24:29 No, definitely true. It's, you know, people audio books are a massive thing nowadays. Games tend to fall further behind that way, but it's become this incredible thing that obviously, blind people get a great use out of but my wife is addicted to audio books now. She actually does more of those than she does reading. I mean, I technically think they're both reading. It's just one's done with yours and one's done with your eyes.   Speaker 1 ** 24:51 Yeah, there's but there's some stuff, whether you're using your eyes or your fingers and reading braille, there's something about reading a book that way that's. Even so a little bit different than listening to it. Yeah, and there's you're drawn in in some ways, in terms of actually reading that you're not necessarily as drawn into when you're when you're listening to it, but still, really good audio book readers can help draw you in, which is important, too,   Matt Forbeck ** 25:19 very much. So yeah, I think the main difference for reading, whether it's, you know, again, through Braille or through traditional print, is that you can stop. You can do it at your own pace. You can go back and look at things very easily, or read or check things, read things very easily. That you know, if you're reading, if you're doing an audio book, it just goes on and it's straight on, boom, boom, boom, pace. You can say, Wait, I'm going to put this down here. What was that thing? I remember back there? It was like three pages back, but it's really important, let me go check that right.   Speaker 1 ** 25:50 There are some technologies that allow blind people and low vision people and others, like people with dyslexia to use an audio book and actually be able to navigate two different sections of it. But it's not something that is generally available to the whole world, at least to the level that it is for blind people. But I can, I can use readers that are made to be able to accept the different formats and go back and look at pages, go back and look at headings, and even create bookmarks to bookmark things like you would normally by using a pen or a pencil or something like that. So there are ways to do some of that. So again, the technology is making strides.   Matt Forbeck ** 26:37 That's fantastic. Actually, it's wonderful. Just, yeah, it's great. I actually, you know, I lost half the vision of my right eye during back through an autoimmune disease about 13 years ago, and I've always had poor vision. So I'm a big fan of any kind of way to make things easier,   Speaker 1 ** 26:54 like that. Well, there, there are things that that are available. It's pretty amazing. A guy named George curser. Curser created a lot of it years ago, and it's called the DAISY format. And the whole idea behind it is that you can actually create a book. In addition to the audio tracks, there are XML files that literally give you the ability to move and navigate around the book, depending on how it's created, as final level as you choose.   Matt Forbeck ** 27:25 Oh, that's That's amazing. That's fantastic. I'm actually really glad to hear that.   Speaker 1 ** 27:28 So, yeah, it is kind of fun. So there's a lot of technology that's that's doing a lot of different sorts of things and and it helps. But um, so for you, in terms of dealing with, with the games, you've, you've written games, but you've, you've actually written some novels as well, right?   Matt Forbeck ** 27:50 Yeah, I've got like 30, it depends on how you count a novel, right? Okay, like some of my books are to pick a path books, right? Choose Your Own Adventure type stuff. So, but I've got 35 traditional novels written or more, I guess, now, I lost track a while ago, and probably another dozen of these interactive fiction books as well. So, and I like doing those. I've also written things like Marvel encyclopedias and Avengers encyclopedias and all sorts of different pop culture books. And, you know, I like playing in different worlds. I like writing science fiction, fantasy, even modern stuff. And most of it, for me comes down to telling stories, right? If you like to tell stories, you can tell stories through a game or book or audio play or a TV show or a comic, or I've done, you know, interactive museum, games and displays, things like that. The main thing is really a story. I mean, if you're comfortable sitting down at a bar and having a drink with somebody, doesn't have to be alcohol, just sitting down and telling stories with each other for fun. That's where the core of it all is really   Speaker 1 ** 28:58 right. Tell me about interactive fiction book.   Matt Forbeck ** 29:01 Sure, a lot of these are basically just done, like flow charts, kind of like the original Zork and adventure that you were talking about where you I actually, I was just last year, I brought rose Estes, who's the inventor of the endless quest books, which were a cross between Dungeons and Dragons, and choose your own adventure books. She would write the whole thing out page by page on a typewriter, and then, in order to shuffle the pages around so that people wouldn't just read straight through them, she'd throw them all up in the air and then just put them back in whatever order they happen to be. But essentially, you read a section of a book, you get to the end, and it gives you a choice. Would you like to go this way or that way? Would you like to go beat up this goblin? Or would you like to make friends with this warrior over here? If you want to do one of these things, go do page xx, right? Got it. So then you turn to that page and you go, boom, some, actually, some of the endless quest books I know were turned into audio books, right? And I actually, I. Um, oddly, have written a couple Dungeons and Dragons, interactive books, audio books that have only been released in French, right? Because there's a company called Looney l, u n, i, i that has this little handheld device that's for children, that has an A and a B button and a volume button. And you, you know, you get to the point that says, if you want to do this, push a, if you want to do that, push B, and the kids can go through these interactive stories and and, you know, there's ones for clue and Dungeons and Dragons and all sorts of other licenses, and some original stories too. But that way there's usually, like, you know, it depends on the story, but sometimes there's, like, 10 to 20 different endings. A lot of them are like, Oh no, you've been killed. Go back to where you started, right? And if you're lucky, the longer ones are, the more fun ones. And you get to, you know, save the kingdom and rescue the people and make good friends and all that good stuff,   Michael Hingson ** 30:59 yeah, and maybe fall in love with the princess or Prince.   Matt Forbeck ** 31:02 Yeah, exactly right. It all depends on the genre and what you're working in. But the idea is to give people some some choices over how they want the story to go. You're like, Well, do you want to investigate this dark, cold closet over here, or would you rather go running outside and playing around? And some of them can seem like very innocent choices, and other ones are like, well, uh, 10 ton weight just fell on. You go back to the last thing.   Speaker 1 ** 31:23 So that dark hole closet can be a good thing or a bad thing,   Matt Forbeck ** 31:28 exactly. And the trick is to make the deaths the bad endings, actually just as entertaining as anything else, right? And then people go, Well, I got beat, and I gotta go back and try that again. So yeah, if they just get the good ending all the way through, they often won't go back and look at all the terrible ones. So it's fun to trick them sometimes and have them go into terrible spots. And I like to put this one page in books too that sometimes says, How did you get here? You've been cheating there. This book, this page, is actually not led to from any other part of the book. You're just flipping   Speaker 1 ** 31:59 through. Cheater, cheater book, do what you   Matt Forbeck ** 32:04 want, but if you want to play it the right way, go back.   Speaker 1 ** 32:07 Kid, if you want to play the game. Yeah, exactly. On the other hand, some people are nosy.   Matt Forbeck ** 32:15 You know, I was always a kid who would poke around and wanted to see how things were, so I'm sure I would have found that myself but absolutely related, you know,   Speaker 1 ** 32:23 yeah, I had a general science teacher who brought in a test one day, and he gave it to everyone. And so he came over to me because it was, it was a printed test. He said, Well, I'm not going to give you the test, because the first thing it says is, read all the instructions, read, read the test through before you pass it, before you take it. And he said, most people won't do that. And he said, I know you would. And the last question on the test is answer, only question one.   Matt Forbeck ** 32:55 That's great. Yeah, that's a good one. Yeah,   Speaker 1 ** 32:57 that was cute. And he said, I know that. I that there's no way you would, would would fall for that, because you would say, Okay, let's read the instructions and then read the whole test. That's what it said. And the instruction were, just read the whole test before you start. And people won't do that.   Matt Forbeck ** 33:13 No, they'll go through, take the whole thing. They get there and go, oh, did I get there? Was a, there's a game publisher. I think it was Steve Jackson Games, when they were looking for people, write for them, or design stuff for them, or submit stuff to them, would have something toward the end of the instructions that would say, put like a the letter seven, or put seven a on page one right, and that way they would know if you had read the instructions, if you hadn't bothered to Read the instructions, they wouldn't bother reading anything else.   Speaker 1 ** 33:42 Yeah, which is fair, because the a little harsh, well, but, but, you know, we often don't learn enough to pay attention to details. I know that when I was taking physics in college, that was stressed so often it isn't enough to get the numbers right. If you don't get the units right as well. Then you're, you're not really paying attention to the details. And paying attention to the details is so important.   Matt Forbeck ** 34:07 That's how they crash from those Mars rovers, wasn't it? They somebody messed up the units, but going back and forth between metric and, yeah, and Imperial and, well, you know, it cost somebody a lot of money at one point. Yeah. Yeah. What do you   Speaker 1 ** 34:21 this is kind of the way it goes. Well, tell me, yeah. Well, they do matter, no matter what people think, sometimes they do matter. Well, tell me about the Diana Jones award. First of all, of course, the logical question for many people is, who is Diana Jones? Yeah, Diana Jones doesn't exist, right? That's There you go. She's part game somewhere? No, no, it doesn't be in a game somewhere.   Matt Forbeck ** 34:43 Then now there's actually an author named Diana Wynne Jones, who's written some amazing fantasy stories, including Howell's Moving Castle, which has turned into a wonderful anime movie, but it has nothing to do with her or any other person. Because originally, the Diana Jones award came about. Because a friend of mine, James Wallace, had somehow stumbled across a trophy that fell into his hands, and it was a pub trivia trophy that used to be used between two different gaming companies in the UK, and one of those was TSR, UK, the United Kingdom department. And at one point, the company had laid off everybody in that division just say, Okay, we're closing it all down. So the guys went and burned a lot of the stuff that they had, including a copy of the Indiana Jones role playing game, and the only part of the logo that was left said Diana Jones. And for some reason, they put this in a in a fiberglass or Plexiglas pyramid, put it on a base, a wooden base, and it said the Diana Jones award trophy, right? And this was the trophy that they used they passed back and forth as a joke for their pub trivia contest. Fell into James's hands, and he decided, You know what, we're going to give this out for the most excellent thing in gaming every year. And we've now done this. This will be 25 years this summer. We do it at the Wednesday night before Gen Con, which starts on Thursday, usually at the end of July or early August. And as part of that, actually, about five years ago, we started, one of the guys suggested we should do something called the emerging designers program. So we actually became a 501, c3, so we could take donations. And now we take four designers every year, fly them in from wherever they happen to be in the world, and put them up in a hotel, give them a badge the show, introduce them to everybody, give them an honorarium so they can afford to skip work for a week and try to help launch their careers. I mean, these are people that are in the first three years of their design careers, and we try to work mostly with marginalized or et cetera, people who need a little bit more representation in the industry too. Although we can select anybody, and it's been really well received, it's been amazing. And there's a group called the bundle of holding which sells tabletop role playing game PDFs, and they've donated 10s of 1000s of dollars every year for us to be able to do this. And it's kind of funny, because I never thought I'd be end up running a nonprofit, but here I'm just the guy who writes checks to the different to the emerging designer program. Folks are much more tied into that community that I am. But one of the real reasons I wanted to do something like that or be involved with it, because if you wander around with these conventions and you notice that it starts getting very gray after a while, right? It's you're like, oh, there's no new people coming in. It's all older people. I we didn't I didn't want us to all end up as like the Grandpa, grandpa doing the HO model railroad stuff in the basement, right? This dying hobby that only people in their 60s and 70s care about. So bringing in fresh people, fresh voices, I think, is very important, and hopefully we're doing some good with that. It's been a lot of fun either way.   Speaker 1 ** 37:59 Well, I have you had some success with it? Yeah, we've   Matt Forbeck ** 38:02 had, well, let's see. I think we've got like 14 people. We've brought in some have already gone on to do some amazing things. I mean, it's only been a few years, so it's hard to tell if they're gonna be legends in their time, but again, having them as models for other people to look at and say, Oh, maybe I could do that. That's been a great thing. The other well, coincidentally, Dungeons and Dragons is having its best 10 year streak in its history right now, and probably is the best selling it's ever been. So coinciding with that, we've seen a lot more diversity and a lot more people showing up to these wonderful conventions and playing these kinds of games. There's also been an advent of this thing called actual play, which is the biggest one, is a group called Critical Role, which is a whole bunch of voice actors who do different cartoons and video games and such, and they play D and D with each other, and then they record the games, and they produce them on YouTube and for podcasts. And these guys are amazing. There's a couple of other ones too, like dimension 20 and glass cannon, the critical role guys actually sold out a live performance at Wembley Arena last summer. Wow. And dimension. Dimension 20 sold out Madison Square Garden. I'm like, if you'd have told me 20 years ago that you know you could sell out an entire rock stadium to have people watch you play Dungeons and Dragons, I would have laughed. I mean, there's no way it would have been possible. But now, you know, people are very much interested in this. It's kind of wild, and it's, it's fun to be a part of that. At some level,   Speaker 1 ** 39:31 how does the audience get drawn in to something like that? Because they are watching it, but there must be something that draws them in.   Matt Forbeck ** 39:39 Yeah, part of it is that you have some really skilled some actors are very funny, very traumatic and very skilled at improvisation, right? So the the dungeon master or Game Master will sit there and present them with an idea or whatever. They come up each with their own characters. They put them in wonderful, strong voices. They kind of inhabit the roles in a way that an actor. A really top level actor would, as opposed to just, you know, me sitting around a table with my friends. And because of that, they become compelling, right? My Marty and my his wife and I were actually at a convention in Columbus, Ohio last weekend, and this group called the McElroy family, actually, they do my brother, my brother and me, which is a hit podcast, but they also do an actual play podcast called The Adventure zone, where they just play different games. And they are so funny. These guys are just some of the best comedians you'll ever hear. And so them playing, they actually played our Marvel game for a five game session, or a five podcast session, or whatever, and it was just stunningly fun to listen to. People are really talented mess around with something that we built right it's very edifying to see people enjoying something that you worked on.   Speaker 1 ** 40:51 Do you find that the audiences get drawn in and they're actually sort of playing the game along, or as well? And may disagree with what some of the choices are that people make?   Matt Forbeck ** 41:02 Oh, sure. But I mean, if the choices are made from a point of the character that's been expressed, that people are following along and they they already like the character, they might go, Oh, those mean, you know that guy, there are some characters they love to hate. There are some people they're they're angry at whatever, but they always really appreciate the actors. I mean, the actors have become celebrities in their own right. They've they sell millions of dollars for the comic books and animated TV shows and all these amazing things affiliated with their actual play stuff. And it's, I think it, part of it is because, it's because it makes the games more accessible. Some people are intimidated by these games. So it's not really, you know, from a from a physical disability kind of point. It's more of a it makes it more accessible for people to be nervous, to try these things on their own, or don't really quite get how they work. They can just sit down and pop up YouTube or their podcast program and listen into people doing a really good job at it. The unfortunate problem is that the converse of that is, when you're watching somebody do that good of a job at it, it's actually hard to live up to that right. Most people who play these games are just having fun with their friends around a table. They're not performing for, you know, 10s of 1000s, if not hundreds of 1000s of people. So there's a different level of investments, really, at that point, and some people have been known to be cowed by that, by that, or daunted by that.   Speaker 1 ** 42:28 You work on a lot of different things. I gather at the same time. What do you what do you think about that? How do you like working on a lot of different projects? Or do you, do you more focus on one thing, but you've got several things going on, so you'll work on something for one day, then you'll work on something else. Or how do you how do you do it all?   Matt Forbeck ** 42:47 That's a good question. I would love to just focus on one thing at a time. Now, you know the trouble is, I'm a freelancer, right? I don't set my I don't always get to say what I want to work on. I haven't had to look for work for over a decade, though, which has been great. People just come to me with interesting things. The trouble is that when you're a freelancer, people come in and say, Hey, let's work on this. I'm like, Yeah, tell me when you're ready to start. And you do that with like, 10 different people, and they don't always line up in sequence properly, right? Yeah? Sometimes somebody comes up and says, I need this now. And I'm like, Yeah, but I'm in the middle of this other thing right now, so I need to not sleep for another week, and I need to try to figure out how I'm going to put this in between other things I'm working on. And I have noticed that after I finish a project, it takes me about a day or three to just jump track. So if I really need to, I can do little bits here and there, but to just fully get my brain wrapped around everything I'm doing for a very complex project, takes me a day or three to say, Okay, now I'm ready to start this next thing and really devote myself to it. Otherwise, it's more juggling right now, having had all those kids, probably has prepared me to juggle. So I'm used to having short attention span theater going on in my head at all times, because I have to jump back and forth between things. But it is. It's a challenge, and it's a skill that you develop over time where you're like, Okay, I can put this one away here and work on this one here for a little while. Like today, yeah, I knew I was going to talk to you, Michael. So I actually had lined up another podcast that a friend of mine wanted to do with me. I said, Let's do them on the same day. This way I'm not interrupting my workflow so much, right? Makes sense? You know, try to gang those all together and the other little fiddly bits I need to do for administration on a day. Then I'm like, Okay, this is not a day off. It's just a day off from that kind of work. It's a day I'm focusing on this aspect of what I do.   Speaker 1 ** 44:39 But that's a actually brings up an interesting point. Do you ever take a day off or do what do you do when you're when you deciding that you don't want to do gaming for a while?   Matt Forbeck ** 44:49 Yeah, I actually kind of terrible. But you know, you know, my wife will often drag me off to places and say we're going to go do this when. Yes, we have a family cabin up north in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan that we go to. Although, you know, my habit there is, I'll work. I'll start work in the morning on a laptop or iPad until my battery runs out, and then I shut it down, put on a charger, and then I go out and swim with everybody for the rest of the day. So it depends if I'm on a deadline or not, and I'm almost always on a deadline, but there are times I could take weekends off there. One of the great things of being a freelancer, though, and especially being a stay at home father, which is part of what I was doing, is that when things come up during the middle of the week, I could say, oh, sure, I can be flexible, right? The trouble is that I have to pay for that time on my weekends, a lot of the time, so I don't really get a lot of weekends off. On the other hand, I'm not I'm not committed to having to work every day of the week either, right? I need to go do doctor appointments, or we want to run off to Great America and do a theme park or whatever. I can do that anytime I want to. It's just I have to make up the time at other points during the week. Does your wife work? She does. She was a school social worker for many years, and now as a recruiter at a local technical college here called Black Hawk tech. And she's amazing, right? She's fantastic. She has always liked working. The only time she stopped working was for about a year and a half after the quads were born, I guess, two years. And that was the only time I ever took a job working with anybody else, because we needed the health insurance, so I we always got it through her. And then when she said, Well, I'm gonna stay home with the kids, which made tons of sense, I went and took a job with a video game company up in Madison, Wisconsin called Human Head Studios for about 18 months, 20 months. And then the moment she told me she was thinking about going back to work, I'm like, Oh, good, I can we can Cobra for 18 months and pay for our own health insurance, and I'm giving notice this week, and, you know, we'll work. I left on good terms that everybody. I still talk to them and whatever, but I very much like being my own boss and not worrying about what other people are going to tell me to do. I work with a lot of clients, which means I have a lot of people telling me what to do. But you know, if it turns out bad, I can walk I can walk away. If it turns out good, hopefully we get to do things together, like the the gig I've been working out with Marvel, I guess, has been going on for like, four years now, with pretty continuous work with them, and I'm enjoying every bit of it. They're great people to work with.   Speaker 1 ** 47:19 Now, you were the president of Pinnacle entertainment for a little while. Tell me about that.   Matt Forbeck ** 47:24 I was, that was a small gaming company I started up with a guy named Shane Hensley, who was another tabletop game designer. Our big game was something called Dead Lands, which was a Western zombie cowboy kind of thing. Oh gosh, Western horror. So. And it was pretty much a, you know, nobody was doing Western horror back in those days. So we thought, Oh, this is safe. And to give you an example of parallel development, we were six months into development, and another company, White Wolf, which had done a game called Vampire the Masquerade, announced that they were doing Werewolf the Wild West. And we're like, you gotta be kidding me, right? Fortunately, we still released our game three months before there, so everybody thought we were copying them, rather than the other way around. But the fact is, we were. We both just came up with the idea independently. Right? When you work in creative fields, often, if somebody wants to show you something, you say, I'd like to look at you have to sign a waiver first that says, If I do something like this, you can't sue me. And it's not because people are trying to rip you off. It's because they may actually be working on something similar, right already. Because we're all, you know, swimming in the same cultural pool. We're all, you know, eating the same cultural soup. We're watching or watching movies, playing games, doing whatever, reading books. And so it's not unusual that some of us will come up with similar ideas   Speaker 1 ** 48:45 well, and it's not surprising that from time to time, two different people are going to come up with somewhat similar concepts. So that's not a big surprise, exactly, but   Matt Forbeck ** 48:56 you don't want people getting litigious over it, like no, you don't be accused of ripping anybody off, right? You just want to be as upfront with people. With people. And I don't think I've ever actually seen somebody, at least in gaming, in tabletop games, rip somebody off like that. Just say, Oh, that's a great idea. We're stealing that it's easier to pay somebody to just say, Yes, that's a great idea. We'll buy that from you, right? As opposed to trying to do something unseemly and criminal?   Speaker 1 ** 49:24 Yeah, there's, there's something to be said for having real honor in the whole process.   Matt Forbeck ** 49:30 Yeah, I agree, and I think that especially if you're trying to have a long term career in any field that follows you, if you get a reputation for being somebody who plays dirty, nobody wants to play with you in the future, and I've always found it to be best to be as straightforward with people and honest, especially professionally, just to make sure that they trust you. Before my quadruplets were born, you could have set your clock by me as a freelancer, I never missed a deadline ever, and since then, I've probably it's a. Rare earth thing to make a deadline, because, you know, family stuff happens, and you know, there's just no controlling it. But whenever something does happen, I just call people up and say, hey, look, it's going to be another week or two. This is what's going on. And because I have a good reputation for completing the job and finishing quality work, they don't mind. They're like, Oh, okay, I know you're going to get this to me. You're not just trying to dodge me. So they're willing to wait a couple weeks if they need to, to get to get what they need. And I'm very grateful to them for that. And I'm the worst thing somebody can do is what do, what I call turtling down, which is when it's like, Oh no, I'm late. And then, you know, they cut off all communication. They don't talk to anybody. They just kind of try to disappear as much as they can. And we all, all adults, understand that things happen in your life. It's okay. We can cut you some slack every now and then, but if you just try to vanish, that's not even possible.   Speaker 1 ** 50:54 No, there's a lot to be there's a lot to be said for trust and and it's so important, I think in most anything that we do, and I have found in so many ways, that there's nothing better than really earning someone's trust, and they earning your trust. And it's something I talk about in my books, like when live with a guide dog, live like a guide dog, which is my newest book, it talks a lot about trust, because when you're working with a guide dog, you're really building a team, and each member of the team has a specific job to do, and as the leader of the team, it's my job to also learn how to communicate with the other member of the team. But the reality is, it still comes down to ultimately, trust, because I and I do believe that dogs do love unconditionally, but they don't trust unconditionally. But the difference between dogs and people is that people that dogs are much more open to trust, for the most part, unless they've just been totally traumatized by something, but they're more open to trust. And there's a lesson to be learned there. No, I   Matt Forbeck ** 52:03 absolutely agree with that. I think, I think most people in general are trustworthy, but as you say, a lot of them have trauma in their past that makes it difficult for them to open themselves up to that. So that's actually a pretty wonderful way to think about things. I like that,   Speaker 1 ** 52:17 yeah, well, I think that trust is is so important. And I know when I worked in professional sales, it was all about trust. In fact, whenever I interviewed people for jobs, I always asked them what they were going to sell, and only one person ever answered me the way. I really hoped that everybody would answer when I said, So, tell me what you're going to be selling. He said, The only thing I have to really sell is myself and my word, and nothing else. It really matters. Everything else is stuff. What you have is stuff. It's me selling myself and my word, and you have to, and I would expect you to back me up. And my response was, as long as you're being trustworthy, then you're going to get my backing all the way. And he was my most successful salesperson for a lot of reasons, because he got it.   Matt Forbeck ** 53:08 Yeah, that's amazing. I mean, I mean, I've worked with people sourcing different things too, for sales, and if you can rely on somebody to, especially when things go wrong, to come through for you. And to be honest with you about, you know, there's really that's a hard thing to find. If you can't depend on your sources for what you're building, then you can't depend on anything. Everything else falls apart.   Speaker 1 ** 53:29 It does. You've got to start at the beginning. And if people can't earn your trust, and you earn theirs, there's a problem somewhere, and it's just not going to work.   Matt Forbeck ** 53:39 Yeah, I just generally think people are decent and want to help. I mean, I can't tell you how many times I've had issues. Car breaks down the road in Wisconsin. Here, if somebody's car goes in the ditch, everybody stops and just hauls them out. It's what you do when the quads were born, my stepmother came up with a sign up sheet, a booklet that she actually had spiral bound, that people could sign up every three three hours to help come over and feed and bathe, diaper, whatever the kids and we had 30 to 35 volunteers coming in every week. Wow, to help us out with that was amazing, right? They just each pick slots, feeding slots, and come in and help us out. I had to take the 2am feeding, and my wife had to take the 5am feeding by ourselves. But the rest of the week we had lots and lots of help, and we were those kids became the surrogate grandchildren for, you know, 30 to 35 women and couples really, around the entire area, and it was fantastic. Probably couldn't have survived   Speaker 1 ** 54:38 without it. And the other part about it is that all those volunteers loved it, because you all appreciated each other, and it was always all about helping and assisting.   Matt Forbeck ** 54:48 No, we appreciate them greatly. But you know every most of them, like 99% of them, whatever were women, 95 women who are ready for grandchildren and didn't have them. Had grandchildren, and they weren't in the area, right? And they had that, that love they wanted to share, and they just loved the opportunity to do it. It was, I'm choking up here talking about such a great time for us in   Speaker 1 ** 55:11 that way. Now I'm assuming today, nobody has to do diaper duty with the quads, right?   Matt Forbeck ** 55:16 Not until they have their own kids. Just checking, just checking, thankfully, think we're that is long in our past,   Speaker 1 ** 55:23 is it? Is it coming fairly soon for anybody in the future?   Matt Forbeck ** 55:27 Oh, I don't know. That's really entirely up to them. We would love to have grandchildren, but you know, it all comes in its own time. They're not doing no well. I, one of my sons is married, so it's possible, right? And one of my other sons has a long term girlfriend, so that's possible, but, you know, who knows? Hopefully they're they have them when they're ready. I always say, if you have kids and you want them, that's great. If you have, if you don't have kids and you don't want them, that's great. It's when you cross the two things that,   Speaker 1 ** 55:57 yeah, trouble, yeah, that's that is, that is a problem. But you really like working with yourself. You love the entre

