Podcasts about judging you

Today we bring you another story told live on stage at the Flagstaff Festival of Science in September 2024. This story is by Dr. Jane Marks. Her story is called Saving Fossil Creek. What's cool about this story is how expertly the narrator weaves the personal in with the science. THAT is how a narrator builds trust. It's how listeners understand how their actions impact the greater world. It's how we, as a society, will change our behaviors because the information becomes more than just statistics. The personal draws us in so we begin to trust one scientist at a time.Three years ago, we were hired by Dr. Jane Marks and Dr. Bruce Hungate, two famous ecologists from ECOSS Center for Ecosystem Science and Society (ECOSS) at Northern Arizona University. at Northern Arizona University. They heard our podcast and then started taking our classes which led to the idea that their students would benefit from taking our classes. So we've been doing online workshops and in-person workshops to help these scientists personalize their stories. The stories are amazing. I have learned so much about science through their stories in a way that brings me in. This is our second year collaborating with the The scientists are so smart and they are trying to save our planet and we get to help them reach more people by personalizing their message. Dr. Jane Marks, is a conservation ecologist and professor of Aquatic Ecology at Northern Arizona University (NAU). She was featured as the lead scientist in the PBS documentary, A River Reborn: The Restoration of Fossil Creek, narrated by actor Ted Danson and she co-produced the video documentary Parched: The Art of Water in the Southwest. For more Jane Marks, go to https://ecoss.nau.edu/team/jane-marks/. Also, check out her previous episodes: Episode 149: "How to Make Your Writing More Personal in any Field and Episode 167: "Even Though I'm Judging You, Don't Judge Me for Being a Chopper Mom.” If you're looking for a writing coach to help your student with college application essays, contact Allison Langer.Writing Class Radio is hosted by Allison Langer and Andrea Askowitz. Audio production by Matt Cundill, Evan Surminski, and Aiden Glassey at the Sound Off Media Company. Theme music is by Justina Shandler.There's more writing class on our website including stories we study, editing resources, video classes, writing retreats, and live online classes. Join our writing community by following us on Patreon. If you want to write with us every week, you can join our First Draft weekly writers group. Join Allison on Tuesdays 12-1 ET. You'll write to a prompt and share what you wrote. If you're a business owner, community activist, group that needs healing, entrepreneur, or scientist and you want to help your team write better, check out all the classes we offer on our website, writingclassradio.com.Join the community that comes together for instruction, an excuse to write, and the support from other writers. To learn more, go to www.Patreon.com/writingclassradio. Or sign up HERE for First Draft for a FREE Zoom link.There's no better way to understand ourselves and each other, than by writing and sharing our stories. Everyone has a story. What's yours?See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Dr. Khwaja Moinuddin grew up in India with what he calls a “normal childhood”. He attended high school and then received his bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering in his home town. With some convincing and soul searching he then came to the United States and attended Texas Tech university where he obtained his Master's degree and began working toward obtaining a PhD. Khwaja tells us about his time at Texas Tech including how, when funding grew hard to get, he overcame his fears and adversity and found a job that helped him stay in school. Even so, while working on his Doctorate degree he secured a job with 3M and, as he tells us, he learned a lot and even today he is grateful for the opportunities he had at this company. Eventually, however, under the advice of others he did finish his PhD, but not in Mechanical Engineering as such.   Khwaja began learning about organizations, how they worked, why often they didn't work well and he developed ways to help people at all levels of organizations learn how to stop being so resistive to change and thus develop more positive attitudes and constructive methods of accomplishing tasks.   We get to hear much wisdom from Khwaja on leadership, resistance to change and how to better accomplish tasks by being more open to new ideas. This episode is a MUST for everyone if you are at all open to learning some new ideas and growing to be better in whatever you do at work, in life and at play.       About the Guest:   Dr. Khwaja Moinuddin is a renowned leader in Continuous Improvement, Change Management, and Business Transformation, with over 22 years of hands-on experience driving measurable impact across diverse industries. His mission is clear: to help organizations embed a culture of excellence, resilience, and continuous learning - not as a temporary initiative, but as a way of working. Whether leading large-scale change programs, coaching executives, or transforming operational models, he has built a reputation for delivering tangible business results and lasting cultural shifts. With deep expertise in Continuous Improvement, Change Leadership, and Robotic Process Automation (RPA), Dr. Moinuddin partners with organizations to challenge the status quo, eliminate inefficiencies, and create high-performing teams. He has worked across multiple industries, functions, and global markets, collaborating with executive leaders, middle managers, and frontline employees to break down silos and drive sustainable transformation. His holistic approach ensures that strategy, execution, and people engagement work in tandem, because real change happens when employees at every level take ownership of improvement. A passionate thought leader and author, Dr. Moinuddin has distilled his years of experience into two books that serve as practical guides for transformation:   "I.N.S.P.I.R.E. - An Adaptive Change Excellence Model and Guide of the people, for the people, by the people" – A framework for leading people-centered, high-impact change initiatives. "Are You (Really) Listening?: Decoding the Secrets of Unheard Conversations" – A deep dive into the power of listening as a critical leadership and change management skill.   Dr. Moinuddin's philosophy is simple: transformation is not about tools, it's about people, mindset, and discipline. If your organization is struggling with change fatigue, leadership misalignment, or resistance to new ways of working, he can help you turn obstacles into opportunities and create a culture where excellence thrives. Let's connect and explore how we can drive real, measurable business impact, together!     Dr. Khwaja Moinuddin's journey is a testament to the power of perseverance, continuous learning, and an unstoppable mindset. Born and raised in a simple middle-class family in Pondicherry, India, a former French colony - he completed his schooling and earned a Bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering before moving to the U.S. to pursue his Master's in Industrial Engineering. At Texas Tech University, he excelled academically, achieving a 4.0/4.0 GPA in his major (Manufacturing) and an overall GPA of 3.83/4.0. While pursuing his degree, he also worked as an intern for Rhodia Inc., a chemicals manufacturing company, gaining valuable hands-on industry experience. Khwaja began his career as an Industrial Engineer with 3M, where he learned the foundations for his expertise in Continuous Improvement (CI) and Change Leadership. Over the years, he obtained multiple professional certifications, including Lean Six Sigma Master Black Belt, Certified Change Practitioner, Certified Prince2 Practitioner and Certified Scrum Master. His career took him across the globe, leading large-scale transformation initiatives in world-renowned organizations such as Ocean Spray Cranberries, Shell, Maersk, GARMCO, HSBC, and PDO (Petroleum Development Oman). Despite a demanding global career, Khwaja pursued his passion for learning, earning a Doctorate in Management Studies and a second Master's degree in Psychology while working full-time. His belief "To Learn is to Breathe" has shaped his leadership philosophy, helping organizations embrace change, embed a culture of excellence, and achieve breakthrough results. Beyond his professional accomplishments, Khwaja is a devoted husband and father. He fell in love with and married his wife, Sangeetha, while in the U.S., and together they have a 15-year-old son, Tanish. They now reside in Chennai, India. Dr. Khwaja travels frequently for his consulting work, and he continues to inspire businesses, leaders, and professionals to transform their organizations, and themselves - with an unstoppable mindset.   Ways to connect with Dr. Khwaja:   https://www.processexcellencenetwork.com/contributor/khwaja-moinuddin https://www.journeytowardsexcellence.com/ https://www.khwajamoinuddin.com/ https://www.journeytowardsexcellence.com/ https://www.khwajamoinuddin.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 ** 01:20 Well, hello again, everyone. I am your host once again. Michael hingson, and you are listening to unstoppable mindset. We're really glad you're with us, wherever you happen to be in the world, and wherever we happen to be talking in the world. And today we're actually talking to Dr Khwaja Moinuddin from India. So it's a long distance boy signals travel a lot faster today than they did when we used covered wagons or Coney pony expresses. So I'm really grateful for the fact that we get to use Zoom and computers and do things in such a meaningful way. So anyway, here we are. Kwaja has written two books, and I know he's going to tell us about those, so I'm not going to give a lot of that away. He has been a transformational leader. He also has a background in mechanical engineering, and that fascinates me, because it seems to me, it's interesting going from mechanical engineering to being a transformational subject matter expert and expert by any standard. So I'm going to be curious to hear about that. But anyway, meanwhile, Khwaja, I want to welcome you to unstoppable mindset, and thank you for being here.   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 02:28 Thank you. Thank you, Michael, it's, it's indeed an honor to be on your podcast. And you know, as as we have been discussing, I'm no expert by any means. I have just gathered years and years of experience, 22 plus years of experience, and I'm still learning and continuous improvement, transformation. It's an ocean. So the more you know I learn, the more I feel like I don't know much. Yes, there is to learn, yes.   Michael Hingson ** 03:05 Well, I know exactly what you're saying. I think if we stop learning, then we have really let ourselves down and let the world down. We need to continue to learn. And I very much enjoy doing this podcast, because I get to learn so much from so many people. It's really a lot of fun. So I want to again, thank you for being here and looking forward to all that we get to talk about today. So let's get to it. I'd like to learn a little bit about maybe the early Khwaja Growing up and so on. Tell us a little bit about you growing up in India and so on.   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 03:38 Yep, I'm from a very small town in Pondicherry called Pondicherry in in India, the closest big city is Chennai. It's about 160 kilometers south of Chennai. It used to be a former French colony. Now the place has been changed. I mean, the name has been changed from Pondicherry to Puducherry. But growing up, I'm the youngest of two kids. I have a brother. He's four years older than me, and my parents were typical middle class, lower middle class, both working parents. They worked really, really hard to put me and my brother through to school. They took care of us, they protected us. So I'm really grateful for my parents, my mom, my dad and my brother also could be quite me, you know, when I was young. So I'm really grateful to my family, because we were just the four of us in our family. Growing up, I went to a public school, initially, I went to a private school, and. Uh, but then my parents couldn't afford the fees, so we moved to public school, and I did all my schooling and my bachelor's in mechanical engineering in Pondicherry. So born and brought up in Pondicherry, which was a small fishing village, didn't know much about the real world until, you know, I graduated and stepped out of India for the very first time to go to the US to do my master's degree. My childhood was, was, was normal, you know, on a living on a on a coast. So I really enjoyed living near the beach. We didn't live very far away from the beach, just maybe, you know, maybe 100, 200 meters away from the beach. Growing up, I had a lot of friends, so we would be, would take our bicycles and and, you know, ride all over the town because it, you know, it wasn't as crazy as it is now with all the traffic and stuff, it was less congested. And the good thing about Pondicherry, an interesting fact is, because it was designed by the French, all the streets in Pondicherry are at right angles to each other. So you would never get lost if you are in Pondicherry, in the middle of the Pondicherry, because wherever you go, if you take a right turn and another right turn and another right turn, you will end up at the same place. So you will never get lost. That's an interesting fact in Pondicherry. How about Pondicherry?   Michael Hingson ** 06:39 So it certainly is a whole lot easier to travel around pontichery than it is to travel around Washington DC by any standard, I think. So yes, there's a lot of Angular streets and streets that go in different directions in Washington. So yeah, I think I'd like pot of cherry that's pretty good. So did you learn to fish?   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 07:03 Not, not, yeah. I mean, I did learn how to fish, but more swimming. Used to go to the ocean almost every day. You know, I think I practically spent a lot of time on the beach with my friends and in the playgrounds. Our playgrounds used to be huge growing up, unlike now, they have become so small and condensed with all the, you know, development, the real estate that's growing in India, in Pondicherry and in India in general. But, but yeah, I did learn how to fish, you know, not using, like a fishing rod in the in the US, but using, you know, the the fishing, the the thread, you know, the nylon wire, fishing net, yeah, yeah. Not, not the net, but the wire, just was the single wire,   Michael Hingson ** 07:58 well, so you what, what got you into mechanical engineering?   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 08:05 Well, you know, as, as all of my fellow Indians would say, in India, you are either an engineer or a doctor first. So, so I really had no choice. I had to become an engineer or a doctor. I didn't score enough to become a doctor, so I naturally became an engineer. But since I have to become an engineer, I was looking at, you know, all the different fields of engineering. What fascinated me was, you know, the field of mechanical engineering, because I heard from several of my friends and colleagues that mechanical engineering is an evergreen field, and typically, mechanical engineers can fit anywhere. And they were really, really they were, they were 100% correct. And I'm glad I chose mechanical engineering and I really liked my subject, because that what I am today would not be if I hadn't learned about mechanical engineering. Well.   Michael Hingson ** 09:07 So you, you got your bachelor's degree, but then you, as you said, you stepped out and you, you actually came to the United States and went to Texas Tech to do your advanced degree. What made you do that? That's moving a long way from home, yep.   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 09:23 So some of my my my friends and my seniors, also, when I was doing my mechanical engineering, they were talking about something called as a GRE or a TOEFL. It sounded Greek, like Greek and Latin to me. I didn't know what it was. I had no intention of going to the US initially. My intention was to get a job and earn a lot of money and and I was almost done studying at that point of time, you know, learning subjects like thermodynamics and lot of advanced mechanics. Engineering stuff for four years really wears you out. But my my seniors and and my cousin also, and my uncles and a lot of my relatives, they said, you know, if you don't do your masters now, and if you go straight away to work, you may not have the inclination to learn more. So they really, they really prompted me or nudged me to do my Masters also, and and my mom, of course, she has been a great, great, great driving force behind me. She She encouraged me to always, always, always learn. She herself has, you know, so many degrees I cannot, I don't even know how many degrees she has. She has master's degrees and Bachelor's degrees in in, you know, all sorts of areas. And to this day, you know, she she keeps learning, and she has been a teacher for about 45 years now. So so my mom, along with my relatives and my friends. They said, You know, you need to study more so. So, you know, I had actually got a job, you know, in my fourth year. And I got a job through on campus interviews, you know, like a career fair in the in the US, similar to a career fair in the US. So I gave up that job and I wrote GRE and TOEFL. I worked hard. Got I did not get like flying colors, but I got, I got good grades in GRE and TOEFL, and then I applied to universities. Initially I was going to be an aerospace engineer, but then my friends also told me that maybe that's a difficult field to get a job in in future, because it requires, you know, us, security clearance and stuff. So you're you're better off doing something which is related to mechanical engineering, or even mechanical engineering. I didn't want to go too much into technical stuff, so I explored industrial engineering, and I found, you know, the courses and all that stuff were really to my liking and to my interest. So, so then I chose industrial engineering and Texas Tech specifically because of the industrial engineering program they had. So then and, and that's one, one thing led to another. And then I landed in Texas Tech University.   Michael Hingson ** 12:26 Well, that must have been fun. So you had lots of new experiences. You learned about football and all sorts of other things in addition to your academic studies. Yes,   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 12:36 yes. Red Raiders. Go Red Raiders. Yeah, right.   Michael Hingson ** 12:40 Well, and I, I went to UC Irvine. I don't know, I still don't know if we have a much of a football team today. We have a good basketball team, but go anteaters anyway. So it's, it is interesting how our lives change and how we end up, how God gives us different opportunities? And then, of course, the issue really is us taking those opportunities and moving forward with them. When you You certainly did. You stepped out and you moved to the United States, you went to Texas Tech, you got your bachelor's, and where did you get your PhD?   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 13:19 So I got my master's from Texas Tech, and I was, I also started to do my PhD in industrial engineering in Texas Tech, but unfortunately, I didn't finish, because the the department ran out of funding, and I had to search for a job. So I started to, I got my job in 3m as an industrial engineer. But I also did an internship in another company called Rodia, which is a chemicals manufacturing company. But then, you know, while I was doing, while I was, you know, still pursuing my full time job, I really wanted to go back to Texas Tech and complete my PhD, because I had completed all my coursework, except for the which was the dissertation which was pending. And you know, at that time, one of the professors told me, quadra, try and complete your PhD, otherwise you will regret it. I still remember his words to this day. I should have, you know, looking back, I should have stayed back in Texas Tech and finished my PhD. I should have, you know, borrowed some more money and finished my PhD in industrial engineering in Texas Tech. But nevertheless, what I did is I did my doctorate, professional doctorate in management studies in Indian School of Business Management. So slightly different. But, you know, I didn't, I didn't actually want to go for an MBA. So I want I did the doctorate in management studies because I was more interested in organizational behavior, operations. Management in that field. So I got it in 2012   Michael Hingson ** 15:07 Wow. So you, you, you did complete it, even though, again, it went in a slightly different direction. But what was your interest that that took you into a little bit more of a business oriented environment, because you had clearly been in mechanical engineering and in that discipline for most of your studies.   