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Excuses to Connect
Excuses to Connect episodes
- 16: Volunteering to Build and Serve Communities with Alice Lam
Alice Lam is the co-founder of Good Neighbour, which is the first pay-what-you-want thrift store in the city of Calgary and it’s completely volunteer-run. The store opened 3 months ago and has been a hub of connections, and a way to create a more inclusive and sustainable city. But before co-founding Good Neighbour, Alice had a long history of volunteering. In this episode, we chat about the story of her parents fleeing Vietnam because of the communist regime, how that’s shaped the types of causes she’s passionate about, and the societal challenges that we are facing right now.
Highlights & Takeaways
- For a long time, she had an identity crisis of not feeling like she belonged to her ethnic culture, but also not feeling like she belonged in Canada either. This contributed to her always searching for community and trying to reconnect with her roots and find herself
- Volunteering to read to immigrant children instilling a strong impression of how valuable volunteers are in the community and helping people become better versions of themselves
- Volunteering helps you find people who share the same intrinsic values as you and how you can find volunteering opportunities suited for you
- The impact and inspiration behind Volly (an app to help people find volunteering opportunities), and Good Neighbour
- Why she feels like we're on a race against time in terms of solving societal problems and wanting to help people who have passionate ideas
Resources Mentioned
- Contact Alice Lam: [email protected] | Twitter
- Good Neighbour YYC
- Tigerstedt Flea Market
- Calgary Community Fridge
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Enjoyed this episode? Share it with a friend and make sure to follow Excuses to Connect on Facebook and Instagram.
Music by Meghan Rennie - Instagram / Soundcloud
Website: excusestoconnect.com
Email: [email protected]
Leave a Voice Message: https://www.speakpipe.com/excusestoconnect
Support Me: Buy Me A Coffee47 min - 15: The Nomad Videographer Project with Thaïs Despont
Thaïs Despont is a videographer originally from France and is the creator of the “Nomad Videographer Project.” In August 2021, she travelled across Canada to help local businesses by creating promotional videos, in exchange for providing her with a place to sleep. Over the course of that month, she created 10 videos in different 4 provinces. Hear her amazing story of seeking discomfort as we talk about the inspiration, challenges, and successes of this project.
Highlights & Takeaways
- How she came to Canada with the dream of building a life here, and how the pandemic impacted her
- Her process of reaching out to these businesses and creating a month-long plan to travel across the country
- Her life-changing experience of filming at the Athabasca Glacier and learning how fast that the ice is melting
- How she used to receive hateful comments of her creative work, but she pushed through because she liked videography
- If you have an opportunity at some point to get out of the system and see what else is possible, it’s the best thing to do
Resources Mentioned
- Contact Thaïs Despont: Website
- Nomad Videographer Project: YouTube | Instagram
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Enjoyed this episode? Share it with a friend and make sure to follow Excuses to Connect on Facebook and Instagram.
Music by Meghan Rennie - Instagram / Soundcloud
Website: excusestoconnect.com
Email: [email protected]
Leave a Voice Message: https://www.speakpipe.com/excusestoconnect
Support Me: Buy Me A Coffee36 min - 14: KOYA - The App to Send Joy to Anyone, Anywhere with Cherie Werner
Cherie Werner is the Co-Founder and Chief Kindness Officer at KOYA. KOYA is a social platform and app designed to create meaningful and intentional connections. You can send people a video or audio message along with an optional gift, like some money for coffee. You pick a location where the KOYA will activate, say your friend’s favourite coffee shop. The recipient receives a notification that they have a KOYA to discover, and you can provide them with hints to nudge them in the right direction. In this episode, we explore KOYA, as well as the F.I.E.S.T.A. Meetup group that she hosts in Austin, Texas, and much more on the topic of connections!