Many of us use artificial intelligence for help with research, work, or creative projects. But some people are getting a LOT more personal with their AI chatbots. We're hearing stories of people treating their chatbot like a friend, or something more than a friend — with some people saying they've even fallen in love with their chatbot. And then there are stories of things taking a scary turn, with people's mental health spiraling out of control after talking to these bots. So, what should we make of AI companions? Is it risky to spend a lot of time talking to an AI bot? We ask AI researcher Dr. Julian de Freitas and psychiatrist Dr. Keith Sakata.  This episode does mention mental health issues and suicide. Here are some crisis hotlines:  United States: US National Suicide Prevention Lifeline Dial 988 (Online chat available); US Crisis Text Line Text “HOME” to 741741 Australia: Lifeline 13 11 14 (Online chat available) Canada: Canadian Association for Suicide Prevention (See link for phone numbers listed by province) United Kingdom: Samaritans 116 123 (UK and ROI) Full list of international hotlines here  Find our transcript here: https://bit.ly/ScienceVsAiCompanions  Chapters: In this episode, we cover: (00:00) What's it like to fall in love with a chatbot? (06:59) Do chatbots help people feel less lonely? (21:19) Chatbots during a crisis (28:43) Red flags to watch out for (33:17) How dangerous are they? This episode was produced by Rose Rimler, with help from Blythe Terrell, Meryl Horn, and Michelle Dang. We're edited by Blythe Terrell. Fact checking by Diane Kelly. Mix and sound design by Bumi Hidaka. Music written by Emma Munger, So Wylie, Peter Leonard, Bumi Hidaka and Bobby Lord. Thanks to all the researchers we reached out to, including Cathy Fang, Dr.  Linnea Laestadius, Dr. Sophia Choukas Bradley, and Prof. Stefano Puntoni. Special thanks also to Jeevika Verma.  Science Vs is a Spotify Studios Original. Listen for free on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Follow us and tap the bell for new episode notifications. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Why do empaths so often fall in love with the broken pieces of others? In this soulful and compassionate episode, Michaela explores the layered way empaths love, not just the person in front of them, but their pain, their potential, and their shadows. She dives into the mystical nature of empathic auras, how they absorb and reflect emotional energy, and why this can draw them toward relationships that are more toxic than tender. Michaela also talks about specific ways each empath aura falls into the trap of loving in layers. In this episode you'll hear about: The energetic nature of empath auras, what they are and how they workWhy empaths are naturally drawn to emotional wounds in othersThe magnetic pull between empaths and toxic relationship dynamicsHow to recognize when your compassion becomes self-sacrificeIf you enjoyed this episode, you'll love the links below:Discover more about yourself with Mystic Michaela's aura quizzes : https://knowyouraura.com/aura-quizzes/Find your aura color: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/bonus-every-aura-color-explained/id1477126939?i=1000479357880Message Mystic Michaela on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mysticmichaela/Explore the Know Your Aura Website : https://knowyouraura.com/Visit Mystic Michaela's Website: https://www.mysticmichaela.com/Join Mystic Michaela's Popular Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/2093029197406168/Our Episode Partners: For a limited time only, get 60% off your first order PLUS free shipping when you head to https://www.smalls.com/KYAGet $30 off the first box - PLUS free Croissants in every box - when you go to https://wildgrain.com/kya to start your subscription.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Todd Marinovich on his brand new book, how sports was his first drug, his biggest regret, why his father was misunderstood, how art became his escape, watching his son fall in love with football and much more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Coach Sean Brosnan turned around a struggling Newbury Park high school cross country team that hadn't qualified for a State Championship in 25 years. Soon, they had won three consecutive National Championships. How did he do it? Sean shares the psychological and physical strategies he used to instill belief, develop fitness, and build the bond between teammates. His all-in, often unorthodox approach, raised eyebrows but undeniably got incredible results. Himself a distinguished endurance runner, Sean was a collegiate All-American in both cross country and track and holds a personal best of 3:44.33 in the 1500m. He's now coaching for the UCLA track team.  His new book is now available: Beyond Fast: How a Renegade Coach and His Unlikely High School Team Revolutionized Distance Running. If you have a young runner in your life - or you're a cross country athlete yourself - buy this book. Like Running with the Buffaloes did for me in college, Sean's work is powerful and may help another generation of young runners fall in love with the sport. Thank You Lever! I'm excited to partner with Lever - a bodyweight support system that helps you run further or faster with less effort and injury risk.   You've probably seen pro runners using Lever - it attaches to any treadmill and you hook into it like a harness. It effectively makes you lighter, enabling you to run more volume than you normally could with reduced injury risk, run faster with less effort, or return to running after an injury more effectively. Lever allows you to do more running with less risk. From building mileage, introducing faster workouts, aiding your return to running after a break, Lever has a place in every phase of training. The pro's have been using Lever for years, giving them the advantage of more training with fewer injuries. They're also common in physical therapy offices. Because you can run with less body weight, you can gain fitness and practice good technique without risking your recovery. Go to levermovement.com and use code Strength20 for 20% off any system (and that's with a capital S). If you're injury-prone or are looking to take a big swing at your goals this year, now is the time for Lever. That's levermovement.com with code Strength20 for 20% off any system. Thank you to 2Before! We are supported by 2Before, a powerful sports supplement made from New Zealand Blackcurrants designed to increase endurance, manage inflammation, support immunity, and promote adaptation. 2Before main mechanism for boosting performance is acting as a vasodilator - it increases blood flow, making it more efficient for the body to pump oxygenated nutrient-rich blood into the muscles. Just like beetroot but more effective, blackcurrant berries are vasodilators, helping you get more blood flow where it's needed, quickly and efficiently.  My personal favorite option includes 100mg of caffeine, so you get the proven performance (and psychological) benefits of caffeine combined with the vasodilation effects of blackcurrant berries. Boost your performance and immune system with 2before: use code JASON for 30% off 20 packs and multi-serve packs at 2Before.com. Thank you to 2Before for supporting Strength Running!