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 15:25 Yes, yes. So, you know, when I was doing my master's degree in Industrial Engineering, you know, and I got interested in continuous improvement, lean, Six Sigma, transformation, change management in that field, more as I was doing my masters in industrial engineering. And then when I got my first job in in 3m 3m is a great company, as you know, you know, I learned all the basics of my lean, Six Sigma change management, you know, hands on in 3m and I'm still grateful to this day that my very first job was in 3am actually, it's a funny story, because, you know, I got the job in 3m on the same day I was interviewed. So the I was very lucky. I think the the line manager really liked me, and he said, kwaja, I'm going to hire you on the spot. So I was, I was really, really, you know, ecstatic on that day, and I still remember that feeling to this day, yes. So what interested me to coming back to your question was when I was working in 3m they have a good mentorship program. So they asked me, you know, how do you want your career to be? You know, where do you see yourself in five years? In 10 years? In 15 years? How do you see yourself growing? And I said, I want to grow in the technical field. I want to become like a subject matter expert in Lean, Six Sigma, Black Belt, Master, Black Belt. And I want to grow in the technical field. And I remember the mentor, she told me, kwaja, while that's a good thought, but you will not grow much if you are purely technical, you will grow more if you combine your technical expertise with management, how to lead people, how to manage people, how to do change management with people so she actually, you know, planted the seed in me to do more of, you know, people management role. And for that, she prompted me to do more courses in people management, leading teams, how to work and collaborate with, you know, cross functional teams. And that interested me, and I started to search for courses that would give me that exposure. And then, you know, given the fact that also I took some courses in my master's, or when I was doing my PhD in industrial engineering, it prompted me more to move away from technical rather than getting a PhD in industrial engineering, to do adopt rate in management studies. And hence I, you know, slightly moved into the people management, operations management, into the softer stuff of managing people and getting stuff done through people, through others.   Michael Hingson ** 18:14 Well, nothing, nothing wrong with that. I know my background was in physics. But along the way, there came a time that I was confronted with an opportunity to take a job that wasn't directly related to physics, and I chose to do it. But out of that, I ended up being put in a situation once where I had to make a choice to either go find a new job or change from doing kind of human factors studies and other things related to a product going in instead into sales, and I chose to go into sales, but my reasoning was, It's difficult enough for blind people to get jobs. Finding a new job would be really a challenge, whereas an opportunity was being offered, and it was a good opportunity, so I accepted it. So again, I know that many times we do find that there is a an opportunity that comes along that maybe we don't expect, and if we take it, it's the right way to go.   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 19:14 Yes indeed. And your story has been fascinating, Michael, to be honest with you, it has been, you know, it's very inspirational. Your story, me and my wife, we were sharing, you know, how you how you overcame adversity, that's really, really, really inspirational.   Michael Hingson ** 19:33 Well, thank you. And I, I appreciate that. And you know, to me, it's just how we live life, and we sometimes we're presented with challenges and and we have to deal with those challenges, which is, of course, our role, and if we don't, then we're the losers for doing it. Well, in your case, did you ever have a defining moment or a situation where, if, since we call this unstoppable mindset, where. Kind of a mindset really affected you and to help you through it.   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 20:05 Yeah. I mean, many, many, many, many situations, there's never a dull day in continuous improvement, so it's full of challenges. Always, always. You know, in every organization I have worked for, there have been challenges in terms of, you know, how to deploy continuous improvement, how to take people with you in the journey of continuous improvement. But one of the things you know early on, when I was doing my my master's degree, is, you know, I think that that laid the foundation also for me to become more resilient and more adaptable. You know, when, when my department said they didn't have funding I wanted to, and this was, you know, when, when I was doing my master's degree, not, not, you know, when I went into my PhD, when I was doing my master's degree, after a semester, they said they didn't have enough funding. So a lot of my colleagues, you know, those who are in engineering, whether mechanical or industrial or or chemical or petroleum engineering, they would they were searching for jobs. I think it was the summer of 2001 and since it was summer, a lot of professors were on were on vacation, and I went door to door, knocking on every professor's, you know, Office, Office door. And almost everybody you know, kind of, you know, either shoot me away or said, you know, we don't have funding. Or, you know, their doors were closed because they were on vacation. So one of the, one of the things I did, you know, you know, I was very, very frustrated. I couldn't sleep. So I thought, What am I doing? What am I doing? What am I doing wrong here? Why am I not getting the funding. Why am I not getting a research assistantship? So as I was laying on my on my bed that that night, one evening, I thought to myself, and an idea came to me, why don't I go into Texas Tech University's Health Sciences Center, which is slightly far away. It's, you know, we have to walk, like, at least half an hour to get to the Texas Tech University's Health Sciences Center. And it's predominantly, you know, biology, Health Sciences Center. So nobody, none of my colleagues, had gone there to look for a job. So I thought, why not go there? Maybe I will find some luck. So initially, you know, I was told, No, you know, you don't have a biology background or, you know, we don't have jobs here. But on the third day, one professor, you know, as I was, I thought, you know, my day, on that day also is going to be a disappointment. Around five o'clock that evening, when I was about to go home and I noticed one professor's door was open. His name is branch Schneider, so if he's, if he's watching, you know, I'm grateful to him also for this brand Schneider. He is the professor in oncology department in Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center. So I approached him, his door was open, and I told him, I'm searching for a job. Any job? Would you be able to give me a job? He thought, he thought about it, and without hesitation, you know, he said, I do have a job, but you may not like it. And he said, You know, it's it involves washing dishes, bakers. Are you comfortable in doing it? I said, I thought about it, and I said, I can do it if it helps me to get in state tuition. And he also thought about it, and he said, Yeah, I think that should not be a problem. And once I agreed to do that, then he said, I don't want you to just do that. I want to use your engineering skills to help me with research. You know, doing some reports, research, reports and analysis using your engineering skills. Would you be able to do that? I said, That's my specialty. I would be glad to do that. So, you know, one thing led to another, and then, you know, he gave me the research assistantship, and you know, I was able to continue with my with my master's degree without, you know, burdening my parents. Because, you know, I had got a huge loan to go to the US, as you know, going to the US during those times is not, is not cheap. It's very expensive. So, you know, I think that's what, that's what laid the foundation. So I thought, you know, nothing is impossible. So if I can do that, I think I can convince people to do change management, at least my change management skills, and, you know, my Lean Six Sigma skills to do the continuous improvement in organizations. So I think that one moment, I think, was, you know, when, when I got that. I didn't realize that, you know, when I got back to my room and I told my friends that, you know, I had got this job, everybody's jaw dropped. They said, You have done something impossible. So they said, you know, we are now going to go to Health Sciences Center also. So I think a lot of our engineering guys went and knocked doors in Health Sciences Center, and they began to get jobs there. I   Michael Hingson ** 25:24 remember once, one of the first jobs my brother ever got. He was, I think, in high school. He had gotten to high school, and he went to apply at a restaurant for a job, just to earn some money. And the owner said, Well, you know, let me think about it. Would you go outside and we got some weeds out in the in the area around the restaurant, would you just pull the weeds? And my brother said, Sure, why not? I don't have anything else to do. So he went out on like, in a half hour, he had, excuse me, he had pulled all the weeds. The manager came out and was just absolutely amazed that he had had done all of that. And he said, Well, okay, and I thought about it, I'll give you a job. And of course, he was really being tested. Would he go out and do whatever he was asked to do? Which Which he did do? And when he came home and told my parents, and I was there at the time about that, they said, you understand that this guy was just testing you to see whether you would do whatever needed to be done to help the restaurant. And you passed, and he got the job. We never know where things are going to come from. And indeed, yes, we should be open and be willing to explore. It's always a good thing when we do that. I haven't thought about that in years, but you just reminded me of that story, and it's a great story, and for me, it was a lesson that you've got to do sometimes different things, and when, when you're really asking for someone's assistance, you also need to look at what they're asking you to do, and you need to do what they're asking   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 27:01 yes, unless it's to shoot No, I'm not going to go out and   Michael Hingson ** 27:07 shoot someone. But that's a different story. But well, that's great. Well, now, while you were in the United States, you also went off and got married, huh?   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 27:18 Yes, I did.   Michael Hingson ** 27:21 Well, that was a that was a good thing. That's another good reason to have come to the US. Yes, now, is your wife from India or the US?   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 27:33 Well, it's a, it's an interesting story. Once again, we she, she is. She's two years younger to me, and, you know, we met at a birthday party, and in, you know, at a professor's daughter's birthday party. And I initially thought I knew her from somewhere, so I was very, very shy to to approach her. But then some of her, some of her friends, or, I think some of my friends who knew her, they asked me if you know I would be okay to drop them to their house. So when I was, when I was driving, I looked at her through the, you know, the rear view mirror, yeah, and I, I liked her a lot, so, but I didn't know whether she was looking at me at that time or not. But then later, I told her that I was looking at you when I was driving. And then, you know, one thing led to another, and you know, we dated. She's from India, so she was also doing her master's degree. When, when, you know, at the time, you know, I was doing an internship in in a chemicals manufacturing company in Vernon, Texas, which is in the middle of nowhere. And I used to drive three hours from Vernon to Lubbock because I thought Lubbock was in the middle of nowhere. But then, when I was when I was working in Vernon, which is just no like a small town of 10,000 people, then when I used to drive back to Lubbock, it was like heaven, Paradise. I could see many people in Lubbock. So when I was driving back and forth. And I was in, I met her in this, in this party, and then we started to date. And then, you know, we got, we got married in the US in 2000 we were dating for a very long time. We lived together also for for a long time, we got to know each other. And then we got married in 2008   Michael Hingson ** 29:42 Ah, well, that's great. Congratulations. How long have you been married now? Thank you.   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 29:48 Well. We have known each other now for 21 years since 2004 Yes, and we have been married since 2008 so 17 years. Wow. Congratulations. Thank you, thank you. And we have a son, 15 years old. And yeah, we, we are still, you know, happily married to each other, and she, you know, she has been a great support for me, not only in times of happiness, but but especially, you know, when I get frustrated, when when I'm not in such a good mood, or when I feel dejected, she has supported me tremendously, and she's still supporting me tremendously, but   Michael Hingson ** 30:30 I bet that goes both ways.   30:33 Yes,   Michael Hingson ** 30:35 you have to be more stable than you.   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 30:41 Yes, well, I think she's more emotionally matured also. Then I don't want to tell her that, but she may know after this podcast   Michael Hingson ** 30:52 well. So you do a lot of work in working with people involved in resistance and change and continuous improvement, and you deal with people with resistance and change. How do you push back? And how do you push beyond that? How do you get people who are so resistive to change to to agreeing to change? You know, the reason I ask is that we all we all hear people talk all the time about how change is important. Changes is necessary, but none of us really want to change. How do you deal with that?   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 31:26 Yes, so, you know, over the years, this is what, this is what I have learned also. And you know, I, I did my masters, my second masters in psychology, and that helped me a great deal. Also, I've always been, you know, fascinated with the psychology of human behavior. So I always wondered, you know, even when working in 3m or in my first company as an intern, I always wondered, you know, why? You know, even if a change is good, why are people resisting? And years and years passed by, I always, I always thought that, you know, we can, we can always convince people with rational, logical stuff, with data. But then I found out, you know, through through trial and error, I don't get convinced using logic. I have my own ways to resist. So when I learned about how I am resisting, I thought that's natural. Then how people, other people would resist. Because, you know my girlfriend at that time, who is my wife. Now, when she used to suggest something I would resist, that. She would say, quarter, you're not organized, you know, let's, let's get the house organized. And I would resist it because, you know, getting organized is a good thing, but then I had my own way of doing stuff. So, you know, to this day, I still resist, by the way, and she's still trying to convince me to get organized, but you know, I know why I resist. You know why I'm resisting. I know how I resist. So you know that, that you know early on, helped me, that, you know, people resist because we are trying to change them. It's not the change, but it's we are trying to change them into something that they don't want to so, for example, you know, one of the one of the line managers, or one of the leaders in a company that I worked for, he was completely against continuous improvement. He was telling me, I have been doing continuous improvement quadra, for 20 years, I don't need you to come and tell me how to do my job and how to improve it. And he was very open about it. I'm so glad he was. He was so open about it. Because, you know, I have also seen people who resist very covertly. They would say yes in front of you, and then, you know, go back and do their own stuff, or, you know, they won't do anything at all. So I wanted to understand him, why he felt that way. And, you know, I went on, you know, plant walks with him, and he was very proud when we were when we were walking around the plant, he showed me all the improvements that he did. So I told him, Bill, his name is Bill, what you're doing is continuous improvement. Bill, so I'm not trying to tell you to do your job. I'm here to tell you how to I'm here to help you how to do your job in a more structured way. And that's what CI is all about. So when I said that, immediately, he said, you know, guaja, I wish somebody you know, in your place, had told me that earlier, because people who had before you, who came before you, they were all about tools and templates. And I hate to use tools and templates. I'm more of a practical guy. So then that was a learning for me, also that, you know, that was an aha moment for me, that people, you know, certain people, have. Certain way of learning, and certain people have certain way of improving, but we all want to improve. So if we guide people in the right direction, and we talk their language, you know, we use their frame of reference, we use their language and and we see what are their pain points, and we try to help them overcome those pain points, then people would naturally, you know, you know, get the we would get the buy in for for the change, and people would not resist so much. So at the end, you know, what happened is Bill became a huge supporter of CI, not only a huge supporter of CI, he passed my green belt exam. Also, I coached him, and he passed my green belt exam. And he was, he was very happy. Initially, he was, he was, he was reluctant to even attend my course. But then, you know, after he went through the course, and then, you know, after we built the rapport. And then I, and then I told him, I'm not trying to replace you or, or I'm not trying to steal your job or, or I'm not telling trying to, you know, tell you how to do your job, because that's not what I'm here for. I'm here to help you. And continuous improvement is a more structured way of doing things, because you may be doing in trial and error, and by doing trial and error, you know, you may be making some costly mistakes, but when we apply it in a structured way, we can avoid 19 99% of errors, most of the time. So he really liked that approach. And he liked my approach of making things very, very practical, not speaking, you know, in heavy technical terms, not using the jargon and explaining it to him, you know, in his own language. That's what helped, you know, reduce the resistance. And over the years, what I have done is also, you know, adapt my way of how I'm approaching resistance. One of the courses which I took, and it was a certification course, also was, you know, instead of waiting for resistance to happen to you, we should approach resistance proactively. You know, when we announce a change, we should naturally expect resistance, and when we have resistance, it's a good thing. I have never, I never heard about it before, before I attended the course. I thought always resistance is bad. I thought resistance is something that we need to fight. We need to convince people, and those people who resist, they don't know what they're talking about. I used to see them as, you know, almost like enemies at workplace. This guy is against CI, why doesn't he or she gets CI, why are they, you know, resisting so much. Why are they criticizing me so much? I used to take it personally also. Later, I learned, you know, not to take things personally as well. So what I what I found, was that we should surface resistance proactively, whether you know it is in work life or in personal life, you know, when we are trying to do something out of the ordinary. When we are trying to improve something, we should expect resistance. And if there is no resistance, then that means either the resistance has gone underground, right, which has gone into COVID stage, or people have not understood the why. You know, what is this change? What is this? How is this going to affect me, people have not understood what you're talking about. So when we explain things, we should naturally expect resistance, and resistance helps in improving, you know, what is whatever we are trying to implement, you know, whether it is like a ERP implementation or, you know, Lean Six Sigma, or a transformation project, digital transformation, anything that we are trying to do, if people are resisting or if people are expressing concerns, it's a good thing. That's what I have learned over the years. Yeah,   Michael Hingson ** 38:50 at least, at least then they're open and they're talking to you about it, which is important. So how do you deal with the person who says, you know, like, like, Bill, I've been involved in continuous improvement, and maybe they really have, but you're talking about change, but in reality, what we have is working, and I'm not convinced that changing it is really going to make a difference. And you know, how do you deal with that?   