These conversations are hard. I've listened back to this one a number of times and the only thing I can keep thinking is "nuance." These discussions are nuanced, these topics are nuanced, life is nuanced. On the one hand I feel like this is all we can do, have an open conversation with someone, hear their thoughts, ask questions, and try to understand different perspectives better. On the other hand I feel like I should have pushed back much harder. Some of the words used weren't OK and I should have addressed that more, not to be combative but to try to get to a better place. You guys wil ..read more

"Philosophy is actually the end of abstractions." Wow, what a statement to think about. How different our approach to life might become if we embrace that thought. How much more reflective and humble we might become. This conversation with Nikos was full of interesting and insightful thoughts. We talked philosophy, biology, evolution, psychology, and spirituality-- all with the same goal of trying to better understand what the hell we are doing here. Not because it is interesting to think about, but because it is the realest, most practical question we can ask. A more complete bio for Niko ..read more

Chad is a successful business person who now works to help coach others on how to be successful. What's super interesting about Chad is that: 1. He has some spiritual and religious values that underpin a lot of his thinking and his goals in life. 2. On the surface, he can seem like a bit of a "finance bro" who overemphasizes his masculinity and his drive to win at life. As we do on this show, we spent the discussion trying to reconcile that, understand who Chad really is, and why he approaches life the way he does. We didn't shy away from the controversial areas or the potential contradict ..read more

Kamal is a photographer who wanted to capture the essence of what really was happening in America in 2020. He wanted to use photography to let all of the division, hate, fear, anger, sorrow, love, compassion, and humanity show its true self--the true story of what was underneath it all. As you'll hear, he is also just a really authentic, thoughtful, self-aware person. It was fascinating to hear his stories, how he became so passionate about photography, and what he learned about humanity as he created his book, Black Astronaut. I love talking to photographers because most of them are natural ..read more

Dana has experienced a lot of trauma and abuse in her life by narcissists. From a young age she dealt with it from her mother and step father and even later in life at the hands of her ex-husband. She spent so much time struggling with this form of physical, verbal, and psychological abuse that it made her question the reality she was living in. As she explains in her work, narcissistic abusers create so much confusion and conflict in the mind of the abused. She's struggled with this for much of her life and that is why her value of finding the truth is so important to her. Dana was super op ..read more

Gerald is a psychoanalyst, who has studied human behavior for a long time. He has used that expertise to formulate hypotheses about social issues, like feminism, civil rights, and most recently mass shootings in America. Some of his views have been called insensitive or offensive. For example, in trying to explore how to stop mass shootings, one of his ideas is to regulate who is allowed to parent a child. The thought being that ineffective child rearing (among other social/cultural issues) is leading to a number of mass shootings. That type of idea is the exact one I want to explore on the sh ..read more

Olga has a belief that free will doesn't exist. This belief isn't rooted in spirituality or intuition, it is deeply rooted in science and reason. Olga believes if people understood that free doesn't exist, it would actually inspire us to be more humble, more caring, and increase our overall quality of life. These conversations are so rich with good discussion because there is so much to get into. Does free will really not exist, how would we know? What are the implications of free will not existing, how do we know it would make people better off knowing that? If free will doesn't exist does th ..read more

There are some conversations, where you feel like you are truly examining the human experience; not for any specific reason, but just because both people are so fascinated with understanding. This discussion with Troy (https://troyhadeed.com/) was a beautiful, deep look into what this existence is really all about. Neither of us would be so naive to assume we have all the answers, but that is not the point. The point is caring enough to explore it. Troy has lived an interesting life and has a super unique perspective. Maybe most importantly he cares a lot about humanity and the world around ..read more

I am not there yet, I know that. I want to be able to have conversations with people, like my guest Frank, and actually get to the root of it. I want to be able to understand what makes people see the world so differently. I want to understand what makes one person think racism and the aftermath of slavery still loom large in our country, whereas another person thinks it is not much of an issue at all. It is hard though. Maybe it shouldn't be so hard, but I find myself trying to walk the line of curiosity and confrontation. Both are necessary at times, but I still find myself hesitant to push ..read more

Sean, at one time in his life, was angry, overweight, drinking too much, and not the person he wanted to be in life. There were various reasons for these issues, but if you had to sum them up, it was that he never really believed he was capable of anything different. Sean was raised a certain way and started to form certain beliefs/habits that seemed impossible to break. This isn't some magical story of transformation, where someone went on a quest to find themselves (not there is anything wrong with that). There was no spiritual awakening or near death experience that prompted the change. Se ..read more