If your business feels like Groundhog Day, this one's for you. You're not lazy. You're not uninspired. You've just outgrown how you've been working. In this episode of Branding Momentum, host Veronica Di Polo shares how to break the loop and feel excited again—without burning it all down. We talk: ✦ What to do when you feel stuck in a rinse-and-repeat cycle ✦ How to find new energy when you're not ready to start over ✦ What real productivity looks like when your brain's in slow mode ✦ And small rebellious shifts that can make your business feel new again This isn't about doing more. It's about doing different. Get smarter ways to rework your week, your inputs, and your energy—so you can fall in love with your work again.

As parents, we are concerned that our kids and teens may engage in high risk behaviors as they grow up. How can we, as parents, encourage our children away from engaging in these high risk behaviors? Or, if they are already doing any of these behaviors, how can we encourage them to stop them? In today's episode Janine and Dr Collier discuss:Dr. Collier's work in addiction and adolescence developmentHow your brain can change and the affect you can have on your reactionsHow parents can reduce high risk behaviorHow to keep lines of communication open between parent and childChatting with your child with framework, ‘We feel, we deal and we trust.'Finding coping skills and strategies How Dr Collier likes to rest and relaxAnd remember, do not forget about yourself, take a few minutes for you and have a little fun!About The Guest - Dr. Crystal CollierDr. Crystal Collier, LPC-S, herself a person in long-term recovery, is a therapist and educator whose comprehensive prevention model, which teaches the neurodevelopmental effects of risky behavior to students, school staff, and families, was selected for the Prevention and Education Commendation from the National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence. Dr. Collier received the Torch Bearer Award from the Texas Association of Addiction Professionals, Outstanding Research Award from the Association of Alternative Peer Groups, and voted Counselor of the Year by the Houston Counseling Association. In her books and free online prevention program, KnowYourNeuro.org, she strives to help people fall in love with their brain, keep it safe from high-risk behavior, and grow executive functioning skills.Website - www.knowyourneuro.orgSocial Media - https://www.instagram.com/instaccollier/ LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/crystal-collier-phd-lpc-s-657191105/ Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/drcrystalcollierAbout The Host - Janine HalloranJanine Halloran is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor, an author, a speaker, an entrepreneur and a mom. As a Licensed Mental Health Counselor, Janine has been working primarily with children, adolescents, and their families for over 20 years. She is the Founder of 'Coping Skills for Kids', where she creates products and resources to help kids learn to cope with their feelings in safe and healthy ways. Janine also founded 'Encourage Play' which dedicated to helping kids learn and practice social skills in the most natural way - through play!If you're interested in learning more about how to teach kids coping skills, download your free Coping Skills Toolkit:https://copingskillsforkids.com/newsletterThe Coping Skills Hub has everything you need to teach kids coping skills, learn more at https://copingskillsforkids.com/hubIf you'd like to purchase Janine's products, including the Coping Skills for Kids Workbook, Coping Skills for Teens Workbook, Social Skills for Kids Workbook, Coping Cue Cards, and more, visit https://store.copingskillsforkids.com or https://amazon.com/copingskillsforkidsConnect with Janine on Social MediaFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/janinehalloranlmhcInstagram @janine_halloran and @copingskillsforkidsYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@JanineHalloranLMHCPinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/encourageplay/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/janine-halloran-43787b7b/

The Seattle Mariners are 1.5 games back of the Astros in the AL West and 1 game ahead of the Rangers for the last Wild Card spot. Cal Raleigh is having a historic season. I'm ready to be hurt, or fall in love. This episode, we're talking about Moto Hagio's They Were Eleven published by Denpa and Chika Mizube's Pass the Monster Meat, Milady! (with story by Kanata Hoshi and character design by Pepperon) published by Kodansha. They Were Eleven credits: Translator: Ajani Oloye Proofreading: Momo Production: Nicole Dochych, Lauren Eldon As always, you can find me on bsky @nidokorn, and my co-hosts Helen (@WanderinDreamr) and Apryll (@manjiorin) on bsky at those places in the parenthesis. You can find both of their writing at The Organization of Anti-Social Geniuses, more of Helen's writing at Narrative Investigations, and my writing at the Fandom Post and Awko Tako. Join the unofficial Taiiku Podcast discord, the OSMCast discord. Used with permission. Listen Show notes: 1:07 - We talk about They Were Eleven 29:17 - We talk about Pass the Monster Meat, Milady! Next time is Tokyo Babylon and Magical Girl Incident

As Fr. Mark-Mary mentioned, the friars will be taking a meaningful break to embrace the rest and the joy of the Jubilee Year. While they are away, please enjoy listening (or re-listening) to this previously released episode, and join us in continuing to pray for Fr. Mark-Mary, Fr. Innocent, Fr. Angelus, and Fr. PT as they follow God's will and heed the call of the Jubilee. The Poco a Poco podcast happens because of many generous donors, including recurring monthly donations of any amount. Thinking about helping out? You can give at https://spiritjuice.org/supportpoco. Thank you! --- What makes us most free, is this submitting to God and this dependence on Him.  Yes, freedom is actually dependent on obedience rather than kind of doing whatever I want. When we fall in love with God and we experience that love, this deep interior freedom takes place and it becomes the most important thing of our lives—even to a point that is greater than our circumstances. This episode is the first part of our series on Interior Freedom by Fr. Jacque Philippe that talks about what it means to live in freedom as sons and daughters of God and how this freedom can become greater than the circumstances of our lives.The first of the nine beatitudes of Matthew said, "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." The world is constantly trying to define us—it tries to tell us who we are. Our successes, belongings, talents, people in our lives, our jobs, culture and technology, all these things tends make us who we are. We beclothed ourselves with these things and we are tempted to find our identity in them. But again, "Who Is God and Who Am I?". To understand what it means to be truly free and live in freedom as sons and daughters of God, we have to keep this question before us. We have to let go of other worldly things and not be afraid of staying in the place of spiritual poverty before the Lord. This episode is the fourth and last part of our series on Interior Freedom by Fr. Jacque Philippe that talks about freedom in spiritual poverty. An invitation for us to remain in this place of poverty and let God define us, give us everything and ultimately lead us to the kingdom of heaven.

Grab your pumpkin spice latte and fall in love with this episode because Camilla and Jessica are breaking down the do's and don'ts of fall fashion. From their go-to sweaters to their favorite boots, the Call It Crew is ready for their autumn rebrand, are you?See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Piggybacking off an earlier episode about sexual tension, this week Megan and Lia delve into attraction in Kdramas. What makes a character attractive? Do we fall in love with emotionally available characters or swoon for the tortured hero... or both? Ready to download your first audiobook? Don't forget to click HERE for your free Audible trial.*Audible is a sponsor of Afternoona Delight Podcast*Are your family and friends sick of you talking about K-drama? We get it...and have an answer. Join our AfterNoona Delight Patreon and find community among folks who get your obsession. And check out www.afternoonadelight.com for more episodes, book recs and social media goodness. And don't forget about the newest member of our network: Afternoona Asks where diaspora Asians living in the West find ways to reconnect to Asian culture via Asian/KDramas.Last but CERTAINLY not least....love BTS? Or curious what all the fuss is about? Check out our sister pod Afternoona Army for "thinky, thirsty and over thirty" takes on Bangtan life.★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★ ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

I'm so excited for today's episode because I get to sit down with my dear friend, Quendie from Quendie Joy. She's not only a stunning makeup artist known for her signature soft glam style, but also one of the bubbliest, most magnetic people I know. For the past five years, I've been referring her because she brings so much beauty, talent, and joy to every client she touches.But here's the best part—you need to follow Quendie on social media. She's hilarious, unfiltered, and always keeps it real. From silly stories about planning her own wedding, to navigating life on crutches or in a wheelchair, she shares it all with authenticity and humor.In this episode, we dive into: ✨ What it's like planning a wedding as both a wedding professional and a bride-to-be ✨ Her journey to Guadalajara, Mexico, where she'll say “I do” later this year (and yes, I'll be there!) ✨ Why joy, humor, and authenticity are her superpowers—on and off social mediaYou're going to fall in love with Quendie's energy, her honesty, and her laughter. Get ready for a conversation that's equal parts insightful and fun!https://www.instagram.com/quendiejoyhttps://www.instagram.com/carissawoo

Grab your life jackets - In this episode of Cast-A-Role, we dive deep into James Cameron's Titanic (1997), the epic romance and disaster film that became one of the highest-grossing movies of all time. We discuss Leonardo DiCaprio's iconic performance as Jack Dawson, Kate Winslet's unforgettable role as Rose DeWitt Bukater, and the on-screen chemistry that made audiences fall in love with their story. From the breathtaking visuals of the RMS Titanic's grandeur to the heartbreaking final act, we explore why Titanic still resonates with audiences decades later. We also break down the film's historical accuracy, the groundbreaking special effects, and the impact of its award-winning soundtrack featuring Celine Dion's “My Heart Will Go On.” Of course, it wouldn't be an episode of Cast-A-Role if Jim didn't have some issues, so we break those down too. and YES! We discuss THAT bit too So join us on board our vessel and hopefully not sink, and make it safely to our end destination.   Also discussed in this episode: Alien: Earth

My opinion on love.