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 39:21 Yep, again, you know, over the years, I have so many stories this. This story, again, is some of the organizations I have worked in this. This particular person was, was saying the same thing. You know, it was one of the TETRA pack manufacturing lines, you have seen the TETRA pack, right? So the the TETRA pack where juice is packed, or milk is packed, or any beverage is packed, right? So these Tetra packs, when they were producing those Tetra packs of juice, they had. An issue of the juice packs being either overweight or underweight. So they had this continuous issue on the line, not just one line, but I think three or four of the lines, so consistently, it would be either overweight or underweight. And if you are consistent, if you are having the overweight or underweight, you would be audited, and you would get into all sorts of trouble. And moreover, you know, you're losing money if you if the pack is overweight and if the pack is underweight, somebody can, can, you know, file a claim. Customer complaints would increase. So this, this particular line manager, he said, you know he was, he was avoiding me. And I know that he would, he would avoid me so, but he, you know, at that point of time, he had no choice. So he said, kwaja, I have a few ideas, you know, I don't before, you know, you come and tell me, you know, continuous improvement, blah, blah, blah. I have a few ideas. I want to test them. And he gave me, he gave me, you know, the his thought process, and he wanted to try that before, you know, he before he agreed to listen to me. So I said, Bob, I'm all for it, please. Please, go ahead and let's see whether you know what you're trying to do. Works or not. So basically, in, you know, in our language, what we call it as as an experiment in continuous improvement terminology, we call it as an experiment. He was trying to do, you know, an experiment with one factor at a time, meaning that, you know, he would try to change one variable, and he would try to see whether that has any impact on, you know, the over overfilled packs or under filled packs. So he wanted to change one variable at a time, and there were three, four variables at that time, which he thought were, you know, suspects. So he wanted to change those variables and see what the impact would be. So I told him, Bob, yeah, let's, let's, let's try that. And I told him, you know, very politely, if that doesn't work, would you be willing to try what I am asking you to do? Because I have an idea. Also, he said, Yeah, let's, let's, let's do that. So I worked with him. I worked with him on the line, with his supervisors also. And he tried, you know, one factor at a time. He trained. He changed this, he changed that. It didn't work. So reluctantly. But then the good thing was, he was open minded also, reluctantly, he said, Okay, let's, let's sit in my office and let's talk. So I told him about a concept called Design of Experiments, DOE, in that, in that me using that you know, methodology, you can basically, you can basically have three, four factors which you can vary them simultaneously, and then see the impact on over packing and under packing. So when I explained to him, when I when I taught him about the concept him and his supervisors and the line operators, he said, Yeah, let's let's try. Let's see if this works. And at the end of the day, we were both trying to improve the process. We were both trying to get rid of this problem, sure, so we should be rolling. And then it worked within, within a few days, the problem got resolved. So what I learned from that is, sometimes, you know, you need to let people you know hit the wall before you offer them a solution. So that's something that I have learned. But of course, you know, in this case, it was not such a costly mistake. It was not, it was not like a disaster, but it was the controlled disaster. So, so what   Michael Hingson ** 43:28 was the actual change? What what change was made that fixed the problem? Or what was your idea that fixed the problem because he was changing variable at a time, but that was one example   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 43:39 at a time. Yep. So we had to do the root cause analysis. And through the root cause analysis, whatever variables that he was going after were not the root causes because he was not using a structured methodology. Okay, when we use the structured methodology, we went into root cause analysis. We did a structured like a fish bone diagram. I don't want to go into the technical details, but we did the in depth root cause analysis, and then we did something called as a design of experiment, where we chose three factors and we varied it simultaneous, so it is a controlled experiment which we did, and immediately, you know, it's not that you know you would do that, and you would get result. One month later, you would get results immediately, you would see the result immediately when you do that experiment versus what he did, it involved a certain bit of time. It would take one week for us to see a change. So when I showed him this and this versus this, he was really impressed. And from that day onwards, he became a huge supporter of CI, in fact, you know, the plant in which I was working in, you know, with the support of, you know, one of the plant managers, Tim, his name, I'm I'm still, you know, in touch with him, and you know we share thoughts with each other. I see him as a huge mentor. Also, you know, we got plant of the Year Award for a plant to talk. About to be shut down, back in 2009 so that's, that's, you know, how we were able to, you know, build the, get the buy in from all the line managers and, you know, get started on the continuous improvement journey. Because the the the management had told that if you don't improve within a few months, you would be shut down. So we all work together, and we did experiments like this, and we were able to turn around a plant, of course, you know, not just me, so I just played one small role in that we did as a team. It was a team effort,   Michael Hingson ** 45:34 and that's how you really overcome resistance to change when, when people see that you bring something to the table that works, then they're probably more apt to want to listen to you.   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 45:49 Yep, indeed. We need to know what we're talking about. You know that that builds trust? Definitely.   Michael Hingson ** 45:54 Yeah. And then the issue is that you what you're talking about is is, in a sense, different than what they understand, and it's a matter of establishing credibility. Yes, which is, which is pretty cool. Well, so tell me about your books. You've written two books, and you've written I n, s, p, i R, E, and you've, you've written another book, tell us about those.   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 46:25 Yes, so I, you know, I have always wanted to share my knowledge, and I have always been sharing my knowledge, you know, through training, through coaching, I have conducted so many training sessions, so many and I have learned also, you know, from from shop floor employees, frontline employees, from middle managers. I have learned so much from them. And also executives, top executives, you know, leaders from various industries. You know whether it is manufacturing or logistics or, you know, back offices, banking, you know, pure manufacturing or logistics container, container shipping business, or aluminum rolling business. So I wanted to write this book to share my knowledge, because when I see that change management or change is being implemented very poorly, that really frustrates me. So I wanted to share this, and I have seen, you know, numerous books being written on this. You know, numerous frameworks, also, you name it. You know, there are so many books out there. What I wanted to do is give a simple framework, which is, I, N, s, p, i, R, E, which is, you know, if you have to implement change you need to inspire employees. There are no two ways about it. If we can talk about logic, we can talk about change management, we can talk about what's in it. For me, everything, but in my experience, if anyone is, if any employee or if any individual is not inspired by the change, the change is not going to go anywhere. They may do out of compliance, but we will not really get their hearts in it. And that's why I, you know, came up with this framework called Inspire, which is I basically is inspired the need for change in employees. N is navigate the organization and build a coalition. And stands for that. S is to surface resistance proactively, meaning, as we discussed, don't wait for resistance to hit you. You know when you least expect it, and then, and then, you know the change goes nowhere. Surface resistance proactively. And P is plan, your implementation. You know, when I say plan, not just, you know, like a, like a 20 step bullet point, there are so many plans that need, that need to come together, like a communication plan, resistance management plan, a training plan. There are so many plans that need to work together. And again, depending on the complexity of the change, you know, I never advocate, you know, over complicating stuff. And then you have, I, which is implementation When, when, you know, this is where rubber meets the road, if we don't implement the change in a structured way, you know, leaders are not role modeling on the shop floor. Leaders are just, you know, we call it as EMR. And this is, again, from another framework called Aim. Aim, you know, basically what we what we mean here is you can express. Leaders can express about the change, role model the change and reinforce the change. EMR, so if leaders are just expressing the change, it will lead to one times the improvement, but if leaders are role modeling the change, it will lead to three. Times the change acceleration. And if leaders are reinforcing the change, it will lead to 10 times accelerating the change. So that's what I talk about, in terms of implementation, you know, experimentation and stuff, which is i, and then you have reinforce and sustain, which is r, and then E stands for evaluating and learning. You know, after we close a change initiative, after we signed off on a change initiative, have what have we learned from it? What have we learned from it, and what, what if we had a, if we had a chance to make a do over, what would we do differently? What have we learned from it? And what would we do differently, and if we were to do implement another change, what are the learnings that we can take from this change that we have implemented and apply the learnings in our next change? And also, you know when, when leadership transitions, many, many changes, what? What happens? And you know this is what I have experienced, and this frustrates me a lot as well. Is, you know, when leadership changes, the change gets, you know, messed up. I want to say fucked up, but you know, and I don't know if I'm allowed to say that. You know, every leader, every leader, wants to come in and you know, right or wrong? You know, I'm not blaming a leader wants to leave their mark in the organization, which is good, but what they what they inadvertently do, is undo the change which their predecessors have done. And then people get confused, you know, they say it as a flavor of the month. Or they say, Okay, let's wait until this leader moves on, so that, you know, we can, we can, you know, just wait until this change passes away and it leads to, you know, production of morale and lots of issues. So this is what I talk about in my book, as well, how to avoid these, these situations. So it's like a practical framework where you know which anybody can take and apply to any change of any complexity, and you know if, even if it is very, very simple change which is going to take maybe 10 days or five days only, they can quickly go through the Inspire framework and see, you know, what are the gaps and whether we have, whether we are implementing the change in a proper, structured way. And these are in this is just a framework, you know, and you know, we don't have to use all the tools that I have mentioned in the book. We can pick and choose the tools which are relevant for the change that we are trying to implement.   Michael Hingson ** 52:38 What is the the key to making change sustainable when maybe leadership changes or the company environment shifts,   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 52:48 yes. So, you know, as Dr Deming said, constancy of purpose, right? So, so if I'm a leader, Mike, and you know, if I'm changing my role, and if I'm going to, you know another function or another department, whether in the same organization or in a different organization, and let's say that you know, Mike, you are taking over my role. What is the constancy of purpose? You know? Are we? Does the organization, you know, it starts from our organization level. Does the organization have a constancy of purpose, and is it aligned with the vision and mission and whatever I have, whatever changes I have implemented, have I communicated them to you? Is there a smooth handover between me and you, so that you understand what are the changes I have done, what are the improvements I have done, and you know how you can take it forward and continuously improve upon it. So one thing is completely undoing and the other thing is continuously improving upon it. So that, you know, people see it as a natural, continuous improvement, rather than continue, rather than, you know, abruptly undoing something and then, and then, you know, starting from, you know, scratch, starting from scratch, and saying that, Oh, no, no, no, no, whatever this person did is total crap. And now we are going to change or revolutionize the whole organization where, which, you know, nine out of 10 times is, is, you know, you're just rehashing what this person has done into something new, into, you know, a different framework or a different bottle, however you want to frame it. So the there has to be a smooth hand over. So that's, that's, you know, point number one, and point number two is the the employees, the middle managers have the middle managers and the in the whole leadership team. They have an obligation. They have a accountability to make sure that, you know, they are aligned, to make sure that if one of their leadership team members is moving on, whenever a new leadership team member comes on board, to onboard them in a structured way, not to leave them, you know, hanging, not to, you know, not to let that person. Know, implement his or her own way completely. You know, let on board them and let them know what has happened in the organization. How they can, you know, continuously improve upon it. I'm not saying that, you know, revolutionary change is not required all. I'm saying that there are times when a revolution is required, but most of the times, continuous improvement is good enough. You know, when, when we, when we continuously improve. It keeps the continuity going. And people don't see it as you know, change after change after change. You know, we don't, we don't induce change fatigue in the organizations if we, if we do it as a continuum   Michael Hingson ** 55:40 makes sense, and it's all about and it's all about communication, yep,   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 55:44 indeed. And that's where, you know, that's why I have written my second book, which is, which is about active listening. You know, I'm a bad listener, I have to be honest. So I used to be a very, very bad listener. Now I'm just a bad listener. So I have continuously improved on my listening skills, and at least I know now that you know, I'm aware of my how I need to improve my listening skills. So over the years, I have done, I have I have learned the techniques of how to listen and when and when I say listen, it is not to many people, many of us, you know, even even now. Also sometimes I catch myself, you know, trying to listen to reply or listen to respond. So when I catch myself doing that, I consciously, you know, try to listen to the person. So again, in this book, I have shared, you know, the the techniques which would help anybody to become a better listener, which, you know, one is one of the requirements for being a great leader, how to listen to people and how to listen to people, truly, truly listen to people. So I talk about simple, simple techniques in the book. You know, for example, paraphrasing, remembering, listening without judgment, right? Or suspending judgment, as I say so. You know, I rank these techniques in increasing order of complexity, suspending judgment being the most difficult, you know when, when someone starts speaking, or, you know, even if, even when we see someone immediately, in the first five seconds, we judge that person. And, you know, right or wrong, we judge that we and in this book, also, I talk about, you know, why we are prone to judging people, and why we have such a such a difficult time in suspending judgment. So if we are aware that you know, let's say that you know when I'm talking to you, Mike, if I catch myself judging you right, so at least I know that I'm Judging You right. So at least I can I know that I'm judging you, and I should not do that. I should listen to you, and I should try to understand where you are coming from, instead of saying, instead of just thinking in my mind, oh, whatever Mike is saying is it doesn't make any sense. So maybe initially it may not make sense. But you know, when we open our ears, we have two years, and that's for a reason, and only one mouth. So we need to listen, and we need to completely understand where the other person is coming from, whether you know it is in personal life or in work life. You know, when we, if we don't listen to the teams whom we are managing, and if we just say, you know, do as I say, it's my way or the highway, people will do because you know you are their line manager. But it won't last long. No, the minute you, you know, change your team, or the minute you go out, people will, people will be, you know, good riddance. So, so that's what they'll be thinking. So how to listen to people, and also it will help the leader to grow. You know, over the years, when I listen to my wife, I have understood my own shortcomings, and if I had listened to her 20 years back, maybe I would have been a different person. Maybe, maybe I would have been a more mature person. So this is what, you know, I talk about in the in the book as well. How can we truly, truly listen? And some techniques like paraphrasing. You know, when, when our mind wanders, you know, it will be good to paraphrase the person to whom you're you're speaking so that you know you you remember, so remembering, paraphrasing, empathy, for example, you know, not just talking about KPI, KPI KPIs to the team members. Understand how they're doing. You know, are they having any personal issues? How is their family? You know, work is not, you know what, what? Work is a part of our life. But you know, we spend eight to 10 hours at at a workplace. So we need to know the team members whom we are managing, and we need to listen to them. If somebody is, you know, performing badly, right? It's very easy to give them a negative feedback. But. So if we listen to them, and if they feel heard, maybe they are going through something, or maybe they are not getting enough support. If we listen to them, and if we create that environment of active listening in the whole team, suspending judgment and listening actively, then we create a more stronger bond, and the team would would become like a world class team. This has been my experience. So this is what I have shared in my, in my in my second book,   Michael Hingson ** 1:00:29 and certainly words to to remember. Well, we have been doing this an hour now, and I think it's probably time that we we end it for the day. But if people want to reach out to you. How can they do that?   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 1:00:43 Well, I am there on on LinkedIn, and people can reach me through email, and I'll be more than happy to, you know, respond to anything they need. And I'm I know if people want to reach out to me to conduct any training sessions, my website is also their journey towards excellence. You know where I have my offerings. So   Michael Hingson ** 1:01:04 what is the website? What is the website called, again, journey towards excellence. Journey towards excellence.com, okay, and your email address, khwaja.moinuddin@gmail.com and spell that, if you would   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 1:01:21 Yes, please. K, H, W, A, j, A, dot, M, O, I n, u, d, d, I n@gmail.com,   Michael Hingson ** 1:01:32 great. Well, I hope people will reach out. I think you've offered a lot of great insights and inspiration for people. I appreciate hearing all that you had to say, and I knew I was going to learn a lot today and have and I always tell people, if I'm not learning at least as much as everyone else, I'm not doing my job right. So I really appreciate your time, and it's now getting late where you are, so we're going to let you go. But I want to thank you again for being here, and I do want to thank everyone who is listening and watching us today. We really appreciate it. If you would, I'd love it. If you'd give us a five star review. Wherever you're watching us and listening to us, if you'd like to talk to me or email me about the episode and give us your thoughts, feel free to do so. At Michael H, I m, I C, H, A, E, L, H i at accessibe, A, C, C, E, S, S, I, B, e.com, or go to our podcast page. Michael Hinkson, that's m, I, C, H, A, E, L, H, I N, G, s, o, n.com/podcast, love to hear from you if any of you have any thoughts as to someone else who might make a good podcast guest. And quad you as well. Would love it if you let us know we're always looking for more people to come on and be guests on the show. But again, kwaja, I want to thank you for being here. This has been wonderful.   Dr Khwaja Moinuddin ** 1:02:47 Thank you. Thank you so much, Mike, and it's been a real pleasure talking to you, and it's an honor to be part of your podcast. I wish I had met you earlier and learned I would have learned so much from you, I would definitely, definitely, definitely, you know, reach out to you to learn more. And you know, thank you for the opportunity. Thank you definitely for the opportunity.   **Michael Hingson ** 1:03:15   You have been listening to the Unstoppable Mindset podcast. Thanks for dropping by. I hope that you'll join us again next week, and in future weeks for upcoming episodes. To subscribe to our podcast and to learn about upcoming episodes, please visit www dot Michael hingson.com slash podcast. Michael Hingson is spelled m i c h a e l h i n g s o n. While you're on the site., please use the form there to recommend people who we ought to inter

