Chapter BE

Joanna Waterfall is teh creator of The Yellow Conference - a community of creative women who come together under one simple vision: to use their skills, talents and resources for good. Joanna created the conference out of her own need to hear other women's stories who were creating their own companies in order to both do good in teh world and follow their own path in life. Joanna's professional career is in graphic design, but her goal is to be able to focus on The Yellow Conference full time. We talk about her goals for growing the conference into an online platform via a Kickstarter, her struggles and doubts along the way and how she has built a community of support around her.

Features: Bill Wither's "Let It Be"

Aaron and Claire Van Holland created M.F.E.O. (We are Made for Each Other) - a Los Angeles based husband and wife studio specializing in locally crafted furniture, lighting and housewares made from reclaimed and sustainable materials. They built their business together with Aaron leaving an advertising job to focus on M.F.E.O. fill time. Claire continues to work her 9-5 job in digital media while they grow the company, with the hope that eventually she will be able to transition to working soley for M.F.E.O. Aaron and Claire discuss not have a formal background in furniture design, what it is like to build a handmade business in the LA area, the importance of working as a team, and the highs and lows throughout.

This is Aaron & Claire's Chapter Be story!

Featuring How They Want Me to Be by Best Coast

Ian Trask is a scientist turned artist who left his job working in a research lab in Salt Lake City to be an artist in Brooklyn, NY. He made the shift in 2007 and worked in a framing store while he took the time to play and experiment with his artwork - refining his artistic voice and making connections within the art communit in NYC. Most of his work is made with discarded manufactured goods, and his sculptures "transform materials of waste and commerical byproducts into refined aesthetic objects through a procedure of reinterpreting a material's value and usefulness." On this episode we talk about the process of realizing when something isn't what you thought it was going to be and how you can take steps to change it.

This is Ian's Chapter Be story!

Featuring: This Must Be the Place by the Talking Heads

Erica Wheeler is an award-winning songwriter and a sense-of-place speaker, educator and advocate. Her performance and educational programs help to enrich lives, engage communities, inspire stewardship, and evoke a sense of place and belonging that is deeply needed in our world today, In addtion to public programs, she specializes in working with parks, conservation organizations, educators and others whose work involves connecting people and place. Today we talk about what it means to connect to our space around us, how we need to listen to our hearts in order to do that and how Erica created a path that allowed her to do this special work that she loves so much. This is Erica's Chapter Be story!

Featuring the song "To Deep Water" by Erica Wheeler

Kory DeAngelo is Chapter Be's guest blogger for the month of March and is a registered dietitian who is passionate about whole foods nutrition and mind-body health. She has a practice, Wholeheart Nutrition, in Seattle, WA and specializes in providing expert nutrition counseling to help clients enhance their physical and emotional health. Her guest post is about being OPEN, and on the podcast short we discuss how being open has effected both her personal and professional life as well as steps we can all take to be more open.

Featured Song: "Into the Great Wide Open" by Tom Petty

Kathy Lee is the founder and owner of Modern Gingham Preserves in Denver, CO. Kathy was a neuroscientist before she became a professional jam & marmalade maker. She spent years working hard to earn her PhD and almost enrolled in nursing school before ultimately following her passion for preserving local fruit, getting her hands dirty in the kitchen and creating original and unique jam recipes. In this episode we talk about everything from the similarities between being a scientist and a jam maker to the fact that there are few "terminal decisions" in life. This is Kathy's Chapter Be story!

Featuring Tomorrow is Gonna Be Better by Josh Radin

Michelle Welsch - a social worker turned entrepreneur - quit her life in New York City and moved to Nepal to work on various projects that support leadership and educational opportunities within the country. What started as a fundrasing project evolved into her conseptualzing, fundraising and building the Learning House - a combination coffee house and tutoring center that provices a vibrant environment to foster educational growth and community in the region. We talk about the cultural differences between teh US and Nepal and how they have led to Michelle living a life that is more focused on gratitude and simply being.

Featured song: Be Lucky by the Who

Today's episode features Cynthia Morris, an author, illustrator, speaker and coach who - in short - has chosen to live a life of creativity. She created a business out of supporting others who want to do the same. She ahs taken big leaps of faith in her life in hopes that it wil show people - I'm doing something brave adn so can you! Cynthia's business, Original Impulse, is based in Denver, CO and she offers both boutique coaching and workshops that aim to help others live their true creative life. She's published a novel and is currently working on illustration projects - proving that you don't have to pick just one thing to focus on in your creative life.

Episode features "Let it Be" by Jennifer Hudson, featuring The Roots

Leslie Clay Nowlin is a small business owner who opened up a boutique, Fab'rik, in Littleton, Colorado. Fab'rik is a women's clothing store that started in Atlanta, Georgia where Leslie is originally from. Leslie worked in hospitality and then sales, and she was a customer at Fab'rik. She love the concept of the store and the personal relationships that she built with the stylists, so when she made the decision to seek out a way to be her own boss, owning a Fab'rik store rose to the top. Leslie always knew that working for herself and owning her own business was something that she wanted to do, and today we talk about her journey to figuring out what that would be and how she would do it.

Erica Hartnick is the founder of the website Yoga Trade. Erica grew up in the Sierra Nevada foothills in Nevada City, CA, and she realized pretty quickly after graduating from college that an office environment was not the right fit for her. She took to the mountains and from that point forward dedicated her life to one that included being in the outdoors and traveling. She has spent years teaching snowboarding, yoga and surfing between the States, Central America and Asia, and during this time, two things became very clear to her: there was a real need for an easier way to find teaching opportunities and for employers to locate interested instructors. It was out of this observation that Yoga Trade was born. Erica has spent much of her life creating her own path and is now working to help others do the same.

Features Let it Be by The Beatles