Simultaneously one of the cutest and most pain-inducing creatures, porcupines capture attention all over their worldwide range. In this paper, Héctor Ramirez-Chaves and his coauthors describe a new species of porcupine from the Andes of Colombia. The work has taken them across different ecosystems and to a good handful of international museums. As Héctor describes Colombia's incredible biodiversity, he also addresses the critical nature of his work. “We still need to study rodents here in Colombia,” he says. “There are plenty of new species groups that have not been studied at all because they are not very charismatic, so they are neglected. People don't study them and they are very important to the ecosystem. So we need more attention in these small mammals.”If you don't want to fall in love with porcupines, don't listen to this episode! Héctor's joy is infectious and the curious nature of these cryptic rodents is irresistible.Héctor Ramirez-Chaves' paper “A review of the Quichua Porcupine Coendou quichua complex (Rodentia: Erethizontidae) with the description of a new species from Colombia” is in volume 106 issue 3 of the Journal of MammalogyIt can be found here: https://doi.org/10.1093/jmammal/gyae140A transcript of this episode can be found here: Héctor Ramirez-Chaves - TranscriptA transcript of this episode in spanish can be found here: Héctor Ramirez-Chaves - Spanish TranscriptNew Species: Coendou vossiEpisode image credit: Omar Daniel Leon AlvaradoCheck out Héctor's lab on instagram: @izbd_lab And take a look at their linktree for recent research: https://linktr.ee/izbd_labBe sure to follow New Species on Bluesky (@newspeciespodcast.bsky.social) and Instagram (@NewSpeciesPodcast) and “like” the podcast page on Facebook (www.facebook.com/NewSpeciesPodcast).Music in this podcast is "No More (Instrumental)," by HaTom (https://fanlink.to/HaTom)If you have questions or feedback about this podcast, please e-mail us at NewSpeciesPodcast@gmail.comIf you would like to support this podcast and enjoy bonus episodes, please consider doing so at https://www.patreon.com/NewSpeciesPod

I'm starting a new series called Darin's Diary. Every Monday, I'll be sharing something real that I'm learning about God as I dig into His Word for myself. This isn't secondhand from pastors, mentors, or books — it's me opening up my Bible, wrestling with what it says, and sharing how it's changing my walk with Him. In this first episode, I'm talking about a verse that completely reshaped the way I see God: John 1:14 — “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” Growing up, I thought I understood God's love, but when I read this verse in its original context, it hit me in a whole new way. For the first audience — both Jews and Gentiles — this was shocking. Unlike the distant gods of the Greco-Roman world, Jesus stepped down, put on flesh, and lived among us. That changes everything. This episode is all about rediscovering God's love in a fresh way — the kind that makes you fall in love with Him all over again. My hope is that as you watch, you'll see that God isn't distant, He's close, and He cares about every detail of your life. Let me know in the comments what stood out to you most, and don't forget to subscribe so you don't miss future episodes of Darin's Diary. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Uplift app is here! Try it free for 30 days   Today, we're diving into part one of a conversation that's going to light your brain on fire—in the best way. I'm joined by Anne-Laure Le Cunff, a brilliant neuroscientist, entrepreneur, and one of the most refreshingly original thinkers I've come across when it comes to learning, growth, and creativity. If you've ever felt stuck in your own head, wished you could reignite your curiosity, or just wanted to fall in love with learning again—this episode is your invitation. Anne-Laure's journey is nothing short of inspiring. She walked away from a high-powered role at Google to study neuroscience, and now she's researching how our brains learn at King's College London. She is also the founder of Nest Labs, where she helps people think with more clarity and live with more intention.  Her work is this beautiful blend of science-backed insight, creative thinking, and practical tools that challenge the way we've been taught to think. Her concept of “Tiny Experiments” completely changed the way I approach curiosity—and I knew I had to share it with you. You're going to walk away from this episode rethinking what's possible. Let's get into it. Timestamps: (02:13) - Anne-Laure's Story: From Google Powerhouse to Neuroscience Trailblazer (04:05) - How She Tested Different Paths Until the Right One Clicked (07:18) - Why Focusing on Output vs. Outcome Changes Everything (14:40) - Breaking Free from the Self-Sabotage Loop (21:08) - The Tiny Experiment That Completely Transformed Her Life   WATCH ALLI  ON YOUTUBE   Links to great things we discussed:    Anne-Laure's Book: Tiny Experiments   I hope you loved this episode!

Megan chats with Sarah Seeds from Plant Based Ginger about the surprising power of narrowing your focus to grow a loyal audience, attract brand partnerships, and create lasting impact. Sarah Seeds has been plant-based for over 20 years, and nothing makes her happier than getting people to rethink veggies. For her, food is creativity, connection, and a little bit of kitchen magic. Whether it's turning zucchini into crispy fries, chickpeas into dreamy hummus, or filling your plate with bold, colorful plants, her goal is simple: to help you fall in love with veggies, one delicious bite at a time.  We dig into why doing less can actually help you grow more. Sarah shares how choosing one clear focus transformed her blog, brought exciting brand collaborations, and kept her creative energy alive. If you've been resisting niching down, this episode will give you the clarity and motivation you need to move forward with confidence. Key points discussed include: - Start with what you love: Passion is the best fuel for building a brand that lasts. - Analytics reveal the path: Use data to see what content resonates and double down on it. - Authenticity wins every time: Genuine engagement builds stronger, more loyal communities. - Brands want specialists: Companies notice when you're known for one thing done well. - Niching down isn't just content: Photography style, captions, and even music choices matter. - Local and seasonal storytelling: Highlighting fresh, regional ingredients adds depth and uniqueness. - Community beats competition: Collaboration with other creators expands reach and support. - Flexibility drives success: Growth comes when you're willing to pivot and refine your focus. The Grow Community Cookbook If You Loved This Episode… You'll love Episode 468: A Hyper-Niche Blog is More Valuable Than You Think (+How to Make an Income From it) with Emily Rhodes Connect with Sarah Seeds Website | Instagram