In the spirit of keeping the fire alive, Luvvie is re-airing some of her most listened-to interviews with some dope entrepreneurs to keep the inspiration flowing. In this episode, Luvvie is talking to lawyer, coach, and newly minted author Rachel Rodgers. Rachel is telling some powerful and formative stories she's never shared before. She talks all about her career as a lawyer and how she shifted into the coaching and entrepreneurial space, and why she's so passionate about making sure women – especially Black women – have the knowledge and tools they need to build multi-generational wealth. Rachel is someone who works hard, knows her boundaries, and is such a professional troublemaker.Luvvie and Rachel discuss how Rachel was able to go from a negative net worth to riding horses that she owns on her ranch. And through her book and her business, she walks women through how that life and outcome is possible for them as well.More about Rachel: Rachel is the founder of Hello Seven, a multi-million-dollar company that teaches women how to earn more money and build wealth, and she's the author of We Should All Be Millionaires: A Woman's Guide to Earning More, Building Wealth, and Gaining Economic Power.

In this season finale, Luvvie reflects on the power of stillness and slowing down. After what seems to be her toughest year in business, Luvvie reveals how stepping back, finding peace, and moving with intention have transformed her life and business. She shares the profound realizations that came from pausing, prioritizing healing, and embracing stillness. This episode is a MUST-listen for anyone needing to reclaim clarity and rebuild, whether it be your own person or your business. 

Bathing in Darkness with Sam Wilmes  Episode 1    On this episode, Sam Wilmes and I discuss reading dark books including Stephen King, horror, and dark literary fiction. We find her book ick, a new-to-me source of books, and books that connect anxiety and depression and humor.    Books mentioned in this episode:    What Betsy's reading:  Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel  A Better World by Sarah Langan  The Nineties by Chuck Klosterman   Books Highlighted by Sam:  The Shining by Stephen King  It by Stephen King  Please Kill Me by Legs McNeil and Gillian McCain  Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn  The Heart's Invisible Furies by John Boyne  Hyperbole and a Half by Allie Brosh House of Sand and Fog by Andre Dubus III  Know My Name by Chanel Miller    Other Books Mentioned in the Episode: All books available on my Bookshop.org episode page.   By Kristen Hannah:  The Nightingale  Great Alone  The Four Winds  By Chuck Klosterman  The Nineties: A Book  X: A Highly Specific, Defiantly Incomplete History of the 21st Century  Fargo Rock City: A Heavy Metal Odyssey in Rural North Dakota  Killing Yourself to Live: 85% of a True Story  Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin  We are All Completely Beside Ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler  I'm Glad my Mom Died by Jennette McCurdy  Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn  Dark Places by Gillian Flynn  The Woman in the Window by AJ Finn  The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins  Townie by Andre Dubus III  The Garden of Last Days by Andre Dubus III  By Hunter S. Thompson  The Rum Diary  Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas  Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ‘72  By Samantha Irby  We are Never Meeting in Real Life  Meaty Quietly Hostile  Wow, No Thank You  Broken (in the Best Possible Way) by Jenny Lawson  I'm Judging You by Luvvie Ajayi  Little Troublemaker Makes a Mess by Luvvie Ajayi Jones Ghost Wall by Sarah Moss  Outlaws of America: The Weather Underground and the Politics of Solidarity by Dan Berger 

