Let's Give A Damn

Anne lives in Winnipeg, Manitoba, with her husband and their children. From her website: “Anne is an oral history writer interested in people, their stories and making meaningful connections. She wrote her first book The Lucky Ones (winner of the Winnipeg Public Library's On The Same Page Book Award) because of her interest in refugees’ personal stories. Anne is excited that this book has enabled her to create a philanthropic component to her volunteering. Her second book Redemption: Stories of Hope, Resilience and Life After Gangs was published by Great Plains Publications in October 2017. All author proceeds from this book are being donated to gang member rehabilitation and mentorship through GAIN (Gang Action Interagency Network).

Anne has been a committed volunteer for 30 years. She began working with the refugee community in 2007 at IRCOM where she spent nine years assisting newcomers learning English. Anne is a founding board member of Humankind International a group of Somali-Canadians and their Canadian friends who built an early years school in the Dadaab Refugee camp in Kenya in 2014. Anne co-facilitates the Book Mates Bookclub at the Women's Correction Centre that she and a friend co-founded. Anne is also involved with Unicef Canada's 25th Team and The Family Resource Centre Initiative at The United Way of Winnipeg.” 

Yes—Anne is a bit of a badass. She is a kind soul that has committed the majority of her life to loving and serving others! Buckle up for the ride—this is a great conversation!

Follow Anne on Twitter. If you enjoyed our conversation or have a question for her, hit her up! I know she’d love to hear from you. Also, check out her website if you’d like to read more about her fascinating books. If you want to read her books (and you should because they’re fantastic!), go ask your local bookstore to order them OR you can visit her website, send her a note on the contact page, and, as she stated at the end of our chat, there may be some that she can send you if you cover shipping. Do it!

Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter to keep up with all that is going on. We have so much planned for the coming months and we don’t want you to miss a thing! And if you want to follow Nick Laparra—Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter.

Support Let’s Give A Damn by contributing the monthly amount of your choice on Patreon. 100% of the money you contribute will go to making more podcasts. Not a dime goes into our pockets! Or you can leave us a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts! Every little bit helps. Thanks for all your help.

Have an amazing week, friends! Please let me know how I can serve you better. I mean it. Love y’all!

Many people would say Kevin Lyman is a legend. In fact, when I told one of my friends that he was going to be on the show, my friend texted me these words: “True legend, helped shape my youth.” I’m very sure so many young people share my friend’s sentiment! 

Over the years, Kevin has started a production company and a consulting firm, he has received many awards, and he has put on some of the best damn live shows the world has ever seen. In our conversation, we spend quite a bit of time talking about the people, places, and things that made me into who he is today. We wade through lots of helpful backstory. Additionally, we talked about the last 23 years of Warped tour and what it feels like to close this chapter in his life. We discuss the many ways we has given a damn and continues to give a damn. We spend some time learning from his life and experiences. Lastly, we get a peek into what’s ahead for Kevin and his company, 4Fini. This is a good one!

Follow Kevin on Twitter and Instagram. If you enjoyed our conversation or have a question for him, hit him up! I know he’d love to hear from you. Follow what’s next for Kevin by checking out 4Fini’s website. Also, check out Kevin’s foundation, Unite the United.

Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter to keep up with all that is going on. We have so much planned for the coming months and we don’t want you to miss a thing! And if you want to follow Nick Laparra—Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter.

Support Let’s Give A Damn by contributing the monthly amount of your choice on Patreon. 100% of the money you contribute will go to making more podcasts. Not a dime goes into our pockets! Or you can leave us a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts! Every little bit helps. Thanks for all your help.

Have an amazing week, friends! Please let me know how I can serve you better. Give more damns this week than ever before.

Grace Theisen and Lauren Lancaster are Michigan natives now residing in Nashville, TN. A few years ago, they started Songs Against Slavery. SAS “empowers and inspires communities to join the fight against sex trafficking in the United States. We raise awareness and funds through benefit concerts and musician partnerships.” Essentially, they raise money through concerts and partnerships and they use the money they raise to help fund projects that directly help free people from human trafficking. 

I truly enjoyed spending time with Grace and Lauren. Their joy for life and passion for helping people come through so many times during our conversation. Additionally, we chat for a bit about some chronic health issues Grace has had to endure for the last few years. We have so much to learn from these amazing women.

Follow SAS on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. Check out their website for resources and for more ways to get involved! If you enjoyed our conversation or have a question for them, hit them up! I know they’d love to hear from you. 

Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter to keep up with all that is going on. We have so much planned for the coming months and we don’t want you to miss a thing! And if you want to follow Nick Laparra—Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter.