Highlights & Takeaways- How Cherie’s family would intentionally leave keepsakes to show that they were thinking of each other, like self-recorded audiobooks, objects hidden in their suitcase, or a 6-month journal that you can only read one day at a time
- How Gen Z is the most overly connected generation, but also the loneliest
- There is your biological family who brought you up, but also your chosen family that invest into you
- Meeting an executive from Lunchclub on her 100th call, and then having their team over for a home cooked meal while they were visiting Austin
- Why she started the F.I.E.S.T.A. (Founders, Investors, Entrepreneurs, Startups, Techies, and Austin Newcomers) Meetup group
- You're never too old. It's never too late. Do your part in showing up and being intentional with the people in your life.
Resources Mentioned
- Contact Cherie: [email protected] | LinkedIn
- KOYA
- Lunchclub
- F.I.E.S.T.A. Meetup Group
- Belonging: Reconnecting America’s Loneliest Generation
- We’re Not Really Strangers
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Enjoyed this episode? Share it with a friend and make sure to follow Excuses to Connect on Facebook and Instagram.
Music by Meghan Rennie - Instagram / Soundcloud
Website: excusestoconnect.com
Email: [email protected]
Leave a Voice Message: https://www.speakpipe.com/excusestoconnect
Support Me: Buy Me A Coffee38 min - 13: A Conversation with my Junior High Teacher with Ms.Riley
Susan Riley (or more commonly known as Ms. Riley) is a junior high teacher who taught me nearly a decade ago. It’s remarkable that we’ve stayed in touch, including grabbing lunch and dinner with groups of students that she’s taught over the years. We talk about her career as a teacher and the impact that she has made on the over 3000 students who passed through her classroom. Especially for former students, this is a really special episode that you don’t want to miss.
Highlights & Takeaways
- How she went from working in theatre, to oil and gas, to going back to university to become a teacher
- How she “bullied” (in other words, pushed students outside of their comfort zone) in order to help them develop not just academically, but also in their personal growth
- How she represents a space and a time in the lives of students, and how it makes her happy to know that her students are there and doing well
- How the pandemic and remote teaching affected her interactions with students
- Finding something that you love to do and don’t be afraid to make changes if needed
Resources Mentioned
- Contact Susan Riley: [email protected]
- Connection Coaching
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Enjoyed this episode? Share it with a friend and make sure to follow Excuses to Connect on Facebook and Instagram.
Music by Meghan Rennie - Instagram / Soundcloud
Website: excusestoconnect.com
Email: [email protected]
Leave a Voice Message: https://www.speakpipe.com/excusestoconnect
Support Me: Buy Me A Coffee1 hr - 12: Unshakable Self (Belief) and Compassion Cards with Aakash Dhingra
Aakash Dhingra has started many initiatives to provide others with a platform to self-reflect and share their stories. For example, he is creating a photo-zine called Unshakable Self (Belief). Inspired by his own struggles of self-doubt, he is interviewing people about how they overcame their self-doubt in order to fully see their self-worth and find meaning in life. Another one of his projects that we talk about is his Compassion Cards. This is a conversation-based card game that he’s used to connect with himself and others on the topic of compassion. Driven by his curiosity and openness, he makes connections wherever he goes!
Highlights & Takeaways
- Sharing stories of people overcoming their self-doubt and Aakash’s goal to reach 1 million people, especially for teenagers to know that they are not defined by anything external to them
- How the more he is himself in any situation, the more he feels like life is amazing
- Having the harsh realization that he had been acting judgmentally towards himself and others when he had made one of his classmates cry
- Why Aakash asked 20 strangers if he could hug them and playing the ukulele at an open mic night
- How he created his own card game and approached strangers to talk about compassion
Resources Mentioned
- Contact Aakash: Instagram | Website
- Unshakable Self-Belief
- Compassion Cards
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Enjoyed this episode? Share it with a friend and make sure to follow Excuses to Connect on Facebook and Instagram.