Kahi dur kisse shuru hue aur baatein judti gayi, waqt yuh guzar gaya ki afsana ban gaya! A Celebration of 20 years of friendship, of togetherness, a hug of comfort and the warmth of love; sometimes breaking bread and sip of hot chai; creating a world where thoughts flow like free verses, sharing our love for poetry like two friends sharing their favourite pie…. When Two Friends, Two Artists, poles apart yet so close together meet, come witness the Magic that gets createdIn a fast-paced world, Manoj Tapadia is like a petrichor, rare yet familiarly pleasant, a filmmaker, screenwriter, and a poet, emerging as a luminary, weaving his unique narrative from the heart of Odisha's steel city, Rourkela, to the pulsating streets of Mumbai. Raised in Raipur, Chhattisgarh, amidst the rich milieu of Hindi literature, Manoj's journey is a testament to the power of enduring passion and cultural roots. Since setting foot in Mumbai in 1997, he has carved a niche in the advertising world, notably as the creative lead for Lifebuoy at Lowe Lintas and the mind behind the award-winning campaigns "Little Gandhi" and "Bindas Bol." His evolution from a junior copywriter to an acclaimed ad filmmaker, with over 100 films and accolades from both local and international forums, mirrors his deep-seated love for storytelling. Beyond the advertising realm, Manoj's talents have flourished in the Indian film industry, contributing to notable films like "Cheeni Kum" and "Madras Café" as a screenwriter, dialogue writer, and lyricist. As he currently juggles writing and directing TV commercials, scriptwriting for prominent directors, and nurturing his debut feature film, Manoj Tapadia remains, at his core, a storyteller – painting vivid narratives through lens, words, and verses.In this incredible episode, Manoj Tapadia and Ashish Vidyarthi sit down in a candid conversation to chat about life and more. In this share of heart you will hear some unheard kisse from their lives; talking about Fate and free will; Stories ranging from Gulzaar Sahab, Dilip Kumar, and Julia Roberts to sharing their thoughts on the Animal Movie debate; How a writer pens a character sketch allowing you to take a peek into the mind of an artist; How each of their life journeys are influenced by poetry and prominent poets that left a mark in their hearts; How Manoj Tapadia became a writer and Why Ashish Vidyarthi doesn't watch his own film?… this and many more revelations coming up in this impromptu meetup. You don't wanna miss this!If you like this episode, please share your love through your Likes and comments. Share this podcast and tag your close friends with whom you would like to have life conversations over chai.Subscribe to the podcast channel for more amazing stories.Alshukran Bandhu,Alshukran Zindagi.------Topics:00:00 Teaser 2:33 Who is Manoj Tapadia? 4:36 Kissa Vidyarthi Sahab Ka5:58 How much of our Life is in our Control? 7:35 Fate Vs Free Will 9:48 Debate: Facewash Ya Facial 10:51 Why People Pay You? 13:00 Gulzaar Sahab & Mediocre Work14:15 Should you compromise your Craft for Money? 16:11 Animal Movie: Morality & Responsibility 18:35 Losing Work & its Consequences19:46 Can you stop others from Judging You?21:00 The Mind of a Creator: How they write characters 24:00 Julia Robert's Pretty Woman: Story Arch 25:18 Life is Painful, Now how do you deal with it? 26:20 How did Manoj become a Writer?30:01 Songs nowadays have no Depth32:23 Old School Vs New Age Content32:38 Amazing Poet Recommendations33: 43 Ashish's love for Poetry 34:47 Thoughts on 1-minute content35:30 Dilip Kumar Sahab Ka Kissa 36:23 Achchi Shayari Zindagi De Jati Hai38:15 Why has Ashish stopped watching Movies? 45:01 Meeting People with No Agenda 45:45 Manoj on Writing for the Love of it47:38 Closing thoughts-------Follow Manoj Tapadia:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/khushkhandosh_khaanabadosh#AshishVidyarthi #ManojTapadia #Interview #Podcast #FilmStories #Unheardstories #filmfacts #AnimalMovie #Unbelievable #facts #Movies #Shayari #Poets #Lifeofanartist #AshishVidyarthiActor #Actorinterviews #Reallife #Actor #Screenwriter #Filmdirector #Manoj #Bollywood #Hindi

He's that neat aesthete you want to meet! YouTube's ‘Little Platoon' isn't just the drollest media critic on the Internet, he's probably the smartest. Also the most… animated. The post “The Little Platoon is Judging You” appeared first on ColemanNation.

On this bonus episode of Brunch with the Branches, Kim introduces her drink of choice for the drink of the day. Today's drink comes from the Branch's vacation adventures while in Greece. The drink is called a French Martini. It's made with vodka, lemon juice, splash of pineapple juice, and Chambord. (Raspberry liquor) Thomas shares how going on two vacations in one month brings him joy. The Branch recommendation is brought to us by Kim as she recommends the book titled I'm Judging You [3:24] by Luvvie Ajayi. It's a funny, “do-better” manual for all generations. The main topic began with recapping Jacob's Graduation Weekend, the friends dinner, family arrival and cook-out, the gifts, and watching him graduate. [5:00] Next, they talked about how the graduation cruise went, as that was the first leg of their double vacation! [14:40] Lastly, they recap their 20 year anniversary trip to Greece. The Branches announce that they will be returning with much more amazing content for Season 3 on July 23! Social Plugs are given [47:46] and Kim gives a traditional Greek toast. [48:36]   Follow Us at:  @rcandyman850 & @RCandyman on twitter  @Kimberly.branch.56 & @BranchKimberly on twitter @brunchwtbranchspod & @BranchBrunchPod

Valentine's Day Greetings Glocal Citizens! It's happy hearts day and this week's episode is especially close to my heart because we're talking learning and language, culture and heritage in multigenerational diaspora communities across the globe. Dr. Taiye Ayoola-Adedeji, a Nigerian-American Pharmacist and recently the CEO of her publishing company, Taikun Publishing, is the author of the innovative, educational and interactive Yoruba-English bilingual book titled, The Yoruba Sound Book for Children, which was successfully launched in April 2022. Currently based in Maryland, Dr. Taiye earned her Doctor of Pharmacy degree from the University of Maryland, School of Pharmacy, a top institution in the U.S. Although she migrated to the US at a relatively young age, she is fortunate to have spent her early formative years in Nigeria where she was truly able to gain appreciation for the Yoruba culture and language. As a mother wanting her own children to also value their cultural heritage, she is even more resolute about finding innovative ways to pass on the rich culture and instilling in them a sense of pride about their great ancestry, cultural heritage and identity. Dr. Taiye is passionate about preserving and promoting the Yoruba language and culture, particularly in the diaspora where comprehensive resources to teach or learn the tonal Yoruba language are limited. We say cheers to continued success with works in Yoruba and other African languages! Special thanks to GC 83, Ivonne Cameron (https://glocalcitizens.fireside.fm/guests/ivonne-cameron) for making the connection. Where to find Taiye? www.yortones.com On Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/yortonesbooks/) On Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/YortonesBooks) On Twitter (https://twitter.com/yortonesbooks) On Youtube (https://www.youtube.com/@yortones9967) What's Taiye reading? Principles and Power of Vision (https://a.co/d/8d3aGxM) by Dr. Myles Monroe History of the Yoruba People (https://a.co/d/cc8O8DF) by S. Adebanji Akintoye Yoruba Proverbs (https://a.co/d/hMKDj7l) by Oyekan Owomoyela I'm Judging You (https://a.co/d/9llxL6b) by Luvvie Ajayi Will (https://a.co/d/fKjnUkg) by Will Smith Other Books On Bookshelf: Just as I Am by Cicely Tyson Finding Me by Viola Davis Don't Drop the Mic by TD Jakes Other topics of interest: About Prince George's County, Maryland (https://ggwash.org/view/67566/prince-georges-county-demographics-vary-a-lot-by-region) Omoluwabi (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omoluwabi) About Oriki and more (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Or%C3%ADk%C3%AC) King Sunny Adé (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_Sunny_Ad%C3%A9) Special Guest: Taiye Ayoola-Adedeji.