Support Let’s Give A Damn by contributing the monthly amount of your choice on Patreon. 100% of the money you contribute will go to making more podcasts. Not a dime goes into our pockets! Or you can leave us a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts! Every little bit helps. Thanks for all your help.

Have an amazing week, friends! Please let me know how I can serve you better. Give more damns this week than ever before.

Richard Lee is the Director of Church Mobilization at the International Justice Mission. IJM is a global organization that protects the poor from violence in the developing world. They are unique in their approach to eradicating human trafficking and helping vulnerable people. They don’t aim to just free the slave. Their aim is to arrest and convict the slave owner—the trafficker—so they can never enslave anyone else again. They do this by partnering with governments and law enforcement all over the world. They have helped free more than 40,000 people from oppression and they’ve seen over 1300 convictions of human traffickers. Truly amazing work!

Follow Richard on Twitter. If you enjoyed our conversation or have a question, let him know! I know he’d love to hear from you. 

Follow IJM on Twitter and Instagram, also. Check out their website for ways to get involved!

Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter to keep up with all that is going on. We have so much planned for the coming months and we don’t want you to miss a thing! And if you want to follow Nick Laparra—Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter.

Support Let’s Give A Damn by contributing the monthly amount of your choice on Patreon. 100% of the money you contribute will go to making more podcasts. Not a dime goes into our pockets! Or you can leave us a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts! Every little bit helps. Thanks for all your help.

Have an amazing week, friends! Please let me know how I can serve you better. Give more damns this week than ever before.

Sheeza Shah is the Founder and CEO of UpEffect, a crowdfunding and support platform for companies dedicated to improving lives and the planet. Her company has become the go-to platform for entrepreneurs who are driven not by how much money they can make, but how many lives they can impact. UpEffect’s recent products have ranged from ethical fashion brands to solar cookstoves — from clean drinking water systems to eco-friendly carry bags. To date, UpEffect’s enterprise-solution approach and campaign-consultant model led by Sheeza has driven their 100% success rate at securing funding for their campaigns, raising over £220,000 to launch products and impact lives across ten countries. This is incredible considering Kickstarter’s success rate is 43% and Indiegogo’s success rate hovers just under 10%.

Sheeza was named to Computer Weekly’s ‘Most Influential Women in Tech’, Asians in Tech’s ‘Top 100 Asian Stars in UK Tech 2017′, CauseArtist’s ’37 Social Entrepreneurs to Watch in 2017′, and DotEveryone’s ’12 top female tech founders’ by Baroness Martha Lane Fox. She’s also an Asian Women of Achievement Award nominee.

Bottom line—Sheeza is a brilliant woman and entrepreneur. I can’t wait for you to hear our conversation. Super helpful stuff!

Follow the work Sheeza and her team are doing on Twitter, Instagram, and on their website. Follow Sheeza on Twitter and Instagram, also. If you enjoyed our conversation or have a question, let her know! She’d love to hear from you. 

Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter to keep up with all that is going on. We have so much planned for the coming months and we don’t want you to miss a thing! And if you want to follow Nick Laparra—Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter.

Support Let’s Give A Damn by contributing the monthly amount of your choice on Patreon. 100% of the money you contribute will go to making more podcasts. Not a dime goes into our pockets! Or you can leave us a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts! Every little bit helps. Thanks for all your help.

Have a wonderful week! Please let me know how I can serve you better. Give more damns this week than ever before, my friends.

Thomas Doochin was still in college when he decided to proactively give a damn. While doing his undergrad at UNC, Thomas and some of his closest friends started Daymaker. Daymaker exists to help cultivate the art of giving in the lives of children. They’re using this unique platform to teach children that is truly is better to give than to receive. Over 9000 children have chosen to give to other children in need through Daymaker so far. 

Thomas is only 23 but he is a already a fountain of wisdom. He humbly shares so much of that wisdom and other things he is learning with us in this candid conversation. I hope you’ll enjoy our conversation. I know you’ll be challenged!

Follow the work Thomas and his team are doing on Twitter, Instagram, and on their website. Follow Thomas on Twitter and Instagram, also. If you enjoyed our conversation or have a question, let Thomas know! He’d love to hear from you. 

Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter to keep up with all that is going on. We have so much planned for the coming months and we don’t want you to miss a thing! And if you want to follow Nick Laparra—Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter.

Support Let’s Give A Damn by contributing the monthly amount of your choice on Patreon. 100% of the money you contribute will go to making more podcasts. Not a dime goes into our pockets! Or you can leave us a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts! Every little bit helps. Thanks for all your help.

Have a wonderful week! Please let me know how I can serve you better. Give more damns this week than ever before, my friends.