Music by Meghan Rennie - Instagram / Soundcloud
Website: excusestoconnect.com
Email: [email protected]
Leave a Voice Message: https://www.speakpipe.com/excusestoconnect
Support Me: Buy Me A Coffee43 min - 11: Seek Discomfort: Creating Connections Around the World with Jonnie Rozin
Jonnie Rozin is the Director of Operations with Seek Discomfort. He’s been my third guest from this amazing company that I’ve had the pleasure to chat with. He actually got his position not because he applied for it, but because of a chance encounter with the CEO while walking in the streets of LA. This is a perfect example of the culture within Seek Discomfort, which is trying to build the world’s largest family. We chat about how they are building this culture and how Jonnie embodies the philosophy of seeking discomfort in his day-to-day life!
Highlights & Takeaways
- How a stranger is just a friend you haven't met yet
- How there is always a “third door” to getting what you want and succeeding in life, rather than waiting in line
- Experiencing loneliness when he moved to a new city, but learning that people make a place and surrounding yourself with amazing people will make it better
- How Airbnb and Yes Theory are breaking down borders and creating connections by sharing culture
- There are many ways people can seek discomfort in their lives, not just skydiving and bungee jumping
Resources Mentioned
- Contact Jonnie: [email protected] | Instagram
- Jonnie’s Articles (Medium)
- Seek Discomfort
- Yes Theory
- “The Third Door” by Alex Banayan
- Seeker Sessions
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Enjoyed this episode? Share it with a friend and make sure to follow Excuses to Connect on Facebook and Instagram.
Music by Meghan Rennie - Instagram / Soundcloud
Website: excusestoconnect.com
Email: [email protected]
Leave a Voice Message: https://www.speakpipe.com/excusestoconnect
Support Me: Buy Me A Coffee41 min - 10: Building Relationships and Hoop Dance Teachings with Sandra Lamouche
Sandra Lamouche is a Cree Woman from the Bigstone Cree Nation in Northern Alberta and married into the Piikani Nation in Southern Alberta. She is a 2 times TEDx Speaker, presenting her first talk on “The Beautiful Struggle Of Life and Other Hoop Dance Teachings”, and a second talk on “Growing Through Challenges”. In this episode, we talk about how hoop dancing has transformed Sandra’s life, and has led her down a path of being a public speaker, an Indigenous writer, and previously working in a school division. A central theme to all of these things is relationship - how are we related to the people and world around us? How can we build trust in these relationships? And why are these relationships important? All of these answers and more are in this episode!
Highlights & Takeaways
- The symbolism of the hoop dance and how it represents the beauty and struggle of life
- The role that interconnectedness and reciprocity play in relationships
- Belonging is where you can be yourself and accepted for who you are, rather than needing to change yourself to fit in
- How Western colonial systems tend to prioritize being productive and very structured in meetings, as opposed to providing intentional time and space to get to know one another
- Things in life get complicated and messy before you sort through them, but in the end, it’s worth it
Resources Mentioned
- Contact Sandra: Website
- TEDx Talk: The Beautiful Struggle Of Life and Other Hoop Dance Teachings
- TEDx Talk: Growing Through Challenges
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Enjoyed this episode? Share it with a friend and make sure to follow Excuses to Connect on Facebook and Instagram.
Music by Meghan Rennie - Instagram / Soundcloud
Website: excusestoconnect.com
Email: [email protected]
Leave a Voice Message: https://www.speakpipe.com/excusestoconnect
Support Me: Buy Me A Coffee34 min - 9: Meeting 100 Strangers Around the World with Ahmad Jabbir
When the pandemic started and Ahmad Jabbir wasn’t able to go on any adventures for a long while, he challenged himself to virtually meet 100 strangers all around the world! In this episode, we chat about the inspiration behind this project and how hearing these stories from 89 different cities have impacted his life. He also opens up about his own story of overcoming bullying and social anxiety to get to where he is today. Looking for an inspiring conversation? This is it!