EPISODE 2 – PROFESSIONAL TROUBLEMAKER   Fear—how do you overcome it, embrace it and turn it into action for change? To discuss this, Edelman's Dani Jackson interviews two-time New York Times best-selling author, Luvvie Ajayi Jones, on her latest book—"Professional Troublemaker"—and how she uses fear as a driver to do more.     PROFESSIONAL TROUBLEMAKER TRANSCRIPT   Dani Jackson Smith [00:00:01] It's who you are at work after hours and back at home exploring every layer, finding out what makes you uniquely you and letting that shine back out into the world. It's authentic 365, a podcast that takes a glimpse into how some of the most inspiring people among us express themselves and make magic happen. I'm your host, Danny Jackson Smith, VP at Edelman by day, community enthusiast and lover of the people, always. At the top of this year's select offices across our U.S. network read Professional Troublemaker: The Firefighter Manual, a tremendously successful book from the now two time New York Times bestselling author Luvvie Ajayi Jones. This episode features our conversation with the Luvvie about the book, and later in the podcast, our employee network groups Gwen and Griot shared their commitment about also being professional troublemakers. So Luvvie, 17 year blogging professional New York Times bestselling author for I'm Judging You the Do Better Manual, multiple podcasts. What inspired you to write Professional Troublemaker: The Firefighter Manual at this time?   Luvvie Ajayi Jones [00:01:12] Yes, I wanted to write this book right now because I feel like the subject of fear is urgent. It feels urgent. Because we are at a time, I mean, when I pitched this book, I didn't know you're going to end up in a global pandemic. But for me, I understand that my career is where it is and what it is today because of the moments that I have dared to do something that felt too big. Something that felt scary, you know, and I think about my TEDTalk being one of those things. I, I have a TEDTalk that not has five million views, and I almost didn't do it. I said no to a twice. I turned it down twice because I was afraid of not being ready to take that stage. I was afraid that I wasn't. I wasn't at the place where I wouldn't bomb or that, you know, I wasn't. I didn't have time to prepare because Ted does not play about their speakers. You know, Ted official make speakers, get coaches. You have to wonder script through the ringer and I turned it down. This is 2017 and the third time they came around about the same event. I was about to turn it down when my friend Eunique Jones Gibson and I called her and I was like, Listen, it's kind of crazy because it's three weeks before Ted and they want me to come and speak. And I was like, everybody else has had a coach, everybody else has had their talks figured out for months and here I am, about to come in three weeks to go. Eunique told me, Everybody ain't you. So I want you to get off my phone and go write this talk and kill it. And what Eunique did in that moment which you loaned me courage I didn't have for myself and I got on that stage and I killed it. And ever since the talk came out over three years ago, I've gotten thousands of messages from people all over the world telling me what their talk did for them. You know what impact that it had, and it had me thinking, like, how often? Do we say no to yes opportunities that could transform our lives, how often do we let fear stop us from doing what we're supposed to do? And I realized that in the moments when I have not let fear stop me, when I've been like, I know, I'm afraid, I know this is big. I know this might feel scary. And I choose to move forward any way, I win. So when it was time to determine what I am writing, what I was writing about, I felt convicted to write it about fear and. I really wanted to use that as a gateway, because in this world, for us to do better, which is what I asked for us to do for book one, we're going to have to do a lot of scary things. And what does that look like? It looks like we're going to be making trouble. We're going to have to be professional troublemakers. And that's actually how I introduce my TEDTalk because to make trouble in this world, it's to disrupt for the greater good. It is to continuously do the things that are scary because you want to hope that you are making some type of positive change, whether at work or at home or just with your friends. And that's why I wrote this book because I feel like. We need to use fear as a driver. We're not weak because we are afraid. We got to actually commit to the fact that to be fearless is just that you're not going to do less because of fear. So, you know, me being the professional troublemaker, I was like, This is the book that I want to write, because it's the book that I need. This is a book that I want to read in the moments when I get another option, another opportunity to do something like a TED talk or something that feels really big. I want this book to be like somebody else's permission to do that scary thing and be audacious no matter what margins that you live in. And it was really important that that I wrote this book because as a black woman who has a lot of reasons to cower in this world, a lot of reasons to, you know, not honor myself, a lot of reasons to fail because the world is rooting for me to fail. I wanted to write this book because I wanted people to see my audacity and hopefully unloading them courage that my friend did for me. So I want people to be loaned courage with my book.   Dani Jackson Smith [00:05:17] 100 percent, this book does that, and I've already started loan in my book out to friends and family. Now tell me, how were you influenced by John Lewis, who we know as Freedom Rider, civil rights activist, U.S. representative that encourages us all to make good trouble?   Luvvie Ajayi Jones [00:05:34] I quote the late, great John Lewis because he talked about us making necessary good trouble, and it's really good for us to use that as perspective. Because when people see like, Oh my god, profession troublemaker, that sounds bad. I'm like, No, that's not a bad thing. The people who make the good trouble in the world are the people who are sitting in the meetings and challenging the idea. That's not great. You know, they're the people who are sitting at the dinner table when the uncle makes an inappropriate joke and say, Eh, that's not cool. Professional troublemakers are the ones who are making sure they're elevating the rooms that they're in. And what John Lewis was asking us to do was to make trouble in our lives in the world. For the greater good like trouble looks like what he did on that bridge, right? But trouble also looks like having a hard conversation with a friend that you know is necessary. Trouble looks like challenging a coworker, thoughtfully challenging them. And I think for us, we shouldn't silence troublemakers. We shouldn't run away from making trouble. We should actually run towards it and realize that it is necessary. We have to make trouble for the world that we want to see. So let's let's normalize troublemaking.   Dani Jackson Smith [00:06:45] Hmm. Stay in good trouble. I am so on your page. So what do you say to those that want to be professional troublemakers but are thinking, I'm no Luvvie, I'm no John Lewis.   Luvvie Ajayi Jones [00:06:56] One, acknowledge the fact that we are afraid day to day small things, big things, right? So a lot of times people are not feeling like they are strong because they're feeling afraid. And I'm like, No, no, we're always going to have something. Life is going to throw something at us, and I want us to not turn our fears into these big dragons. You know these we will be afraid of asking for a raise because we're like, What if they say no? What if they say no? Did you die? You know? And I think about the fact that sometimes the thing that we're afraid of, it gets created into this big monster that takes up a whole room. And all we got to do is slay the dragon because we created the dragon. And what that looks like day to day is you thinking, you know, if I speak up in a meeting, Oh my God is going to write me up and am I going to get fired? You know, if you are working at a company that will fire you for challenge for thoughtfully challenging a coworker, that's not the company for you. But most companies do not fire you for it, right? And there might be different microaggressions that are attached to it. But I often think about how we will opt out of the best case scenario for because of the fear of whatever that worst case scenario is. We will act out of doing what is our obligation, our job, because we're afraid of that mosque that we've built up in our heads, we're afraid of getting fired. And I'm always like, You know what? Quantify your decisions. Put it on paper, what is the worst case scenario if you do get fired somehow because you spoke up in the meeting? Well, do you not have a savings account? And I'm talking to people who are privileged. You know, when I when I say that we should be troublemaking, we should be disrupting rooms. I'm talking to those of us who can especially afford to. We're not in acute danger of losing our homes, our livelihoods. And so when we build up these fears and we're like, Oh, well, if I get fired, what if you get fired? Do you become, do you lose your home, you become homeless? Do you lose everything you've ever worked for? Can you get another job? Is this the only job is the only company? And we're constantly acting out of that best case scenario because of all these fears and all the things that we tie to the actions we do. And I'm like. Covid should have given us more perspective, and I hope it does. In that that's what fears for, you know, keeping us from physical danger. Fear is what keeps us from putting our hands in fire. But the same thing that keeps us from putting our hands on fire is the same thing that's telling us not to speak truth when we are obligated, when there's nobody else in the room to do it but us, you know? It's the same thing that's keeping us from using our power and our access and our privilege. Because we don't want to lose those things, but I'm just like all those things are infinite. And as we are the privileged ones, we are the ones that are on Zoom, which already makes us privilege, we're the ones who are like, yeah, like I have a savings account that can last at least four months. We are the ones that should be putting ourselves on the line, not the person who's living paycheck to paycheck. Not a single mother who is like, I'm only making minimum wage and I do need this job. I don't want her to make trouble. I want her to survive. But we are beyond survival. We are thriving. And that thriving looks like now, OK, now that we have made ours, we've gotten comfortable. We have gotten the homes. We have paid our rent now, mortgages. We're not in constant acute danger, so our power needs to be used for other people. This trouble that we're going to make is not just for us, it's for those who are not in the room, the times they were speaking up. We're speaking up for the people who are not at the table. We're literally sitting at the table and we're still being quiet because we're expecting somebody else to do this thing. And I'm like, I don't know who you waiting for because who else but you know, you're literally at the table. It's you. You're supposed to speak up, not the person who not there or you're waiting for your coworker to say so you can be like, Hey, I agree. We always waiting for people, and I think we need to start waiting for that permission.   Dani Jackson Smith [00:10:52] That is tremendous because you will wait and wait and wait and waste away in your waiting. I've heard Seth Godin describe what you just described as the lizard brain, right? That thing that gets you stuck and in that fight or flight fearful mind state. How much has being from Nigeria shaped the way you approach this book?   Luvvie Ajayi Jones [00:11:12] I mean, my Nigerian-ness informs everything that I do, including my writing in my voice. But at the core of this book is my very Nigerian grandmother, like she was an elder stateswoman, and she is in the tradition of black grandmas everywhere that we all know. You know, she didn't take anything. To, she didn't allow people to tell her she didn't belong. My grandmother took up space without apology. She was fierce. She was kind. You know how like, they will lambaste you one moment, then be asking you if you want to eat the next. That was her all day, and everybody was her daughter and her granddaughter to where people actually didn't really know who was her actual real blood family. Because at the heart everybody was family and the way she allowed herself to be celebrated, the way she was unshakable. She had this energy of grounding that made you feel like everything was going to be OK. She didn't question herself. In any big way. And I watched that and I didn't realize that it was given me permission to be there. I didn't realize that I was learning from her. What it was like to kind of go through life and then get to a point where you realized that all along you've been good enough, and I'm just wondering what happens if we have that type of idea, but ourselves before we turned 65. What if we had that energy before we had grandkids that unfuck-with-able energy before we have gray hair? Some of us have gray hair and authorities shut out to me. But you know, at the core of this book, I put her in it because just the audacity that older black women carry that they don't get to have until they are older. I'm like, Why are we got to wait that long? You know what? How will our lives be different if we kind of moved with that fearlessness? And it's not even the idea that they weren't afraid of anything is that they always move forward regardless. Is that like the fear didn't make them do less? My grandmother was definitely that. So having her woven through the book was important because I wanted people to learn from her story and hopefully be affirmed by her story. Again, the world gives us many reasons to not celebrate ourselves, to cower. And she did not. She refused to buy her head. You know, she walked in every room, what she owned it and she found no stranger, nobody was a stranger to her because that woman could talk to a rock. Will ride in a taxi by the end of the taxi, shoot. She has asked this man who his family is, how is his kids, what their names? And almost nothing like  making a friend everywhere. There are no strangers. If I rode with her in a taxi, we weren't paying for that taxi because by the end of the day, the people are like, No, no, no, you guys go ahead. I'm sorry, what magic you do, but it just because she was just so she fit anywhere she was and she let herself be there and she didn't apologize for herself.   Dani Jackson Smith [00:14:18] Let's take a short break from the interview to talk Nigerian culture, specifically Yoruba culture and the purpose of an oriki, which Luvvie calls a standing ovation for your spirit. It is a word that combines two words to mean praising your head and or mind. Here is my oriki, Dani of House Jackson and Smith first of her name. Reflection of the Universe Lover of the people. Champion of community. Curator of connections. Dragon slaying culture queen. Can't stop. Won't stop creator. Generational wealth builder, and chi-town's finest. Now let's hear a few other orikis.   Anica Malabanan [00:14:54] Anica Shalamar of House Malabanan in first of her name. Warrior of healing justice. Seeker of Truth. Challenger of oppressive systems. Filipina fierceness and lover of cheese.   Chelsea Horn [00:15:11] Chelsea Reni of House Horn. First of her name. Wizard of words. Curator of quality time. Eater of all things spicy. Explorer of beach destinations. Master of Meaningful Conversation. Philosopher of pop culture. Scholar of spelling. And Queen of the Horn household.   Orlanthia Phillips [00:15:30] Orlanthia House of Landi and Phillips, first of her name. Fire Tongue, daughter of the most high god gourmet chef of sustenance for the body and resolve. Encourager of many maker of excellent wardrobe and wisdom, kindness and love.   Tiffany Hammond [00:15:47] Tiffany Carroll of House Hammond, Advocate of all. Breaker of Bullshit. Connector of community. Connoisseur of wine. Publicist of positivity.   Dani Jackson Smith [00:15:57] As we get back into the interview, think about your oriki. Think about that standing ovation for your spirit that you may need when you're not feeling confident. Luvvie, let's talk about imposter syndrome and how do we get over it?   Luvvie Ajayi Jones [00:16:11] I think about imposter syndrome. As something that is useful to a certain point, it's useful in that if you have it, you will naturally be like, I got to do certain things to make sure I stay good at my craft and my work. So it actually can drive you to be better. But what happens is imposter syndrome can also start you because if you get presented with an opportunity you don't think you're good enough, you might walk away from it. And absolutely, you can be transformative. Like my TED talk. Imposter syndrome for women, especially like it's debilitating in that it's the reason why we don't ask for raises reason why we don't ask for the number that we want because we're afraid that we're not worth it. We're afraid of people's. No, we're afraid that we have to earn our way into it or that we haven't earned our way into it. We're constantly trying to earn our way in this world, and I talk about how we all know people who are in positions of power who have no reason to be besides the fact that they're just wildly confident about themselves. They are so confident and they will speak of themselves so highly that they would treat their way into a room. And the people who are qualified, who are good, who practice their work have the nerve to say we're not good enough. And then because we're not speaking of ourselves, high enough other people start to doubt us. So it becomes this wild circle. So I'm always like, all right, let's use impostor syndrome for what it's supposed to do to drive us to be better. But let's drop it after a bit. Let's not let it make us not do the thing, right? Ask for the thing. See the thing. And it's a, I think, imposter syndrome just depend on our careers. You know, at first you might think, Oh, I'm not worth that job, and then you get the job and then you get the raise. All right, cool. Now your career can go up. I think imposter syndrome just changes. Then you go. How do I must do certain things? To sustain my way in this room. And then you end up in a wild grind where you just like I must overwork and it comes with all these things, I just think we need some of the behind.   Dani Jackson Smith [00:18:23] Anica Malabanan, in member of Gwynn and moderator of the Book Club, shared her take on imposter syndrome during our discussion.   Anica Malabanan [00:18:31] There's this given moment where I in my head, at least I'm I'm thinking that. I need to be perfect, like I need to do things perfectly, and there's this expectation that I sat with myself, even though I'm very capable of doing my job. If even like the littlest thing triggers me self-doubting myself, that's when that like imposter syndrome comes in, which is kind of weird, because when we have that big group discussion I was talking about like, what is a quality about you? And I think confidence. But that doesn't then turn off the fact that sometimes I will have the imposter syndrome where I don't think I'm capable, which is like a weird balance where you're like competent in one thing, but you still have that self-doubt inside. And I think self-doubt was a big theme that came up in our group discussion.   Dani Jackson Smith [00:19:18] Kelly, Jordan Landy Phillips and Kim Smith join Anica in discussing professional troublemaker, sharing thoughts on confidence, doing too much and change.   Anica Malabanan [00:19:27] We also talked about is finding that way to share your confidence, but also still be humble and appear humble and actually to feel humble, but to not let the humbleness like you, your star. I guess for lack of a better way, and that's a great way to to describe that. There's times in our life where we've been felt to feel a little bit smaller, and I think a lot of the themes in this book is to hype us up and say, Now we got to come out of the shell, come out of that fear and really like challenge what's been going on and like Dove Deep.   Orlanthia Phillips [00:20:04] We also talked about being too much. I personally made the decision to never use that phrase again. And Brooke, who was also in the room, she contemplated that with dealing with a young woman in her life, her niece. I have a daughter who's 13, and she's at that age where they're dramatic in our role and in doing all this. What you say something? And how could you say, you know what? You want too much? Go sit down. I want to hear that too much, you too much. And and instead of saying that someone is too much anymore or they are too some, you're too dramatic to listen to extra because that was my other nickname for her extra. And instead of saying words that could be mistruth for her to be less than what she is or to shrink down in the future and to dumb herself down, and that be all she is. I have made the commitment to never say that somebody is too much or too something if there is a behavior that needs to be addressed and we're going to address that behavior. For instance, you know what? You're not going to speak, talk back to your mom. We're going to address that behavior and talking back, and that's not acceptable. But I'm not going to say this year too much. I want her to speak out when something is wrong. We want her to speak. I want her to absolutely not let somebody bully her and run over her one day. So we were talking about that in our group. How, yeah, we're going to make the distinction now of addressing the behavior without putting that label on someone.   Tiffany Hammond [00:21:41] One of the things that we really honed in on was a part in growing loud for a wildly where she says change is not optional, it's less necessary and perpetual go to that can break our hearts, make us scream, thrill us. It will challenge us and sometimes make us wonder if we can make it past the pains of it all. And I think that kind of just explains everything about this book in every different aspect of it. It's all about change, and we have to realize that it's not optional. We have to just go with the flow and do what's necessary to change in a good way.   Dani Jackson Smith [00:22:16] Returning to the interview, I asked Levi to talk about her writing process.   Luvvie Ajayi Jones [00:22:21] Writing a book takes clarity on what you want to say because you see a book through all these pages and sometimes you're tempted to talk about a thousand things but really need to have a core. And I start every book writing process with the thesis statement. My first book, I'm judging the do better manual. My thesis statement was We are all ridiculous and we got to find ways to do better at being humans. The thesis of this book is to do better and to do better at being a human. You don't have to do some scary things. You're going to have to make some good trouble. Here's how. So I do that. From there, I write the outline, which is really a brainstorming session with myself. What are all the things that I want to put in there? And I just make it rough and there find the patterns and I break it up, and then I write my book proposal, which will include. My outline now, deeper chapter summaries of each thing. How would market the book, what is this book going to be called? And actually my book proposal, says the firefighter manual. So my UK copy of the book is called the firefighter manual. When the U.S., we going with the professional troublemaker, the firefighter manuals and tagline. And then you go into your own bay in writes. Over months, some people do years. I wrote my first book in five months. I wrote this one in four and then you edit because draft one. To exist and needs to be poor, but it needs to exist, that's the job, and then you have an editor who actually breaks it apart. And sometimes that they just make it, they make it seem so. Yeah, the machine of a book and writing it all, it's all tied. But it starts with be clear about what I want to say.   Dani Jackson Smith [00:24:12] How do you get that clarity, honestly?   Luvvie Ajayi Jones [00:24:14] What are the things that are that jump out at you? Start there? For me, my clarity came in. I get clarity in different moments, like I brought this book into three sections, but they do because I like frameworks. Then I broke into chapters like I write, there's an app that I love called Scrivener. That is really great for writing big pieces of things like scripts and books and whatever it is that allows you kind of put it all on paper and then when you're done, you figure out what doesn't fit. Write it all down. You don't have to figure out what fits and what doesn't. Until the end of it. And then you start deleting chapters if you want to and saying that doesn't fit, then you pull that out.   Dani Jackson Smith [00:24:59] That's fair. As we close, what advice do you have for those that may be on the fence about becoming professional troublemakers or that may be exhausted?   Luvvie Ajayi Jones [00:25:07] I hope this book gives somebody permission to speak up in the meeting, you know, because their jobs by being in the room is to make sure that the room is elevated. You can be on the margins and still dream audaciously because I'm a testament of why dreams come true. My hope is that those who have not been doing much decide to spend this moment to rise up and do something and make impact. So those who have been doing all the work can chill for a bit. You know, self-care is sometimes saying no. And maybe that looks like sitting it out for a bit. But listen, the world needs your troublemaking. The world needs you to find some energy after you recharge to come back and speak up. For those who don't have the same voice and platform and access as you and just know that you are a part of a community of troublemakers. For me, what I actually want for this book is to empower a million people to be troublemakers, so the people who are tired can take a nap for a day and trouble keeps going for the greater good.   Dani Jackson Smith [00:26:08] Let's go. Let's be professional troublemakers for ourselves and for the greater good. Lovey. Thank you so much for meeting with us today.   Luvvie Ajayi Jones [00:26:16] Thank you for having me.   Dani Jackson Smith [00:26:19] And that's a wrap for this episode. I hope you are inspired and that you get a copy of Professional Troublemaker over the holidays. Many thanks to you for rocking with me and until next time, keep it authentic all day, every day. Special thanks to our squad. Sarah Black, Denise Busch, Jermaine Dallas, Satyen Dayal and Trisch Smith. Authentic 365 is brought to you by Edelman.