Special Patreon Release: Wisdom from a Homeschooling Dad with Steve Lambert   Luke 6:40 (NI) "The student is not above the teacher, but everyone who is fully trained will be like their teacher."   *Transcription Below*   Questions and Topics We Discuss: What are some wonderful aspects of your lifestyle that are not available to families who are not home educating their children? What are some common questions you get about homeschool and what truth do you have to replace the myths? How long will prep take for the homeschooling parent and what does a typical schedule look like?   Steve Lambert has worn many hats in his 73 years: Pastor, author, speaker, stock broker and more. Together, he and his wife Jane Claire Lambert created and publish "Five in a Row" homeschool curriculum which has been a reader's choice favorite for nearly 30 years. They began homeschooling their children in 1981 and their seven grandchildren were homeschooled as well.   Five in a Row Website   Thank You to Our Sponsors: Chick-fil-A East Peoria and Savvy Sauce Charities   Connect with The Savvy Sauce on Facebook, Instagram or Our Website   Gospel Scripture: (all NIV)   Romans 3:23 “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,”   Romans 3:24 “and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.”   Romans 3:25 (a) “God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood.”   Hebrews 9:22 (b) “without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.”   Romans 5:8 “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”   Romans 5:11 “Not only is this so, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.”   John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”   Romans 10:9 “That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”   Luke 15:10 says “In the same way, I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”   Romans 8:1 “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus”   Ephesians 1:13–14 “And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God's possession- to the praise of his glory.”   Ephesians 1:15–23 “For this reason, ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers. I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is like the working of his mighty strength, which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.”   Ephesians 2:8–10 “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God – not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God‘s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.“   Ephesians 2:13 “But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ.“   Philippians 1:6 “being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”   *Transcription*     Music: (0:00 – 0:08)   Laura Dugger: (0:09 - 1:37) Welcome to The Savvy Sauce, where we have practical chats for intentional living. I'm your host, Laura Dugger, and I'm so glad you're here.   I want to say a huge thank you to today's sponsors for this episode, Chick-fil-A East Peoria, and Savvy Sauce Charities.   Are you interested in a free college education for you or someone you know?   Stay tuned for details coming later in this episode from today's sponsor, Chick-fil-A, East Peoria.   You can also visit their website today at Chick-fil-A.com/EastPeoria.   I'm excited to introduce you to my fascinating guest, Steve Lambert.   Steve has a unique perspective, as he has worn various hats, such as pastor, author, speaker, stockbroker, and more.   But today, we're going to hear various stories of how God has been faithful in calling he and his wife, Jane, to homeschool, and also publish homeschool curriculum called Five in a Row.   Regardless of our family schooling choice, these stories will build up our faith and remind us who we get to turn to in all things.   Here's our chat. Welcome to The Savvy Sauce, Steve.   Steve Lambert: (1:37 - 1:39) Good morning. It's great to be with you, Laura.   Laura Dugger: (1:40 - 1:53) Well, you are a part of a multi-generational homeschooling family.   So, will you begin our time by taking us back to that initial decision that you and your wife made to home educate your children?   Steve Lambert: (1:54 - 3:31) Sure, I'd love to. We made that decision back in 1981. I'm sure probably you and many of your listeners were not even born in 1981. But my wife came to me and she said, "So, hypothetically, what would you think if…” and my response was something like, "That cannot possibly be legal."   Because at that point, we knew no one who homeschooled. We never met a homeschooler.   I don't, you know, it was just completely foreign to my understanding. But I began to pray about it.   And as I did, I felt like the Lord said, "You're accountable for how you raise your children."   And I thought, well, if I'm accountable, then I ought to have some idea of how they're being raised.   Because, frankly, in a classroom, 95% of their lives are spent there in the classroom.   And they get home on the activity bus at 5:15 and eat dinner and go up and do their homework.   And that's the end of the day. And so, I thought, alright, maybe that's a good plan.   Now, parenthetically, let me add that it wasn't until a couple of years later, I felt like the Lord spoke to me and said, "And your children are accountable for how they turn out," which was profoundly important to me at the time.   Because we've all known great families who produce train wrecks for kids.   And we've known some train wreck parents who produce great kids. But we're accountable for how we raise our kids.   And I thought, if I'm going to have to sit for the final exam before the Lord of Heaven, I'd like to at least have some input in some part and at least know how they were raised. So, that was beginning in 1981.   Laura Dugger: (3:32 - 3:43) That is incredible, because you had no idea.   I'm even getting goosebumps just thinking now of where your family is at from that decision.   And could you catch us up to speed? How many children do you have?   Steve Lambert: (3:44 - 4:25) We had two daughters. We kind of left that in the Lord's hand. And that's what we ended up with. And my wife would have loved to have more, but we ended up with two daughters.   And between them, they have six daughters and one grandson. So, we have seven grandkids.   Several of them are through homeschooling now, college or career. The youngest at this point is six.   So, they're third-generation homeschoolers, which I think speaks to the validity of the homeschooling option for many people. You know it's worked successfully when your children want to homeschool their children rather than running as far away from homeschooling as they could possibly get.   Laura Dugger: (4:27 - 4:38) Well, and even going back then to 1981, you were questioning at that point, is this even legal?   So, catch us up. At that time, were there any legalities that you were up against?   Steve Lambert: (4:40 - 8:42) Then, like now, it really does depend on the state where you reside.   And Missouri has always been fairly homeschool-friendly. That said, within about a year after we began, our oldest daughter had been in public school in K-1 and had been in a private Christian school for one semester of second grade before we began the decision to homeschool.   And someone, presumably a family member I suspect, turned us into Family Services for Educational Neglect Child Abuse.   So, we had that dreaded knock at the door, and DFS came and had to inspect the children, make sure that they weren't bruised or harmed in any way, and then begin kind of the prosecutorial process against us.   But eventually they realized they really didn't have much say, so they turned the case over to the superintendent of schools.   And we happened to live in the same district where Jane and I had become high school sweethearts.   So, we hired an attorney, and we went and had a meeting with the superintendent of schools.   I often tell the story and describe him as being an older gentleman.   Now, in reality, compared to me today at age 73, he was probably only 60. He was a young fellow of about 60. But when you're 30, that seems pretty old.   And he had a couple of PhDs in education and administration, and he said, "You know, I strongly disagree with the choice you've made," but unfortunately, we had had our daughter tested using standardized testing just prior to that, and he compared her test scores after a year of homeschooling with her test scores when she had been in his public school classrooms, and she had improved significantly in every subject area.   So, he said, "I'm not going to cause you any problems, but I still think you're making a serious mistake." And the footnote to that story was lived out less than a year later when my phone rang, and it was the superintendent of schools.   And he said, "Mr. Lambert, can I speak with you frankly?" And I thought, oh boy, here we go. He said, "I don't know if you're aware of this, but we're having some problems in public education."   And I said, "No, not, I can't believe that. Really, doctor?"   And he goes, "No, we really are. Test scores are declining. Parents are unhappy. Faculties are unhappy. Administrations are unhappy. Students are unhappy. And I put together a blue-ribbon panel of educational experts for six weeks this summer to discuss how can we reface and reimagine education in our district. And you seem to have a very unique perspective on education, Mr. Lambert. Would you consider being a part of that panel?"   And I said, "I would."   And so, I went to the first meeting. They all introduced themselves and they all had lots and lots and lots of letters after their name.   One was the director of curriculum development, another the director of elementary testing, another the director of high school counseling.   And finally, I introduced myself and said, "Hi, I'm Stephen Lambert. I'm a homeschool dad." And every head in the room turned to look at me sitting in the back because up until that point, as far as I know, none of those men and women had ever seen a homeschooler and lived to tell about it.   So, they began the journey. The first night of the discussion and the person in charge of the summer series said, "You know, we can all make a long list of things that are wrong with public education, but let's not start there. Let's start on a positive note as we explore this difficult topic. Number one, responsibility for educating children rests with the state."   And I raised my hand and I said, "That's not right."   And he said, "What do you mean that's not right?"   And I said, "No, the responsibility for raising and educating children rests with their parents and only insofar as they choose to delegate some or all of their authority to you, does the state have anything to say about it?"   And he said, "Let's take a brief recess." So, it's probably just as well that I didn't tell him that God told me that because that would have made his head explode completely.   But anyway, that was 40 years ago. So, lots of water under the bridge since then in public education, I'm sorry to say has not gotten better, but instead it's gotten worse.   Laura Dugger: (8:44 - 9:07) Well, and I think within that, you've even brought up some questions that people have about homeschooling families when you first were talking about the standardized tests.   So, do you get these questions? A lot of times, do your children have any friends?   Did they grow up socialized or how did they compare to their peers?   Those types of things that there may be an underlying myth.   Steve Lambert: (9:09 - 11:20) Oh, for sure. Those are the common questions. I was so ignorant of homeschooling in 1981 that I didn't even notice. I didn't even know the word socialization.   I was too ignorant to even know that, but I did know friendship.   And in fact, I prayed and I asked the Lord, I said, "How are my kids going to have friends if they're homeschooled?"   And as you and some of your listeners may understand, I felt like the Lord spoke to me, not audibly, but in a sense that I clearly understood his heart.   And he said, "Do you want friends for your children?"   And I said, "Yes, Lord, of course I do more than anything."   And he said, "And so friends come from being in the midst of people." And I went, yes.   And then I paused and I could sense him kind of waiting on me. And I said, "Don't they?"   And I felt like the Lord said, "No, if you want friends for your children, ask me. I'm the author of friendship."   And he reminded me of David and Jonathan, for example.   He said, in my imagination, at least he said, "This very night, I can hear the prayers of tens of thousands of people around the earth who are surrounded by people, but who are contemplating suicide this very night because they're so lonely. Friends don't come from being in large groups. Friends come from heaven, ask me."   And so, that became a prayer. And neither of our children, none of our grandchildren have ever lacked for friends, lots of friends, close and intimate friends through sports, through music, through their church connections.   And it really has turned out to be true that friendship, whether you're an adult, a child, or a teen, if you're lacking friends in your life right now, getting involved in more and more people and more and more busyness isn't necessarily the answer.   Just stop and ask the Lord, "Lord, I'm lonely. I need some friends in my life. Would you bring me some?"   And our daughter's first close friend, after I prayed that prayer was a number of months later.   It was a little girl who had immigrated all the way from South Africa.   Her father had immigrated to the United States after becoming a believer to attend a Bible college and then came to Kansas City to attend a seminary.   And his daughter became my daughter's best friend, but she came from halfway around the globe.   And since then, there've been so many that we couldn't count them all.   Laura Dugger: (11:22 - 11:49) Wow. Steve, that is such a powerful and encouraging parenting tip, really just in every phase that we know where to turn and that God is the one who actually has the power to make these prayers answered.   So, thank you for sharing that. What would you say are some wonderful aspects of your lifestyle that were not available to families who were not home educating their children?   Steve Lambert: (11:50 - 14:20) You get to see your kids come to life, to discover who they are and why they were made and to watch them learn to read and to watch them explore and discover God's amazing creation in the world around them.   You can travel with your kids. If you're homeschooling, you can take them wherever you go and you can have school in the car or school in the park or school at the lake.   My kids, instead of reading about some of the national parks and reading about some of the great museums in America, we went and we saw them firsthand and in the process we got to see them begin to blossom and figure out who they were and why they were created.   We're seeing with all that's happening today, a struggle that really so much boils down to children and teenagers and young adults having absolutely no idea who they are and they're questioning everything from their gender to their faith, to philosophy, to finances, to all those kinds of ecological issues.   They really have no idea who they are and it's because in the classroom, nobody ever teaches them.   You know, it says in Luke 6:40, "that a student is not greater than his teacher, but when he is fully trained, a student will be like his teacher."   Discipleship is really about teaching and if you're not disciplining your children, somebody is.   And in a public-school classroom, the wisdom of Dr. Luke suggests that your children will grow up to be just like their teachers and that's exactly what we're seeing in today's culture.   So, if you want to have some input, if you want to see your children blossom, I mean, there's nothing more exciting than seeing your children learn to read for the first time and it's not that difficult.   I mean, I often tell parents if you were trapped on a desert island, just you and your child, could you teach them to read?   Well, sure you could. You take a stick and you make the letter A in the sand and you'd say, this is an A and then this is a B and this is the number two and this is the number three.   There's nothing more rewarding at the end of life. And I can say this at age 73, I can say this without any reservation.   The single most important thing you can do is to trust your life to Jesus.   The second most important thing you can do is find somebody who's like-minded and marry them and make that marriage work through thick and through thin.   And the third most important thing you'll ever do is raising your children and watching them become the men and women God created and take their place in a dying culture.   Laura Dugger: (14:22 - 14:42) And you have years of wisdom journeying through being a homeschooling dad.   And so, again, I would love to hear more about your journey. So, if we go back to 1981, I'm assuming that all of the curriculum was not available that we have available today.   And so, how did you and your wife practically live this out?   Steve Lambert: (14:44 - 22:14) Well, you're right, Laura. There wasn't any of the curriculum, which in many respects was a blessing.   To be honest, there's so much material out there today. It's a little overwhelming.   If you go to some of the larger homeschool conventions, you can find as many as seven or 800 vendors there, each telling why their particular curriculum is the one that you ought to choose.   But back then there were no choices. And in fact, we contacted a couple of Christian curriculum publishers and asked to buy their materials.   And they said, "No, we can't sell you because that would upset our Christian school customers because they had the exclusive right to this material."   And so, we began with a old set of world books and a stack of children's reading books.   And I think we did go to the yard sale, and we found an American history book that was published, I think in 1943. And so, it was somewhat incomplete because it didn't explain who won World War II.   It just kind of ended in the middle of the war, but we began that journey.   And what we discovered was that God consistently brought us the tools, the resources, and the people that our children needed.   I would come home on certain days and I'd find Jane kind of crying in her bedroom and the girls crying in their bedroom.   And because they were, we were trying to replicate school at home. And that's completely the wrong direction.   Well, it turns out we didn't want school at home. We wanted homeschooling, which is an entirely different proposition.   And so, on that journey, Jane began to pray. And she said, "Lord, this is not what I had in mind for our children. I did not imagine that we would be fighting and arguing over. You will do your homework. I won't. You can't make me. Yes, I can. How can I teach my children?"   And he said, "Why don't you read to them?" And she said, "Well, I do read to them, but how can I teach them?"   And he said, "Why don't you read to them?" She said, "No, no, I understand. I love to read to them, but how do I teach them?"   And he said, "Why don't you read to them?" And so, after the third time, they began focusing more on reading aloud.   And that just naturally led to the entire world around us. It doesn't really matter what you're reading.   God gave educators and parents a secret weapon, and it's called curiosity.   And so, if you can engage that curiosity and you read them a story, it doesn't matter what three bears, and suddenly they want to know more about bears.   And how does this hibernation thing work and where do they live? And do we have any near our home?   And can you find bears? And what's the difference between a black bear and a grizzly bear? And how long do they live? And what do they eat?   And suddenly you become the guide rather than the opposing force.   Suddenly you begin to sit on the same side of the desk with your students and you go on a learning journey together, because particularly in those early years up to middle school, really the only lessons, the lesson that you really need to teach children is to fall in love with learning.   If they learn that you're home free, because they will self-direct and self-educate right on through high school, graduate school, they'll be lifelong learners.   But if you reduce education to nothing more than carrots and sticks and dangling promises and threats, they will quickly learn that learning is not fun.   And we just need to get through this as quickly as we can so that we can get on with life and the things that are truly important.   And if you doubt that, I often tell parents who are contemplating homeschooling, if you doubt that, just look in the mirror, go back and just think about, for example, your fifth grade social studies exam.   Tell me who the Norman Conqueror was. When did the Norman Conquest take place? How did that change European history?   And you'll say, wow, I remember. I've heard of the Norman Conqueror, the Norman Conquest, but honestly, I don't remember it yet.   Why not? Because honestly, I just learned it long enough to take the test. And then I forgot. And your kids are just like you. Many attribute Einstein with the saying that doing the same thing the same way and expecting some sort of a different result is insane.   So, it stands to reason if you teach your kids the same way you were taught to memorize names and dates and highlight pages and books for Friday's quiz, they'll end up with the same results.   They won't particularly be interested in learning. They won't remember 99% of all the things that you checked off your checklist that you covered with the children, but they don't remember any of it.   So, through reading, that opened the door for the girls to begin to ask questions.   And suddenly, like I said, instead of being in that tug of war, where as a parent or a teacher, you're trying to force children to memorize and regurgitate long enough to take a test, you suddenly become a resource person and you take them to the library and you take them to the natural history museum and you take them to the art gallery and you take them on nature hikes in the woods.   And one question always begets ten more. I remember that when my oldest daughter, her firstborn was about two or three and she was getting ready for bed and in the bathtub and she said, "Mama, can I ask you a question?"   And my daughter said, "No." She said, "Please, mama, just one question."   She said, "No, honey, you've already had your 472 questions for today. Mama's exhausted. Finish your bath. Let's go to bed. You can ask a question tomorrow."   She said, "Please, mama, please. Just one more question." She said, "All right, one more question. And then it's bedtime."   She goes, "Okay. So, like, how does electricity work, mom?"   So, that curiosity that God gave those children is the spark that makes homeschooling, not only a joy, but makes it infinitely doable.   Whether you dropped out of high school or whether you have a doctorate in education, if you can keep that curiosity alive, your kids are going to be great.   And let me add one other thought. We live in a world, the dean of a medical school, school of medicine at a university told me not too long ago, he said, "Do you realize that the body of knowledge of the human body doubles every year?"   We learned more in 2022 about the human body than we had learned in all of history through 2021. And he said, we get the best and the brightest, the top one tenth of 1% who come here to medical school.   And there's no way they can possibly keep up with the amount of new knowledge that's being developed.   And if you ask someone who has a doctorate in any subject, the most tempting question to ask is, so you must know pretty much everything there is to know about that.   And if they're even remotely honest, the first thing they'll say to you is, "Oh no, no, no, no. The farther we explore, the deeper we get, the more we realize we haven't even scratched the surface. There's so much we don't understand. The more we learn, the more we realize how much we yet have to learn."   And so, that's an infinite loop of getting children to begin to manage their own education. We've said for years, you know, he got the best education money could buy, or they gave him the best education.   You can't give a child an education. They're education resistant.   The child has to learn to want to know, to be hungry and thirsty to know more about the world that God created around them and how it works.   And homeschooling is a wonderful vehicle to make a lifetime learning out of your son or your daughter.   Laura Dugger: (22:15 - 28:23) And now a brief message from our sponsor.   Did you know you can go to college tuition free just by being a team member at Chick-fil-A East Peoria?   Yes, you heard that right. Free college education. 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Now, back to the show.   The more I learn about homeschooling, the more encouragement I've heard from homeschooling parents, they will talk about there is always a learning gap no matter how you were educated.   And so, I love how you're addressing that with lifelong curiosity that we will continue learning our whole life.   But you also mentioned this word, if parents are considering homeschooling, you said it's so doable.   And when you're talking about Jane hearing from the Lord, read to your children, I find that so encouraging.   That's my favorite activity to do with our girls. That was the impetus for your family launching Five in a Row.   Is that right?   Steve Lambert: (28:24 - 32:17) That is right. Over a period of time, Jane certainly did math mechanics in a math workbook, and she used some specific structured approach to phonics to teach reading.   But other than that, it was largely an open palette in which reading helped direct the course of education.   And that became something that many of her homeschool friends as the years went by found enviable.   They said, "You know, how does that work?" And she said, "Well, you just read aloud to your children, and then there's opportunities in an illustrated book to talk about the illustrations, the perspective, vanishing point, type of colors, the difference between watercolor and gouache, complementary colors on the color wheel, history, where did our story take place, what's it like, where is it on the map, what do people eat there?"   And they said, “Yeah, we don't get that.” So, she began to just really as kind of a love gift for a few girlfriends, began to write some lesson plans to go with some popular children's books.   And one thing led to another, and that was in 1994. So, this is our 29th year in publication, and I think Five in a Row has won pretty much every award that's out there, from Reader's Awards, Magazine Awards.   