Cortney Gusick is an amazing human that cares so much about how people live and how they die. You won’t find a shortage of people wanting to inspire you to live well. You won’t, on the other hand, find too many conversations happening around dying well. As a result of the death of her father and the experiences she and her family went through during that tough time, Cortney decided to start Pāhiki with the purpose of promoting environmental stewardship in deathcare. She does this by creating in two ways—by helping humans re-engage physically & environmentally in the death space and by building dignified and beautiful caskets that are eco-friendly and non-toxic. 

By the way, Pāhiki means “to pass quietly, go lightly, touch gently.” Beautiful!

Follow the work Cortney and her team are doing on Instagram and on their website. If you liked our conversation or have a question about preparing for death well, hit her up via IG or their website! She’d love to hear from you. 

Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter to keep up with all that is going on. We have so much planned for the coming months and we don’t want you to miss a thing! And if you want to follow Nick Laparra—Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter.

Support Let’s Give A Damn by contributing the monthly amount of your choice on Patreon. 100% of the money you contribute will go to making more podcasts. Not a dime goes into our pockets! Or you can leave us a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts! Every little bit helps. Thanks for all your help.

Have a wonderful week! Please let me know how I can serve you better. Give more damns this week than ever before, my friends.

I met Stephen Keppel on Twitter a few months back. I knew right away that I needed to have Stephen on. I’m always intrigued to see someone making a difference within a world that is known for its red tape and bureaucracy—the corporate world. Stephen is the Vice President of Social Impact at Univision, the General Manager of Rise Up, the Executive Director of the Univision Foundation, and the Co-Founder and Chairman of EGI—the Economic Growth Initiative for Haiti. 

Follow Stephen on Twitter. And clicks the links above to keep up with the work he is doing at Univision and beyond. 

Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter to keep up with all that is going on. We have so much planned for the coming months and we don’t want you to miss a thing! And if you want to follow Nick Laparra—Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter.

Support Let’s Give A Damn by contributing the monthly amount of your choice on Patreon. 100% of the money you contribute will go to making more podcasts. Not a dime goes into our pockets! Or you can leave us a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts! Every little bit helps. Thanks for all your help.

Have a wonderful week! Please let me know how I can serve you better. Give more damns this week than ever before, my friends.

I met Jen Lewis over a decade ago when she was teaching at a school in Honduras—the same school my father taught at. After leaving Honduras and getting another degree from John Brown, she started Purse & Clutch—a company that is about art, about connection, and about sustainability. They work directly with artisans in Guatemala & Ethiopia, providing thoughtfully designed, and ethically made handbags to help end the cycle of poverty. They aim to be a part of changing the fashion industry for good. Jen is wise, full of passion, and full of love for others. In our conversation, we cover living in dangerous places, whether Arkansas or Texas is better, motherhood, entrepreneurship, and so much more! There are so many valuable takeaways in our conversation. Let’s go!

If you’d like to connect with Jen, shoot her an email at [email protected]. If you enjoyed our conversation, let her know! Also, follow Purse & Clutch on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. Lastly, AN AMAZING OFFER FOR YOU! Through January 31, enjoy FREE SHIPPING on your P&C order by entering the code GIVEADAMN at checkout. Who doesn’t love free shipping?

Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter to keep up with all that is going on. We have so much planned for the coming months and we don’t want you to miss a thing! And if you want to follow Nick Laparra—Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter.

Support Let’s Give A Damn by contributing the monthly amount of your choice on Patreon. 100% of the money you contribute will go to making more podcasts. Not a dime goes into our pockets! Or you can leave us a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts! Every little bit helps. Thanks for all your help.

Have a wonderful week! Please let me know how I can serve you better. Give more damns this week than ever before, my friends.

Ben’s story involves prison, it involves homelessness, and it involves Ben being getting shot at as he narrowly escaped from communist Romania. I told Ben during our convo that parts of his story remind me of The Great Escape—you know, the WWII movie with Steve McQueen and Charles Bronson. Ben is an amazing man who has fought hard to raise a money, start a church, run Vital Solutions, and so much more. This is an incredible story of bravery, resilience, perseverance, and passion. You know what? All of these things are required at some point if you’re going to give a damn. 

Follow Ben on Twitter. If you enjoyed our conversation, go let him know! Also, follow the work Vital Solutions is doing. Amazing stuff!

Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter to keep up with all that is going on. We have so much planned for the coming months and we don’t want you to miss a thing! And if you want to follow Nick Laparra—Facebook, Instagram,& Twitter.

Support Let’s Give A Damn by contributing the monthly amount of your choice on Patreon. 100% of the money you contribute will go to making more podcasts. Not a dime goes into our pockets! Or you can leave us a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts! Every little bit helps. Thanks for all your help.

Have a wonderful week! Please let me know how I can serve you better. Give more damns this week than ever before, my friends.