In this episode, Naomi and I talked about why she loves to write, why she decided to create a blog, what life at home has been like for her, where her ambition comes from, and how it manifested when she was younger. I was able to relate to her stories about blocking out others' opinions and the amazing feeling of positive feedback on your work. She also discussed the growth the comes from letting go of the fear of judgment and creating things that YOU love. I hope you enjoy this conversation! Email me, follow the podcast on Instagram, and listen at this link: https://www.flow.page/inspiredtobeemazing New episodes every other Friday at 12 pm eastern time. Please subscribe, leave a 5-star rating, a nice review, and SPREAD THE WORD! Thank you for all of the support. SPOTLIGHT: Luvvie Ajayi Jones is a 2-time New York Times Best Selling author for I'm Judging You and Professional Troublemaker: TheFear Fighter Manual, host of the podcast Professional Troublemaker, and creator of the blog Awesomely Luvvie (www.awesomelyluvvie.com). Follow her on Instagram @luvvie. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app

Each day as we inch closer to summer, we are reminded of all the possibilities that surround us daily. The leaves on the trees are becoming greener by the minute, the grass is finally dense and fluffy, flowers are pushing their way through the dirt. And just as the earth evolves, so do we. That’s why we wanted to bring you the Spring Back Series. After a particularly hard year or winter, it’s hard to remember all that we learned the year before. It’s even harder to put those lessons into practice and find ways to evolve into the people we were meant to be. So today we are springing back to an episode we love featuring the one and only Luvvie Ajayi Jones. You may know her as the New York Times bestselling author of I’m Judging You or as a speaker and podcast host. She exists beautifully at the intersection of comedy, media, and justice. She encourages all women to embrace their authentic selves and continually strive to be the best versions of themselves. So let’s spring back to Luvvie’s first time here with all new commentary from Jen about the impact of social media, the three steps we can take to be true to ourselves, and Luvvie’s new book, Professional Troublemaker.  * * * Thank you to our sponsors!   PolicyGenius | When it comes to insurance, it’s nice to get it right. Head to policygenius.com to get started now.    Public | You can start investing today with as little as $1. You’ll even get a free slice of stock when you join. Head to public.com/JEN to get started today.  Betterhelp | Start living a happier life today. Join over 1 million people who have taken charge of their mental health at Betterhelp.com/forthelove.

I’m Judging You (2016) is author Luvvie Ajayi’s humorous perspective on all of society’s worst foibles. Covering everything from breaking the unwritten rules of social media to sexism and racism in their most repugnant forms, Luvvie Ajayi is judging it all and she wants readers to know. By calling out these mistakes through a combination of wit and criticism, Ajayi offers some humorous and helpful tips for improving your reputation in society. *** Do you want more free audiobook summaries like this? Download our app for free at QuickRead.com/App and get access to hundreds of free book and audiobook summaries.

Election Day is near at hand in the United States, and our judging faculties are working overtime.Given the high stakes, it's worthwhile to ask: how does this process work? How can we judge – ourselves, others, ideas, and institutions – more effectively? Is judging even a healthy process?"Really good judgment is discernment," offers Dr. Teri, "You've got to step away from the linear right-wrong, black-white, good-bad...that binary thing. Discernment comes from a different place." -------------------------------------------------------------"He who knows others is clever; He who knows himself has discernment."Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching-------------------------------------------------------------What's the difference between judgment and discernment? Judgment, first of all, draws from our more primal faculties, the fight-flight-freeze impulses we once relied upon for our survival. In other words, when we judge, we draw conclusions hastily, with little to no processing. Second, the act of judging assumes a power differential: courtroom judges and magistrates sit on a bench, stationed above the prosecutor, defendant, and jury. Finally, when we judge the actions and character of others, we really judge ourselves.And we deserve better than that, don't we?Discernment, on the other hand, is a process we use to distinguish among different degrees of appropriate and inappropriate. When we practice discernment, we're not sorting behaviors, decisions, statements, or – least of all – people into "good" and "bad" boxes. Discernment is about reflecting on varying shades of virtue: good, better, best. We can't truly discern without developing a holistic understanding of the context involved. It necessarily involves our brain's higher cognitive functions. Let's be clear, however: we all judge."Let's talk about how the judge inside us works," counsels Dr. Teri. "The judge's intention is to give us a sense of security even where there is none, to control the world in ways that it cannot be controlled. It's wired into us as a survival mechanism, but then it gets out of hand."To reach our highest potential, we need to break out of the judging mindset and embrace the practice of discernment.Listen to Episode 16: Judging Me, Judging You now on:Apple PodcastsSpotifyGoogle Podcasts[Graphic credit: "Stylish black man showing thumb down." Photograph by Wallace Chuck. Used under Creative Commons CC0. Source: Pexels.com]Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/ParadiseReclaimed?fan_landing=true)

Listen as we discuss all things social media in part 3 of I'm Judging You including oversharing on social media, polygamy not being for us, and using social platforms as our news outlet. You agree with us or nah?

Welcome to the Novel Black Girl podcast where we highlight literature from authors of color to discuss issues that impact that culture. In the first installment of our pilot episode, we kick it off reading Part 1 of I'm Judging You by Luvvie Ajayi Jones! Take a listen and read along with us as we discuss friendships, "baehood", and more!

Dr. J Kiley Hamlin is an Associate Professor of Psychology and the Canadian Research Chair at the University of British Columbia. There she directs the Centre for Infant Cognition, where she examines the developmental origins of moral judgments in preverbal babies and young toddlers. She is the recipient of numerous awards and grants from the Association for Psychological Science, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, and the John Templeton Foundation, among others. In this episode, we discuss her research which illuminates when and how babies express the earliest forms of a moral sense. Paper referenced in this episode: Hamlin, J. K., & Van de Vondervoort, J. W. (2018). Infants’ and young children’s preferences for prosocial over antisocial others. Human Development, 61(4-5), 214-231. https://doi.org/10.1159/000492800 Transcript available at: https://www.ambercazzell.com/post/msp-ep38-KileyHamlin APA citation: Cazzell, A. R. (Host). (2020, August 25). Babies are Judging You with Kiley Hamlin [Audio Podcast]. Retrieved from https://www.ambercazzell.com/post/msp-ep38-KileyHamlin

Entertainment: Will & Jada brought themselves to the table, Viacom has fired Nick Cannon, Tamara left The Real, and Meg Thee Stallion has been shot Hot Topics: We give "I'm Judging You" type scenarios & how far is TOO far with how people respond to COVID? Article: Being black is... Godspiration: The importance grace - how and why

Thank you to everyone who's ever listened to Mindfully Millennial! We love putting this podcast together and we wanted to pop in to say how grateful we are for you. Each one of you who listens gives us the motivation to continue to book awesome guests and bring you even more content. Thank you!What we're reading: White Fragility by Robin DiAngeloSo You Want To Talk About Race by Ijeoma OluoThe Last Mrs. Parrish by Liv Constantine What we're listening to (podcasts): Code Switch by NPR Balanced Black Girl by Lestraudra Alfred Check Your Privilege by Myisha T. HillAccounts we're following as we learn more about allyship for BIPOC: @luvvie - Author of I'm Judging You@rachel.cargle - Writer and Activist and creator of The Great Unlearn@theconsciouskid - Parenting and Education Resource @the.root - Bringing awareness to issues in the Black community Our episode on being an ally for women of color in the workplace, featuring Sage and Aparna, Founders of Future For Us can be found on iTunes. Stay tuned for Season 2 launching later this summer!

Are you a zodiac sign shamer? Let's admit it, we all have our biases, even with #Astrology.

Do you want more free audiobook summaries like this? Download our app for free at QuickRead.com/App and get access to hundreds of free book and audiobook summaries. I’m Judging You (2016) is author Luvvie Ajayi’s humorous perspective on all of society’s worst foibles. Covering everything from breaking the unwritten rules of social media to sexism and racism in their most repugnant forms, Luvvie Ajayi is judging it all and she wants readers to know. By calling out these mistakes through a combination of wit and criticism, Ajayi offers some humorous and helpful tips for improving your reputation in society.

Today's guest is Luvvie Ajayi, a New York Times bestselling author and speaker who uses her voice to inspire and critique. She recently published the hugely successful I'm Judging You, runs a life and business school called The Do-Better Academy, and the TED Talk she did has over four million views! Luvvie straddles the line between comedy and activism, readily critiquing pop culture and advocating for minority rights. In this episode, Luvvie gets into the central role that writing, persistence, and authenticity have played in getting her where she is today. When Luvvie's original plan to be a doctor fell by the wayside, she simply followed her heart and did whatever she felt like next, never letting fear get in the way. Her experience of regret after shying away from fearful things was more damaging to her than doing the things themselves, and today she speaks about how this tendency helped her fall into one success after another. We also hear her thoughts on her new book, which advocates for people to learn how to judge each other about things that matter and how that could create a more just society. It all comes down to listening to that dream which is always in front of us, and the knowledge Luvvie shares today about how to do that would be valuable to anybody looking for a push.

For the better part of 2018, I was trying to figure out the best way to talk about race in The Shameless Mom Academy.  I was doing all the research, learning all the things, curating all the resources.  I wanted to be able to have the most valuable, productive, well-planned conversation possible.  Then I realized something.  I was sitting up on my high horse of white privilege waiting to make this as comfortable as possible for me, so I could make it as perfect as possible for you.  And that is NOT how this conversation should go.  This is not about my comfort.  This is not about tying anything up in a bow.  And by waiting to have this conversation with you, I was not only sitting in my white privilege, I was continuing to make space for white supremacy at the expense of people of color, including my friends of color and Shameless Moms of color. So, a few days ago, after an incident in this community that screamed of privilege, I knew I could not sit this out any longer.   By waiting to talk about this I was doing harm, I was being complicit.  I was part of the problem and not part of the solution. I sat down and recorded this to share what I’m learning about white privilege, how I’m navigating it and what resources I’m finding to be the most informative and valuable. My hope is that you find this informative and eye-opening.  After over a year of reading and research, I have been humbled over and over by how little I understood about white privilege and how much I was doing to contribute to the problem more than the solution.  Please note the people and resources listed below.  These women have been instrumental in my learning over the last year - and have been powerful forces of education and support in countless conversations about race at the expense of their own time, energy, and resources.  They are heroes and warriors. Resources: Books: Me and White Supremacy Workbook by Layla Saad This Will Be My Undoing by Morgan Jerkins We’re Going To Need More Wine by Gabrielle Union I’m Judging You by Luvvie So You Want To Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo The Last Black Unicorn by Tiffany Haddish White Fragility by Robin Diangelo Hunger by Roxane Gay This Body Is Not An Apology by Sonya Renee Taylor Becoming by Michelle Obama People to follow on social media: Layla Saad Rachel Cargle Ijeoma Oluo Danielle Brooks Sonya Renee Taylor Lena Waithe Laverne Cox Tracee Ellis Ross Issa Rae Serena Williams Ericka Hart Jessamyn Roxane Gay Catrice Jackson ShiShi Rose Morgan Jerkins Please note this list is not comprehensive.  These are resources that have been helpful to me.  I would love to know if there are others that have been helpful to you. Thank you to our sponsors: Bioclarity: Go to BioClarity and use the code SHAMELESS at checkout to get your free clarifying masque when you purchase a skincare routine. Hourglass Cosmetics: Get free shipping with your purchase of a full sized Caution Mascara at Hourglass Cosmetics and use the promo code SHAMELESS at checkout.

Today on the podcast we are joined by the Luvvie Ajayi, award-winning author, speaker and digital strategist who thrives at the intersection of comedy, technology and activism. Her book, I’m Judging You, is a hilarious book of essays, inspiring readers to BEHAVE BETTER, one sharp and funny side-eye at a time. In this episode, we talk about where her confidence in what she does comes from, and what her approach was when she started writing. Luvvie shares how she stays in check with herself, and how she began to use humor as a tool without even realizing it. We also talk about Luvvie’s New York Times Best Selling book, I’m Judging You–from what sparked the idea, to how she wrote 80,000 words in 5 months. We are so happy to have Luvvie on the podcast because she has used her voice to fight for those who do not have one, to incite change, and inject humor when necessary.   We also talk about… Getting a D in chemistry, and changing her college career Moving to Chicago + feeling like she needed to change herself The apps that helped Luvvie write her book Understanding the tagline in her book The feminism olympics Privilege Social media and how Luvvie manages it   Find more to love at almost30podcast.com!   Resources: Learn more: luvvie.org Instagram: @luvvie Twitter: @luvvie Read: I’m Judging You by Luvvie Ajayi Listen: Rants & Randomness Podcast Check out: Scrivener   Watch: Insecure Learn more: yourpodcastpro.com   Upcoming Events: Almost 30 Tour | December 4th, Vancouver Almost 30 Tour | December 6th, Vancouver       Sponsors: Chosen Foods | Use code ALMOST30 for 50% off at chosenfoods.com/almost30 Veggie Grill | Veggie Grill is offering and extra $10 for every $40 gift card! Head to veggiegrill.com for yours! LOLA | Head to www.mylola.com use code ALMOST30 for 40% off when you subscribe Woo More Play | Use code ALMOST30 for 10% off at www.woomoreplay.com   Beekeeper’s Naturals | Use code ALMOST30 for 15% off at beekeepersnaturals.com Four Sigmatic | Use code ALMOST30 for 15% off your order at foursigmatic.com/almost30   The Almost 30 Podcast is edited by Podcast Masters