It's more than 100,000 families, 600,000 children have used Five in a Row in the last 29 years, and virtually no advertising.   It's almost exclusively by word of mouth, from a veteran homeschool mom pulling aside a young mom who just spent $1,300 on a massive stack of curriculum and is completely overwhelmed just three weeks into September, to say, you know what, we tried that, and we tried this, and we tried this other program, and we spent a lot of money.   And then an older mom told me about Five in a Row , let me show you how it works.   And suddenly that changes everything for so many of these young moms.   Most of the problems that new homeschoolers are facing simply are not issues at all. And the crazy part is that there are some things they ought to be worrying about, but they don't know enough yet to worry about the correct areas.   But both the obvious and the more subtle areas, God has answers.   If he's invited you to go on the homeschool journey, he has something amazing in mind for your family.   There are very few born homeschoolers, very few 15- or 16-year-old adolescent young women tell their school counselor, "You know what, I'd like to spend my life living in a two-income world on a single income and stay locked up with little people all day long without any peer support and have my mother-in-law and my sister-in-law think I'm crazy."   That's not on most young women's radars, but it begins, for most families, the same way it began for our family.   Hypothetically, honey, what would you think if, as the finger of God, the same God that said, let the waters be parted, the one that said, Lazarus, come forth, the one that said, let there be light, says, "Why don't you homeschool your kids?"   And so, you become what we often call accidental homeschoolers.   It suddenly occurs to you something that you swore you would never, ever do.   But the good news is the one who invited you is faithful. Love is a powerful motivator.   We all have stuff, and God has tried to make us deal with our stuff for years, and we've been resistant in many cases.   So, he invites us to the covenant of marriage so that we'll have a living witness to remind us of our stuff.   Honey, why do you always wait to the last minute? Honey, why do you get so upset?   And if we're still stubborn, then he invites us to have children so that we have several living witnesses.   But if we remain stiff-necked, finally he invites us to homeschool with children. And this way we have a house full of living witnesses all day long that say, "Mama, how come this and why do you do that?"   And suddenly we begin to grow in ways we never thought possible through the medium of homeschooling. It strengthens marriages.   It grows us up in Christ. It causes us to deal with our stuff.   It's amazing what it does for our children.   Laura Dugger: (32:18 - 32:44) It does seem like progressive sanctification, how the Lord has built that in within the family.   And I just appreciate how you've gone before us. And so, if someone's feeling nudged in this direction, can you paint a picture, even using Five in a Row curriculum, what kind of prep would that require for the homeschooling parent?   And what kind of schedule would their day look like?   Steve Lambert: (32:46 - 39:39) Homeschooling is essentially tutorial education, and that's always been the realm of kings and the super wealthy who hired an individual tutor for their children.   Because of homeschooling, our children can have a tutor. And tutorial education is so inherently efficient that even if you're terrible at it, your kids are going to do pretty darn well. So, when we start out, we're tempted to emulate the classroom. So, we think, well, my daughter's six.   She was going to go into first grade, so we need to start at 7:45 in the morning and we need to go until 3:45 in the afternoon with 20 minutes for lunch.   Nothing could be further from the truth. You can work with a kindergarten or first grader; 90 minutes a day is probably overkill.   So, it's something that anybody can do in their schedule, at least in those early years. And it works best when it works for you and for your children.   If your kiddo is a late-morning sleeper, trust me, they're not going to be at their best at 7:45. Don't let them sleep until 9:30. That's okay. You'll realize, for example, when you have teenagers, that they don't come to life until sometime after 11:00 p.m.   That's when they want to come into your bedroom and ask you important life questions when you're struggling to try to get to sleep.   So, first of all, you work with your children's schedule to some degree.   You work with the schedule that works for you. And you work where it works for you. If you're sick or if you're dealing with morning sickness and pregnancy, homeschool's going to happen in the bed today, kids.   Come on, gather around. We're going to read a story.   If it's a nice day, homeschooling is going to happen at the park today.   We're going to go on a nature hike. We're going to look at trees and wildlife and streams and rocks and waters.   And we're going to learn to take our paints with us.   And we're going to learn to paint the sky the way the illustrator did in our story this week that we're reading in Five in a Row.   When Jane began, she actually would take the girls to a cemetery nearby where everything was beautifully mowed and there were beautiful trees and lakes.   So, Five in a Row is built around the concept of reading a classic children's book, which Jane has selected thoughtfully and curated.   And you read it for five days in a row.   And so, on the first day, you're going to read the story aloud.   And the children just want to know how did the story ended, what happened?   A very surface, cursory reading of the story, really thinking only about the plot.   But, you know, as you go back and watch a movie the second or the third time or read a book sometimes or play the second or third time, you discover there's a whole lot more beneath the surface.   So, the first day they look at, on Mondays they do social studies.   So, they look at the setting of the story. Where did it take place?   How did people live in the 17th century? How did people live today in Japan or Australia?   How did people live along the Ohio River in the 1800s? What sort of foods did they eat? What was their language like? Let's find it on a map.   Let's learn more about it and maybe plan to cook a meal from that region or that period of history later in the week for the family.   And you can make that as complex as you want.   You can have the children make shopping lists and invitations and invite Grandma and Grandpa and help cook the meal and learn liquid and dry measure and cups and quarts and all of that and put a towel over their arm and serve the meal to Grandma and Grandpa and tell them about what they learned about Spain or Italy or France or Canada this week.   So, now you've read the story and you've learned something about what's going on in the story.   So, Tuesday, we go back and we read it a second time.   This time we look at language arts, so new vocabulary words that came up in our story this week, new creative writing techniques that maybe there was a cliffhanger that made us want to turn the page and read and see what was next or maybe the author was really great at asking questions or writing dialogue or opening sentences that create curiosity.   And so, we learned some of those techniques, and we can try them ourselves.   And even a four- or five-year-old can dictate while Mom writes down their story, and they can illustrate it later and share it with Dad.   And then on Wednesday, we look at the art. So, what did the artist teach us? What medium did they use?   Was this charcoal? Was it pen and ink? Was it watercolor or gouache? Was it oils or pastels?   How did they draw the water? Look, they drew reflections on the water. It's not just blue paper, is it?   You can see the same colors in the water that were on the shore on the opposite side.   You know what, kids? Let's get out your colored pencils or your crayons or your pastels.   Let's try drawing water more realistically the way the illustrator taught us in our story today.   And maybe learn something about famous artists who had similar styles of Degas or Renoir or Van Gogh or whoever.   Thursday, we do applied mathematics, which is not the same as math.   You're going to be doing math for 15 to 30 minutes every day in a sequential approach.   But this is about learning, you know, the difference between a square and a rectangle.   Well, they have four sides, but what's the difference? They're not all equal on the rectangle, are they?   We're going to learn, like I said, how many pints in a quart, how many quarts in a gallon.   And then on Fridays, we do science lessons. So, there's lots of opportunities in every children's book to learn more about why does the sky look blue?   Why is the grass green? Why do some things float when you put them in the water and some things sink?   And all of a sudden, you're at the kitchen sink with a stopper in it.   You fill it with water, and you've gotten a penny and a cork and a birthday candle and whatever is in the kitchen junk drawer.   And suddenly, the kids are learning about buoyancy, and they're testing things, and they're predicting their answers, learning more about the world of science and creation.   So, typical day, long story short, for a beginning homeschooler with a kindergarten-aged child, probably going to be 15, 20 minutes maybe for phonics, 15 to 20 minutes for math, which at that level is simply learning the digits and haven't even thought about adding yet.   And then another 30 open-ended minutes, 30 minutes to 90 minutes for exploring Five in a Row or whatever it is that you're reading that day.   And for some days, that might turn into two hours.   In fact, there are some days where it turns into all the way to bedtime and continues over the next two days.   If you're learning about the solar system, and suddenly that catches their attention, and they want to go to the planetarium nearby, and they want to borrow their uncle's telescope, they eat, sleep, and drink astronomy for the next two or three days.   And frankly, that's not an interruption in the curriculum. That's the answer to a prayer.   God, please help my children grow curious. Help them nurture their love of learning. Cause them to want to learn.   And sooner or later, we're going to learn about astronomy anyway, but all too often, it's while the kids are fascinated by a bug that just crawled in the room.   And so, the smart mom puts astronomy on the shelf for the moment and learns about insects. Or vice versa.   You're trying to learn about insects, and they're staring out the window looking at moons still visible in the western sky that hasn't set yet.   So, helping children learn in the proper season is another key to making it all work. It's so flexible, and it's so simple.   Laura Dugger: (39:41 - 40:33) Guess what? We are no longer an audio-only podcast.   We now have video included as well. If you want to view the conversation each week, make sure you watch our videos.   We're on YouTube, and you can access videos or find answers to any of your other questions about the podcast when you visit thesavvysauce.com.   Well, that flexibility sounds so freeing and attractive, and as you explain it, it just sounds like such a lovely educational experience.   And yet, I know a lot of homeschooling parents fear is that when their children graduate from the home, they wonder if they've done enough and how they'll perform out in, quote, the real world.   So, what was your experience as you and Jane launched your first child to college?   Steve Lambert: (40:35 - 46:24) Well, we actually sent our first one to college a week after she was 16. And to be honest, I wouldn't recommend that again for a variety of reasons.   She had a four-point-something or other GPA in college beginning at just barely 16. But being academically ready and being emotionally ready are two different things.   And so, probably, if for no other reason, we missed out on two more years of just exploring and learning together in home education.   But when she went, she was the top of her class pretty much in every subject.   Almost every study done of homeschool students by private industry and government suggests that students, on average, score about 20% higher if they were home-educated in every subject except math, where they're about the same, than their public school peers.   And it's now been more than 20 years since Harvard set out, and they kind of were one of the earliest ones to create full-time recruiters for homeschool students because universities and the marketplace are looking today for homeschoolers.   They realize that these kids are the leaders today. I saw a study of a small private university, I think in the Carolinas, if I recall, and they only had 3,000 students on campus, of which 90 were homeschooled, so 3% of the student body.   But of the 12 elected student leadership positions, student advisor to the dean, senior class president, whatever, 11 of the 12 were homeschool students.   So, even their peers recognized that these were the leaders in their community.   And we now live in a world where nobody seems to want to work. Everywhere you go, there's help-wanted signs.   And we've seen so many stories from friends and customers whose children were homeschooled who said it's a tremendous opportunity right now in the marketplace if you just show up and you're just semi-dedicated to actually doing the job.   I interviewed a guy, well, he actually came up to ask me questions after I spoke, in Chicago, as a matter of fact.   And he was the head of human resources for a large Fortune 50 company, and he said he had, I don't know, a quarter of a million employees.   And so, I asked him, I said, so this is in May, you're out recruiting, I assume.   And he says, “Yeah, I've got six recruiting teams crisscrossing American college campuses trying to recruit new employees.”   And I said, “So you're obviously looking for the highest-grade point average or highest graduating class position and competing for those students.”   He said, “No, not at all.” And I said, no? I said, “So IQ or SAT score?”   He goes, “No, none of that.” I said, “Why?” He said, “Let me tell you something.”   He said, “The average new hire costs us $70,000 to train. And this has been 15 years ago.   So, it's probably 170,000 a day. And no matter what your discipline, whether you're in sales, marketing, quality control, engineering, whatever, we're gonna spend the first year teaching you how we do it here, not how you learned it in college.   If we aren't successful in our recruiting, our company will go bankrupt. This is our largest single expense is personnel.”   And we have learned over the years that graduating class position or grade point average or SAT score IQ is totally irrelevant when it comes to determining who'll be successful in the company and who won't.   And I was a little taken aback and I said, “Well, if it's not any of those things, then you just throw darts at resumes?”   He goes, “No, no, no.” He said, “We can accurately identify these students in the most cases.” I said, “So what do you look for?” And he said, “Well, you're gonna laugh.” I said, “Maybe.” He said, “First and foremost, by far and away, the ability to get along and work well with others.”   He said, “If you can't, you're gonna get cross ways of your boss or another employee and either quit or get fired in the first six months.   The second is to be able to complete a job, see it through to completion and meet the deadline.   And number three, if you're really, really golden, the ability to work within the constraints of a budget.   Those are the things that are successful, whether you work for our company or whether you're an entrepreneur or whether you're a homemaker, whatever you do in life.”   So, with that in mind, I've spoken all over the country and encourage parents. These are things that we need to be working on. There are things that are not being worked on in the classroom.   So, look for opportunities to hand more of the education off to your students, let them plan what do I wanna study for the next two days, the next two weeks, the next two months?   Where am I gonna get the resources to discover that by the time they're in high school?   I'm gonna give you a budget to work with. There's $200, you can buy some resources, tools that you think would be useful in the process.   Where do we need to be in project management to start the process?   Where should we be by the end of week two? Where should we be by the end of the month?   These are the skills that employers are looking for and so many parents have told us that their kids have just rocketed in the marketplace.   My final question to this guy was, so are you finding bright young men and women who can do the job?   He goes, there's never been brighter, more thoroughly educated young men and women who can do the job.   He said, the problem is I can't find any who will do the job.   I can't find people who will do even four hours work for eight hours pay.   They wanna go to Starbucks, they wanna be on their cell phone, they wanna be on Facebook, they wanna be talking to their friends, taking care of their online banking, paying bills.   And so, character comes first. And if we teach our children their purpose and their place in this world, if we help them find and discover their giftedness and their aptitudes and invite them along those pathways and we increasingly turn more and more of that education over to them in the high school years where they begin to take responsibility for their own education, we're going to end up with not just capable but outstanding young men and women who can quickly take their place in our culture and rise to the very top because frankly, there's very little competition.   Laura Dugger: (46:26 - 46:36) Wow. Well, Steve, is there anything else that we haven't yet covered?   Any scriptures or stories to share that you wanna make sure we don't miss?   Steve Lambert: (46:37 - 50:16) The thing we want people to take away from all of that is not that the only way to raise your kids is to homeschool or that God doesn't approve of anything else.   The point is, listen to God and do what he said, but don't put your fingers in your ears because he often calls us to things that we really maybe didn't wanna hear and obedience is better than sacrifice.   One of my favorite stories, when our oldest daughter started to college, she went through placement counseling that summer and the placement counselor said, "You know, I don't think I've..." That was in 1991. He said, "I don't think I've ever had a student who was homeschooled."   So, that's pretty interesting. And she said, "Okay, great." And there were 30,000 students at this college and she was not only at that point, as far as we know, the only or first homeschooler, but she was also the youngest, having just turned 16 that in the middle of August.   And so, when she began, one of the prereq classes that every incoming freshman had to take was public speaking.   And she realized much to her horror that her public speaking teacher was the guy who had helped with her placement counseling earlier in the summer.   And she really didn't want anybody to know she'd been homeschooled, but she said there were returning GIs from Operation Desert Storm.   There were empty nest moms coming back to finish the degree. There were pre-med students. There were student athletes.   There were just every kind of student in that class because everybody had to take public speaking.   And he said, the very first day, the teacher said, "I'd like for everybody to give a six-minute speech on Monday. That's the best way to do this is just to jump in on whether or not you think we ought to be involved in nation building. Except for you, Ms. Lambert, and I'd like for you to give six-minute speech on what it was like to be homeschooled."   And she slunk down below her desk and tried to disappear into the floor.   And she said, "Dad, what am I gonna do?" I said, "Well, just get up and tell them."   So, she did. And she said, you know, as far as I can tell over the course of that semester, she said every single person in that class, whether they were 18 or 58, found me somewhere on the campus in the quadrangle at the library, the cafeteria, in the parking lot, and said in one way or another, their own words, "You're so lucky your parents cared enough about you to be involved in your education. I'm jealous. I'm envious. I wish my parents had been."   She said, but the one that killed me was a girl who was 18, had just graduated from a prestigious high school the previous May.   And she began to tell her story. And she said, "When I began high school four years ago, my goal was to become valedictorian of my graduating class. I've never been at a sleepover. I've never been to a, you know, skating party or, you know, movies. All I've done is study for four years. And she said, I was in AP classes all the way through and my GPA was like 4.7887. And there was this guy and his was 4.78779. And he and I competed every year in every class. And it came down to the final test and the final class and the final semester. And I beat him by two points."   And so, last May, she said, my dream came true.   And I stood on the football field and I gave the commencement address, the valedictorian address to 4,000 of my peers, their parents, civic leaders, laity, community leaders of faith. And both of my parents were too busy to attend.   She said, "I wish my parents cared and had been as involved in my education as yours were. You're very lucky."   And she said, "Dad, it just killed me to hear her story."   And I said, "I don't have any answers, honey, but our joy was raising you girls and seeing you become the people that God intended you to become."   Laura Dugger: (50:18 - 50:43) Wow, Steve, that is so powerful.   And what an incredible charge to leave each of us with to go and do likewise.   And as we wind down our time together, you are already familiar that we are called The Savvy Sauce because savvy is synonymous with practical knowledge.   And so, as my final question for you today, what is your Savvy Sauce?   Steve Lambert: (50:45 - 51:59) Read aloud, read often, read to your spouse, read to your kids.   Jane and I continue, we've been together now 57 years, and we still read aloud to one another every single day.   I read aloud to my kids still on occasion, my grandkids still, my daughters are in their 40s.   My grandkids, but that was the joy. And that's the thing that when all else fails, when your relationship is struggling, when your homeschool day is falling flat on its face, get a great book and snuggle together with your kids and read out loud.    It's in that process that their imaginations are birthed, their angst is quieted, and disagreements between spouses can suddenly be pushed aside because suddenly you're facing sorrow and you have a sword in your hand or you're coming down the Mississippi River on a riverboat or whatever it is that you, it unlocks doors that sometimes we didn't even know were locked.   So, that's the Savvy Sauce that's worked for us. Read aloud, read often, and don't let a day go by that you don't read to your children, even when your kids are 18. And if you have little ones, read to the little ones and I guarantee you the high schoolers will come around and listen to every day.   Laura Dugger: (52:00 - 52:23) I love that so much. That is wonderful.   And I have very much appreciated your insights and wisdom that you shared with us today.   So, thank you for the legacy that you and Jane have been building for years.   Thank you for being a faithful and intentional father and husband.   And thank you so much, Steve, for being my guest.   Steve Lambert: (52:24 - 52:29) Laura, it's been my pleasure. I've appreciated the opportunity. Thank you for what you do.   God bless you.   Laura Dugger: (52:29 - 55:45) Thank you. One more thing before you go. Have you heard the term gospel before?   It simply means good news. And I want to share the best news with you.   But it starts with the bad news.   Every single one of us were born sinners, but Christ desires to rescue us from our sin, which is something we cannot do for ourselves.   This means there is absolutely no chance we can make it to heaven on our own.   So, for you and for me, it means we deserve death, and we can never pay back the sacrifice we owe to be saved.   We need a Savior. But God loved us so much, he made a way for his only son to willingly die in our place as the perfect substitute.   This gives us hope of life forever in right relationship with him. That is good news. Jesus lived the perfect life we could never live and died in our place for our sin.   This was God's plan to make a way to reconcile with us so that God can look at us and see Jesus.   We can be covered and justified through the work Jesus finished if we choose to receive what He has done for us.   Romans 10:9 says, “That if you confess with your mouth Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”    So, would you pray with me now?   Heavenly Father, thank you for sending Jesus to take our place.   I pray someone today right now is touched and chooses to turn their life over to you.   Will you clearly guide them and help them take their next step in faith to declare you as Lord of their life?   We trust you to work and change lives now for eternity. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.   If you prayed that prayer, you are declaring him for me, so me for him.   You get the opportunity to live your life for him.   And at this podcast, we're called The Savvy Sauce for a reason.   We want to give you practical tools to implement the knowledge you have learned. So, you ready to get started?   First, tell someone. Say it out loud. Get a Bible.   The first day I made this decision, my parents took me to Barnes & Noble and let me choose my own Bible.   I selected the Quest NIV Bible, and I love it. You can start by reading the book of John.   Also, get connected locally, which just means tell someone who's a part of a church in your community that you made a decision to follow Christ.   I'm assuming they will be thrilled to talk with you about further steps, such as going to church and getting connected to other believers to encourage you.   We want to celebrate with you too, so feel free to leave a comment for us here if you did make a decision to follow Christ.   We also have show notes included where you can read scripture that describes this process. And finally, be encouraged.   Luke 15:10 says, “In the same way I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”   The heavens are praising with you for your decision today.   And if you've already received this good news, I pray you have someone to share it with.   You are loved and I look forward to meeting you here next time.