Highlights & Takeaways
- How hearing about other people’s stories was a wake-up call to how privileged Ahmad’s life was and it led him to be more grateful
- His social psychology professor in university explaining that we dig deep down, we all have one core thought and how you can use journaling to challenge negative beliefs
- How working hard towards one’s projects is like the growth of bamboo: the first four years, you won’t see anything, but then on the fifth year it grows 80 feet
- Different parts of the world have different “excuses to connect”
- There’s no right or wrong way to connecting
Resources Mentioned
- Contact Ahmad: [email protected] | Facebook
- Rob Lawless (Rob’s 10K Friends)
- We’re Not Really Strangers
- “Grit” by Angela Duckworth
- Seek Discomfort
- Humans of ULeth
- Living Room Series
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Enjoyed this episode? Share it with a friend and make sure to follow Excuses to Connect on Facebook and Instagram.
Music by Meghan Rennie - Instagram / Soundcloud
Website: excusestoconnect.com
Email: [email protected]
Leave a Voice Message: https://www.speakpipe.com/excusestoconnect
Support Me: Buy Me A Coffee42 min - 8: Connecting and Networking in University with Kathleen Massey
Kathleen Massey is the Associate Vice-President (Students) at the University of Lethbridge, which means that she oversees various student services. She shares the role that connection and networking have played in her life and what it looks like as we transition back to more in-person interactions. There are many helpful mindset pieces to take away from this episode, like cutting ourselves some slack if our connection skills are a bit rusty due to how long we’ve been apart.
Highlights & Takeaways
- Growing both as a farm and city kid and how that allows her to empathize with students
- Networking doesn’t have to be a business-y term, but rather as a descriptor of “I like to bring people together”
- People will forget what you've said, they'll forget what you did, but they'll never forget how you made them feel
- The balloons and bricks metaphor when it comes to building connections
- Every conversation is an opportunity to extend an invitation for ongoing connection
Resources Mentioned
- Contact Kathleen: [email protected]
- Humans of ULeth
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Enjoyed this episode? Share it with a friend and make sure to follow Excuses to Connect on Facebook and Instagram.
Music by Meghan Rennie - Instagram / Soundcloud
Website: excusestoconnect.com
Email: [email protected]
Leave a Voice Message: https://www.speakpipe.com/excusestoconnect
Support Me: Buy Me A Coffee41 min - 7: Recess for Adults: The Importance of Play and Inclusion with Tyson Bankert
Do you remember recess as a kid? Tyson Bankert has created a version of recess for adults. He is the founder of Recess Calgary, which is an inclusive space for adults to come, forget about their responsibilities for a while, and just have fun! Tyson’s personal slogan is: “Promote Justice, Edify Others and Befriend the Lonely.” We explore how he embodies this slogan in all the community development work that he does, such as with the Community Development Learning Initiative. We also talk about how unconscious bias and systemic barriers relate to the ability to connect with others. This is an insightful conversation that you want to listen to until the end.
Highlights & Takeaways
- Befriending those that feel excluded and creating spaces where people can safely opt-in and participate
- Using a strengths-based approach to engage and build communities
- How adults can boost their wellness through fun and play
- Being a queer black male and how unconscious bias affects interactions
- Questions to ask yourself when you want to get more involved in new spaces and opportunities for connection
Resources Mentioned
- Contact Tyson/Recess Calgary: Instagram, Website
- Community Development Learning Initiative
- “The Art of Gathering” by Priya Parker
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Enjoyed this episode? Share it with a friend and make sure to follow Excuses to Connect on Facebook and Instagram.
Music by Meghan Rennie - Instagram / Soundcloud
Website: excusestoconnect.com
Email: [email protected]
Leave a Voice Message: https://www.speakpipe.com/excusestoconnect
Support Me: Buy Me A Coffee47 min
About Excuses to Connect
From the publisher's feed
Have you ever wanted to connect with someone, but you stopped yourself? Excuses to Connect is a podcast about actively creating the conditions that make meaningful connections easier. In other words, you can make excuses to connect. Join me, Richard Lee-Thai, as I have conversations with experts, friends, and strangers on their struggles and successes when it comes to human connections. As a listener, I hope that you can take these insights and find excuses to connect with people. You never know how any one connection can transform your life.
https://excusestoconnect.com/