This week on the podcast, our guest is Renée Hicks, founder of Book Girl Magic, an online book club that centers books by and about Black women. Renée shares with us her journey into reading, how her reading has inspired the reading life of her children, and her love of romance novels, one in particular. You can find everything we talk about this week in the show notes below. By shopping through the links you help support The Stacks, at no cost to you. Shop on Amazon and iTunes. BOOKS The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead The Mothers by Brit Bennett You Can't Touch My Hair by Phoebe Robinson We Are Never Meeting in Real Life by Samantha Irby Becoming by Michelle Obama The Wedding Date by Jasmine Guillory The Perfect Find by Tia Williams Nappily Ever After by Trisha R. Thomas The Proposal by Jasmine Guillory Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie The Secret by Rhonda Byrne The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz You Are a Badass by Jen Sincero Charlotte's Web by E. B. White The Giver by Lois Lowry Eloquent Rage by Brittney Cooper I'm Judging You by Luvvie Ajayi Everything's Trash, But It's Okay by Phoebe Robinson Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan Toni Morrison The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison Tayari Jones Octavia E. Butler Kindred by Octavia E. Butler Parable of The Sower by Octavia E. Butler Men We Reaped by Jesmyn Ward Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi Whiskey and Ribbons by Leesa Cross-Smith An American Marriage by Tayari Jones The Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel Wilkerson Passing by Nella Larsen Barracoon by Zora Neale Hurston A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James The Mother of Black Hollywood by Jennifer Lewis Roots by Alex Haley Native Son by Richard Wright The Color Purple by Alice Walker The Autobiography of Malcolm X by Malcolm X and Alex Haley Harry Potter Series by J.K. Rowling The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin Black Boy by Richard Wright Jason Reynolds The Coldest Winter Ever by Sista Souljah Roll of Thunder, Hear my Cry by Mildred D. Taylor The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas We're Going to Need More Wine by Gabrielle Union Black Klansman by Ron Stallworth EVERYTHING ELSE Book Girl Magic Noelle Gray Creative Nappily Ever After (Netflix) Sanaa Lathan Crazy Rich Asians (Warner Bros. Pictures) Ep. 4 The Stacks Book Club -- Men We Reaped by Jesmyn Ward Anna's Instagram (Renée's book friend for more great recommendations) Family Matters (CBS) Kindle Paperwhite (Waterproof) Black-ish (ABC) Marsai Martin 23 and Me BlacKkKlansman (Focus Features) Connect with Renee and Book Girl Magic: Book Girl Magic Website|Book Girl Magic Instagram|Book Girl Magic Facebook|Book Girl Magic Twitter Connect with The Stacks: Instagram|The Stacks Website|Facebook|Twitter|Subscribe|Patreon|Goodreads|Traci's Instagram To contribute to The Stacks, join The Stacks Pack, and get exclusive perks, check out our Patreon page. We are beyond grateful for anything you're able to give to support the production of this show. If you prefer to do a one time contribution go to paypal.me/thestackspod. Sponsors Audible- to get your FREE audiobook download and FREE 30 day trial go to audibletrial.com/thestacks. My Mentor Book Club - for 50% off your first month of new nonfiction from My Mentor Book Club go to mymentorbookclub.com/thestacks The Stacks participates in affiliate programs. We receive a small commission when products are purchased through links on this website. Shopping through these links helps support the show, but does not effect my opinions on books and products. For more information click here.

Judging You is back for a very special 'music' themed episode! A lot of music has come out so we just HAD to talk about it.

This week we’re continuing the You Deserve More series in acknowledgment of Women’s Equal Pay Day. Each year, I lead thousands of women through 20 principles that help them use their God-given gifts to earn more money. (Learn more at iwillearnmore.com) Many of the women I know struggle with the fact that they don’t get the same respect as men. We know that’s true, because we can see it in how we get paid. When you find out that you are getting paid less for the same thing someone else is doing, it can be a shock. Most people keep quiet. They might be too upset to say anything. They may be afraid that it will tarnish their reputation if they speak up. The truth is, someone needs to speak up. That someone should be you, because you’re not the only one going through these things. Standing up for yourself will create a domino effect. When others hear you speak up, it will give them the strength to do the same. Equality starts with you. On this episode of Redefining Wealth, I have such a sensational guest who knows all too well the importance of this: Luvvie Ajayi Luvvie is an award-winning writer and digital strategist who thrives at the intersection of comedy, technology and activism. A twelve-year blogging veteran, she's the voice behind the respected and hilarious AwesomelyLuvvie.com, where she covers all things pop culture with razor sharp commentary and wit. Her first book, I’m Judging You, was a New York times bestseller. She’s also an amazingly powerful, and inspirational, speaker. She sat down on this episode and shared a time when she was treated unfairly, financially, at a speaking engagement just because she is a black woman. What adds insult to injury is that they reached out to her because of her fame and popularity. We also discussed the importance of pushing through your fears, and how you can build the best relationships right from the get got. Hint: You don’t start by selfishly asking for something! I know this is going to be an interview you take a lot away from. Get your pen and paper ready and then download this episode to learn how you can achieve the success you want and get the equality you deserve!

Fall is my favorite for so many reasons (let’s be honest, mostly puffy vests and Uggs).  But I’m particularly embracing this fall because of some of the things that are going on around me.    All around me I see people using their voices, taking a stand, letting their values shine and expressing gratitude.  YES! YES! YES! AND YES!     More of all of this, please.     Listen in to hear what I’m most excited about this month – inspired by some listener emails and reviews.     Happy SHAMELESS October to you!     xoxo, Sara    Links Mentioned: SMA Episode 155: Silence Is Not An Option Book: I’m Judging You by Luvvie Ajayi  

Judging You is back with your hosts Nepri & Tre. We're in the studio covering everything about the BET Awards + more. Email: JudgingYouPodcast@gmail.com Twitter.com/JudgingYouPod We do not own the rights to any of the music used in this episode.

Episode title: Book recommendations Description: We catch up on the latest news: Amber’s bush, some new songs (let Asahd take his naps!) and a semi movie review for the Mummy. We then spend the rest of the time discussing our favorite books, books that changed our lives and much more. Oh, and we may have spent 10 minutes ranting about Fifty Shades of Grey. Links: Saida Karoli - Orugambo >> https://youtu.be/jwAxSZblzvQ Goodreads >> http://goodreads.com/ Some of the authors and books discussed in this episode: Books: I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell by Tucker Max > http://bit.ly/2sGT8gV He’s Just Not That Into You by Greg Behrendt and Liz Tuccillo > http://bit.ly/2sOjYEj Yes Please by Amy Poehler > http://bit.ly/2sGaI4H I’m Judging You by Luvvie Ajayi > http://bit.ly/2tEnCxz Become A Better You by Joel Osteen > http://bit.ly/2shLMQq Slow Heat in Heaven by Sandra Brown > http://bit.ly/2rvkMKC The Magic of Thinking Big by David Schwartz > http://bit.ly/2sOa2uq 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey > http://bit.ly/2shxwae The Year of Yes by Shonda Rhimes > http://bit.ly/2tjtnBa Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert > http://bit.ly/2rMOtGl The Fault in Our Stars by John Green > http://bit.ly/2rIj5gZ Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe > http://bit.ly/2sKCYUB Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl > http://bit.ly/2sGXCnO The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch > http://bit.ly/2tECYlt The Defining Decade by Meg Jay > http://bit.ly/2rw1g0z The Gifts of Imperfection by Brene Brown > http://bit.ly/2shXdaF I Thought It was Just Me by Brene Brown > http://bit.ly/2sK8kuw The Social Animal by David Brooks > http://bit.ly/2sGW5OC Bad Feminist by Roxanne Gay > http://bit.ly/2rMPlKQ So Long, Insecurity by Beth Moore > http://bit.ly/2ssiEEK Hunger by Roxane Gay > http://bit.ly/2tjK6V1 Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie > http://bit.ly/2tk7PED Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi > http://bit.ly/2tERlpV Authors: Kresley Cole > http://bit.ly/2tEb0Gv Megan Crane > http://bit.ly/2sONOZi Elizabeth Gilbert > http://bit.ly/2sKmpYT Music: Song: Jordan Schor - Cosmic (feat. Nathan Brumley) [NCS Release] Music provided by NoCopyrightSounds. Watch: https://youtu.be/LVh4PFKNzMA Download/Stream: http://ncs.io/CosmicYO Find us on the internet: Twitter: [at]TheBTWPodcast (https://twitter.com/TheBTWPodcast) Facebook: By the Way, with Rokcie & Golder (https://www.facebook.com/bythewaypodcast) Email: btwpodcast@outlook.com Golder’s Twitter: [at]golderxmier (https://twitter.com/golderxmier) Rokcie’s Twitter: [at]iheartrokcie (https://twitter.com/iheartrokcie)

Welcome to Judging You! The pop culture podcast talking all things entertainment and HBCU Life! Today Tre covered Lala being cheated on. Nepri talked about the new Kendrick Lamar album. We both discussed getting involved at an HBCU and our new EXECUTIVE BOARD positions! Follow us: twitter.com/judgingyoupod twitter.com/tretelingram twitter.com/nepri_jamesss

Season II, Episode I Description: We are revamping the podcast by taking a leaf from the TV shows, we will now be doing a season with a number of episodes before taking a (long?) break. In this episode, we try to put our 2 cents on the discussion of whether #MenAreTrash. We also discuss Shether and conspiracy theories: is Drake a talent vampire? We want to know. Golder is geeking out over free time and Rokcie complains about something or other. Some of the things mentioned in this episode: Video mentioned with Gigi Money in it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JUpaEbnlSUI Phoebe Robinson's book: https://www.amazon.com/You-Cant-Touch-My-Hair/dp/0143129201 Yaa Gyasi's book, Homegoing: https://www.amazon.com/Homegoing-novel-YaaGyasi/dp/1101947136 Luvvie Ajayi's book, I'm Judging You: http://luvvie.org/im-judging-you-book/ Song used: Living Nightmare by snowflake Ft: Blue Wave Theory dig.ccmixter.org/files/snowflake/54422 (c) copyright 2016 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Find us on the Internet! Twitter: @TheBTWPodcast Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bythewaypodcast/?ref=bookmarks Email: btwpodcast@outlook.com Final message: Yes Batman was raped, https://comicvine.gamespot.com/forums/gen-discussion-1/did-talia-al-ghul-assault-batman-in-batman-inc-699480/ Slipping a man something in his drink to drug him and having sex with him is Rape. Rape is having sex with someone without their consent regardless of gender. We hope you like, see you next Monday

After a bit of a hiatus we are back with an episode that's dedicated to storytelling. Joining me on this week's episode is Dr. Katie Zimolzak. We get into what we love about stories and share some of our favorite reads. Links mentioned in the show: Love You Forever by Robert Munsch https://www.amazon.com/Love-You-Forever-Robert-Munsch/dp/0920668372 Haus Frau by Jill Alexander Essbaum https://www.amazon.com/Hausfrau-Novel-Jill-Alexander-Essbaum-ebook/dp/B00MKZE2QQ I’m Judging You by Luvvie Ajayi https://www.amazon.com/Im-Judging-You-Do-Better-Manual/dp/1627796061 Tell the Wolves I’m Home by Carol Rifka Brunt https://www.amazon.com/Tell-Wolves-Carol-Rifka-Brunt/dp/0812982851 The Summer We Got Free by Mia McKenzie https://www.amazon.com/Summer-We-Got-Free/dp/0988628600 Cormoran Strike series by Robert Galbraith AKA J.K. Rowling https://www.amazon.com/Robert-Galbraith/e/B00CM8UJ86 Southland by Nina Revoyr https://www.amazon.com/Southland-Nina-Revoyr/dp/1888451416 Feed Books: http://www.feedbooks.com/publicdomain

Last month on December 18th, we held out first live podcast.  It was the coldest day of the year and we were joined by the New York Times best-selling author Luvvie Ajayi.  We talk about so many things including how she felt meeting Oprah, the success of her book “I'm Judging You” and much more.  Listen to this episode and you'll feel like you were there with us. 

Paul brings up the importance of voting and civic duty, and lightens the mood with a fun game. Shimina shares her observations and views on showing emotion in a professional work setting, as well as in some social situations. Have we reached a point in American culture when showing emotion is more acceptable? At the end of the day we’re only human, and in our opinion, we’re most successful when we show up as our true self. Voter Guide: San Francisco Leauge of Pissed off Voters: http://www.theleaguesf.org/voter_guides The Quickest Nonpartisan Voter Guide You’ll Find - Get Educated About California’s State Propositions: https://ballot.fyi Follow Luvvie Ajayi on Twitter (twitter.com/luvvie) and her website http://awesomelyluvvie.com. Her new book, “I’m Judging You,” is out in stores now. Follow us on Facebook (Head Boss in Charge) and Twitter (@HeadBossPod). Email us a question at headbosspodcast@gmail.com. Song Credits: "Bossy" by Kelis (feat. Too $hort) "The Boss" by Rick Ross (feat. T-Pain)

Judging YOU, Judging Me...A greater prison there will never be. Judgment is insidious. It's everywhere. And it kills. Maims. Destroys. Yet the majority of us have no idea the places and spaces that judgment exists in our daily lives, words, thoughts, businesses, families, relationships, etc. Life without judgment = freedom. Are you willing to discover where you might be keeping yourself imprisoned? Let's play and shake this topic down to it's roots! Rhonda’s vibrant and exuberant personality coupled with the space of no judgment, not only invites people into the fullness and truth of themselves, but provides the catalyzing energy to quicken the time frame, allowing them to achieve their greatest levels of success and happiness faster. She’s been deemed the atom bomb of consciousness and an energetic powerhouse. People can’t help but walk away activated, energized and feeling better as a result of playing with Rhonda. www.rhonda-burns.com POTENCY IS MY GAME!  www.facebook.com/CoachRhoBurns BIG Living

Ms. Adams is Judging You, Neutral Carpeting: "Mr. Clozoff's Mystery Papers" Can You Focus on Letters?