Can you fall in love sight unseen? To learn more about NOCD and book a free call, click this link - https://learn.nocd.com/jordantheresa Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Love Is Blind is a Netflix dating show where singles form deep connections in “the pods” by talking through a wall without ever seeing each other. If they fall in love, they get engaged sight unseen, only meeting face-to-face after the proposal. The couples then go on holiday, move in together and plan a wedding before deciding at the altar if love really is blind.In this episode, I sit down with Sarover, one of the stars from Love Is Blind UK Season 2. Sarover opens up about her journey, how she navigated cultural expectations, finding love in the pods and saying “yes” to facing a shocking breakup just three months into marriage.We dive into:

Today, Ali sits down with Jessica Bell van der Wal, founder of Frame, to talk about her deeply personal fertility journey and what ultimately led her to create a resource to better support others.Jessica talks about learning about her mother's miscarriages, growing up Catholic, and facing her own unexpected challenges when trying to conceive. She opens up about having PCOS, a mild thyroid condition, irregular cycles, and ovarian cysts, and also navigating infertility treatment with no fertility coverage. She also gets real about anxiety and shame, the loneliness of late-night Googling, and going through IUI (which ultimately led to her pregnancy). Follow on IG: @meet_frameFor more, click: www.frameyourfuture.comTOPICS COVERED IN THIS EPISODE: TTC; ART; IUI success; PCOS; thyroid condition; ovarian cysts; male factor infertility; anxiety; shameEPISODE SPONSORS: BEAUTIFUL BIRD AND WORK OF ARTAli's Children's Book Series about IVF, IUI and Family Building Through Assisted Reproductive Technology https://www.infertileafgroup.com/booksThe latest book in the Work of ART series, “Beautiful Bird” tells the story of three parents, one incredible boy and a family built with love—and a little bit of science.Order yours now! The first 150 copies will be Personalized, Signed and Numbered! Don't miss out on this limited edition! Tap the link in bio and stories to order your copy today.When Helen decides to have a baby on her own, she welcomes Jack Bird into the world through IUI with the help of her friend, Aaron. But when Jack is born and needs extra care in the NICU, Aaron and his partner, Blake, fall in love with Jack, too. Together, the three join forces to raise Jack, proving that family isn't about how you start—it's about how you grow.Order yours now at https://www.infertileafgroup.com/booksFERTILITY RALLYIG: @fertilityrallywww.fertilityrally.comNo one should go through infertility alone. Join the Worst Club with the Best Members at fertilityrally.com. We offer 5 to 6 support groups per week, three private Facebook groups, tons of curated IRL and virtual events, and an entire community of more than 500 women available to support you, no matter where you are in your journey.Join today at link in bio on IG @fertilityrally or at www.fertilityrally.com/membershipSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/infertile-af/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacySupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/infertile-af-infertility-and-modern-family-building-through-art/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Brea and Mallory talk about their most anticipated books for September and October! Email us at readingglassespodcast at gmail dot com!Reading Glasses MerchRecommendations StoreLinks -Reading Glasses Facebook GroupReading Glasses Goodreads GroupAmazon Wish ListNewsletterLibro.fmTo join our Discord channel, email us proof of your Reading-Glasses-supporting Maximum Fun membership!www.maximumfun.org/joinReadathon - 9/13Glasser Book Club Pick - The BewitchingBooks Mentioned -The Good House by Tananarive DueAnother by Paul TremblaySeptember Mother Mary Comes to Me by Arundhati RoyNonfiction, memoir, mother/daughter relationship, IndiaHot Desk by Laura DickermanRomance, book world, rival book editorsWild Reverence by Rebecca RossSet in the Divine Rivals universeAll the Way to the River by Elizabeth GilbertMemoir, love, queer, addiction, codependencyThe Secret of Secrets by Dan BrownNew Robert Langdon bookHistory Matters by David McCulloughEssay collectionAwake by Jen HatmakerMemoir, grief, divorce, infidelity, marriageWhat Can We Know by Ian McEwanSci fi, a hundred years in the future an academic searches for a mysterious poem read out loud in 2014What a Time to Be Alive by Jade ChangGrieving broke young woman accidentally become viral self help guruIt's Me They Follow by Jeannine CookMagical realism, bookstore owner helps people find love through books but is lonely herselfBest Woman by Rose DommuLiterary fiction, family dramedy, coming-of-age, trans protagonist, wedding dramaThe Wilderness by Angela FlournoyLiterary fiction, female friendship across 25 yearsVianne by Joanne HarrisSequel to ChocolatWhatever Happened to Lori Lovely? by Sarah McCoyLiterary fiction, 1950s actress leaves to become a nunLife and Death and Giants by Ron RindoLiterary fiction, teenage boy who is almost eight feet tall and changes people who meet himThe Healing Hippo of Hinode Park by Michiko Aoyama, translated by Takami NiedaLiterary fiction, feel good, Japan, people get emotionally healed by a hippo ride at a playgroundWe Love You, Bunny by Mona AwadWeird fiction, both prequel and sequel to BunnyOne of Us by Dan ChaonHorror, historical, 1915, orphaned twins on the run join a carnivalDinner at the Night Library by Hika Harada, translated by Philip GabrielLiterary, Japan, food, Tokyo library/cafe that is only open at night and serves meals inspired by books by dead authorsA Different Kind of Tension by Jonathan LethemShort stories, literary, surreal, specificWill There Ever Be Another You by Patricia LockwoodLiterary, woman with strange disease starts to lose grip on reality in pandemicLittle Movements by Lauren MorrowLiterary, race, class, art, small town, choreographySympathy Tower Tokyo by Rie Qudan, translated by Jesse KirkwoodSci fi, Japan, near future, architect designing a skyscraper for housing criminals becomes friends with chatbotThe Killer Question by Janice HallettMystery, amateur sleuth must solve a murder set during pub trivia, clubs are revealed through trivia questions, texts, and emailsA Killer Wedding by Joan O'LearyMystery, matriarch of ultra-rich Irish family is found dead at expensive weddingA Murderous Business by Cathy PegauMystery, queer, historical, NYCA Rather Peculiar Poisoning by Chrystal SchleyerHistorical cozy mystery, turn of the century, two brothers vie for the same woman, one gets poisonedThe Librarians by Sherry ThomasMystery, four librarians band together after two patrons show up deadThe Belles by Lacey N. DunhamThriller, dark academia, historical, 1950s, secluded collegeOld Money by Kelsey MillerThriller, returning to a small town twenty years later to solve murder of family memberHot Wax by M. L. RioThriller, rock and roll, road tripWitch You Would by Lia AmadorContemporary romance, paranormal, low stakes, witchesSweet Heat by Bolu BabalolaContemporary romance, second chance, wedding dramaThe Austen Affair by Madeline BellParanormal romance, feuding stars of an Austen film adaptation accidentally travel back in timeIt Seemed Like a Good Idea by Lauren BlakelyContemporary romance, small town, rom com, grumpy/sunshine, bodyguard, mistaken identity, forbidden romance, only one bedEvery Step She Takes by Alison CochrunQueer contemporary romance, travel, Portugal, sapphic, “practice” relationship that turns realIt Had to be Him by Adib KhorramGay contemporary romance, spicy, second chance, former classmates reuniting in ItalyLady Like by Mackenzi LeeHistorical queer romance, Regency, two women vying for the same duke fall in love with each otherThe Most Unusual Haunting of Edgar Lovejoy by Roan ParrishGay contemporary romance, New Orleans, low stakes, ghosts, toasty, hauntsBy the Horns by Ruby DixonSecond book in Royal Artifactual Guild seriesWitch of the Wolves by Kaylee ArcherRomantasy, witches, werewolves, Victorian, enemies to loversSpellcaster by Jaymin EveRomantasy, slow burn, dark academia, enemies to lovers, spicy, magicWhat Fury Brings by Tricia LevensellerRomantasy, spicy, princess in matriarchal fantasy world must kidnap a husband to become queenThe Shattering Peace by John ScalziOld Man's War, book 7A Ruin, Great and Free by Cadwell TurnbullThe Convergence Saga, book 3The First Thousand Trees by Premee MohamedAnnual Migration of Clouds, book 3Sunward by William AlexanderLow stakes sci fi, found family, space, courier training androidsExtremity by Nicholas BingeSci fi horror, time travel, police procedural, end of the world, Philip K Dick meets True DetectiveThief of Night by Holly BlackSequel to Book of NightThe Formidable Miss Cassidy by Meihan BoeyFantasy, horror, supernatural creatures, historical, Singapore, governessFate's Bane by C.L. ClarkNovella, sapphic romantasy, tragic, adventure, warring clansA Land So Wide by Erin A. CraigHistorical romantasy, gothic, Scottish fairytale retelling, Canadian wildernessThe Macabre by Kosoko JacksonQueer horror, art history, gay, fantasy, cursed paintingsSaltcrop by Yume KitaseiSci fi, cli fi, dystopian, two sisters on search for thirdThe Maiden and Her Monster by Maddie MartinezSapphic romantasy, Jewish folklore, gothic horror, golemsThe Faerie Morgana by Louisa MorganFantasy, Morgan le Fay reimaginingThe Summer War by Naomi NovikFantasy novella, young witch trying to undo spellAmong the Burning Flowers by Samantha ShannonFantasy, prequel to Priory of the Orange TreeUncharmed by Lucy Jane WoodRomantasy, low stakes, witches, found familyAcquired Taste by Clay McLeod ChapmanHorror, short storiesThe Autumn Springs Retirement Home Massacre by Philip FracassiHorror, funny, final girl, slasherSpread Me by Sarah GaileyHorror, erotic, novella, sci fi, mysterious specimen in remote lab breaks freePlay Nice by Rachel HarrisonHorror, haunted houseFiend by Alma KatsuHorror, powerful family with evil secretsWe Are Always Tender with Our Dead by Eric LaRoccaHorror, queer, small town, New England, violence, goreGalloway's Gospel by Sam RebeleinHorror, cult, small townWhy I Love Horror by Becky SpratfordNonfiction anthology with essays about horrorThe October Film Haunt by Michael WehuntHorror, cult horror movie, filmmakingYou Weren't Meant to be Human by Andrew Joseph WhiteQueer horror, Alien meets MidsommarWhat Stalks the Deep by T. KingfisherSworn Soldier, book 3I Want to Be Where the Song Is by Mary J. BligeMemoirStill Bobbi by Bobbi BrownMemoir, makeup industryThe Improbable Victoria Woodhull: Suffrage, Free Love, and the First Woman To Run for President by Eden CollinsworthWomen's historyArticulate: A Deaf Memoir of Voice by Rachel Renee KolbMemoirLin-Manuel Miranda: The Education of an Artist by Daniel Pollack-PelznerBiographyTruly by Lionel RichieMemoirNight People: How To Be a DJ in '90s New York City by Mark RonsonMemoirSuper Natural: How Life Thrives in Impossible Places by Alex RileyScience, creatures who live in extreme environmentsReplaceable You: Adventures in Human Anatomy by Mary RoachScience, human bodyOctoberThe Irish Goodbye by Heather Aimee O'NeillLiterary fiction, sisters returning home, Long Island, family secretsOverdue by Stephanie PerkinsLiterary fiction, librarian protagonist, couple agrees to a month of dating other people before they get marriedTom's Crossing by Mark Z. DanielewskiEpic Western, 1980s, Utah, two friends determined to rescue a pair of horsesThe Devil is a SouthpawLiterary fiction, story within a story, teen escaping from a detention centerWe'll Prescribe You Another Cat by Syou Ishida, translated by E. Madison ShimodaSequelBad Bad Girl by Gish JenAuto-fiction, mother-daughter relationship, China, moving to USSoyangri Book Kitchen by Jee-hye Kim, translated by Shanna TanLiterary fiction, woman opens bookstore/cafe and transforms communityHeart the Lover by Lily KingPrequel/sequel to Writers and LoversThe Lucky Ride by Yasushi Kitagawa, translated by Takami NiedaMagical realism, a depressed man takes a magical taxi that changes his lifeThe Land of Sweet Forever by Harper LeeShort stories, essay collectionBog Queen by Anna NorthLiterary fiction, forensic anthropologist investigates strange ancient body found in bogMinor Black Figures by Brandon TaylorLiterary fiction, NYC, queer, Blackness, art worldMenu of Happiness by Hisashi Kashiwai, translated by Jesse KirkwoodKamogawa Food Detectives, book 3We Had a Hunch by Tom RyanMystery, 3 former famous teen detectives return home to solve a new murderMockingbird Court by Juneau BlackShady Hollow, book 6Mirage City by Lev AC RosenEvander Mills, book 4The Wayfinder by Adam JohnsonHistorical fiction, Polynesian Islands, young girl on quest to save her peopleChristmas at the Women's Hotel by Daniel M. LaverySequel to Women's HotelThe Women of Artemis by Hannah LynnGreek retelling, Amazon warriors building an army to fight abusive menI am Cleopatra by Natasha SolomonsCleopatra reimaginingThe Haunting of Paynes Hollow by Kelley ArmstrongHorror, strange inheritance, lakefront cottage, secrets, something in lakeThe Unveiling by Quan BarryHorror, survival horror, film scout on cruise to Antarctic, gets stuckGirl Dinner by Olivie BlakeHorror, dark academia, exclusive sorority with secretsHerculine by Grace ByronHorror, woman stalked by malevolent force flees to commune of trans women in IndianaThe Last Witch by C.J. CookeHistorical horror, 1400s Austria, witchcraft, witch huntsIf the Dead Belong Here by Carson FaustHorror, Indigenous Southern gothic, family ghosts, search for missing kidKing Sorrow by Joe HillHorror, dark academia, rare book thief, dragon who wants bloodCrafting for Sinners by Jenny KieferHorror, queer, religious cult, craftingThe Hong Kong Widow by Kristen LoeschHistorical horror, 1950s Hong Kong, competition between mediums in a haunted houseFutility by Nuzo OnohHorror, Nigeria, women summoning spirit to get revenge on bad menHer Wicked Roots by Tanya PellHorror, queer reimagining of Rappaccini's DaughterThe Graceview Patient by Caitling StarlingHorror, autoimmune disease, experimental medical trial at weird hospitalNowhere Burning by Catriona WardHorror, abandoned ranch of infamous movie star becomes refuge for teen runaways…but with a priceThe Salvage by Anbara SalamHorror, historical, gothic, Scotland, haunted shipwreckThe Devil She Knows by Alexandria BellefleurSapphic paranormal romance, deal with a sexy demonMate by Ali HazelwoodSequel to BrideWhen I Picture You by Sasha LaurensQueer contemporary romance, sapphic, music, forced proximity, workplace romanceJulia Song is Undateable by Susan LeeContemporary romance, high powered CEO hires dating coachThirsty by Lucy LehaneGay vampire romance, rom-com, screwball comedy, enemies to loversCover Story by Mhairi McFarlaneContemporary romance, fake dating, office cultureDealing with a Desperate Demon by Charlotte SteinParanormal romance, bookstore owner, demon, magicAnd Then There Was the One by Martha WatersHistorical romance, 1930s England, murder mysteryOur Vicious Oaths by N.E. DavenportRomantasy, magic, political intrigue, enemies to loversThe Ordeals by Rachel GreenlawRomantasy, elite magical college, deadly trials, dark academia, supernatural creaturesCinder House by Freya MarskeRomantasy, queer, Gothic romance, sapphic, Cinderella retellingThe Isle in the Silver Sea by Tasha SuriRomantasy, historical, sapphic, medieval folklore, Britain, knight and witchAlchemy of Secrets by Stephanie GarberFantasy, romantasy, dark academia, historical, Los Angeles, magicThe Everlasting by Alix E. HarrowFantasy, romance, genre-bendy, reluctant lady knight and historian travel through time to rewrite their fatesWhen They Burned the Butterfly by Wen-yi LeeFantasy, sapphic, reimagining of the secret societies of postcolonial SingaporeAll That We See or Seem by Ken LieSci fi thriller, hacking, technology, virtual reality mysteryRed City by Marie LuFantasy, romance, alternative Los Angeles, magic warfare, dystopiaWitches of Dubious Origin by Jenn McKinlayLow stakes fantasy, books, witches, magic, New EnglandThe Women of Wild Hill by Kirsten MillerFantasy, modern day witches waging war on the patriarchyPsychopomp and Circumstance by Eden RoyceFantasy, Southern gothic, historical, post Reconstruction, family funeral dramaKill the Beast by Serra SwiftFantasy, The Witcher meets Howl's Moving CastleQueen Demon by Martha WellsRising World, book 2A Mouthful of Dust by Nghi VoSinging Hills, book 6The Uncool by Cameron CroweMemoirVagabond by Tim CurryMemoirFuture Boy: Back to the Future and My Journey through the Space-Time Continuum by Michael J. Fox and Nelle FortenberryMemoirJoyride by Susan OrleanMemoir, creativityPride and Pleasure: The Schuyler Sisters in an Age of Revolution by Amanda VaillHistoryThe Man of Many Fathers by Roy Wood Jr.MemoirQueer Enlightenments: A Hidden History of Lovers, Lawbreakers, and Homemakers by Anthony DelaneyHistoryThe Zorg: A Tale of Greed and Murder That Inspired the Abolition of Slavery Siddharth KaraLetter from Japan by Marie Kondo and Marie IidaNonfiction, Japanese customs that inspired Kondo's philosophy

As Fr. Mark-Mary mentioned, the friars will be taking a meaningful break to embrace the rest and the joy of the Jubilee Year. While they are away, please enjoy listening (or re-listening) to this previously released episode, and join us in continuing to pray for Fr. Mark-Mary, Fr. Innocent, Fr. Angelus, and Fr. PT as they follow God's will and heed the call of the Jubilee. The Poco a Poco podcast happens because of many generous donors, including recurring monthly donations of any amount. Thinking about helping out? You can give at https://spiritjuice.org/supportpoco. Thank you! --- What makes us most free, is this submitting to God and this dependence on Him.  Yes, freedom is actually dependent on obedience rather than kind of doing whatever I want. When we fall in love with God and we experience that love, this deep interior freedom takes place and it becomes the most important thing of our lives—even to a point that is greater than our circumstances. This episode is the first part of our series on Interior Freedom by Fr. Jacque Philippe that talks about what it means to live in freedom as sons and daughters of God and how this freedom can become greater than the circumstances of our lives.We cannot grow in freedom unless we grow in faith, hope and love—that's the recipe for freedom. Faith, hope and love are the three theological virtues that connect us to God. As Christians, we are people who believe in God, hope everything from Him, and want to love Him with all their hearts and to love their neighbors. This episode is the third part of our series on Interior Freedom by Fr. Jacque Philippe that talks about the key role of theological virtues in acquiring internal freedom with a particular focus on the importance of Hope. An invitation to freedom for those who feel defeated and those who might've lost a sense of hope in the Lord.