On the merits of imperfection, bringing joy back to fitness, disrupting an industry and sculpting an online home for wellness

Episode 99: Melissa Wood

Content and conversations for times of transition and change.

Join me in discussion with renowned luminaries and dear friends to explore life's myriad transitions, our understandings and our responses. What does it mean to be present, to shift our perceptions, to engage with the world meaningfully, with dignity and care? With respect for the ancient practices and the modern wisdom that continue to inform and elevate our exchanges, each episode is an invitation to Practice You.

Personal Journals

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Health & Fitness

On redefining power, living and leading without apology, spacious parenting and the perceptions holding us back.  (2:24) – Self-awareness, identity, and heritage. (7:32) – Identity, belonging, and cultural heritage. (11:38) – Heritage, identity, and systemic racism. (16:35) – Privilege and allyship in a 20-year marriage. (20:50) – Parenting, values, and personal growth. (27:01) – Parenting teenagers and respecting their identity choices. (31:40) – Privilege and its various forms. (36:23) – Privilege and leadership with a focus on neurodiversity and accessibility.  One of Australia's leading credentialed coaches for female executives and entrepreneurs, Kemi Nekvapil is an author and a highly sought-after international speaker, a flower farmer, a wife and mother, and a solid friend. She's studied leadership and purpose at The Gross National Happiness Centre in Bhutan and trained with Dr Brené Brown to become a Certified Dare to Lead™ Facilitator, working with teams and organisations to create daring leaders and courageous cultures. Kemi is a facilitator for The Hunger Project Australia and a regular interviewer of industry icons including Elizabeth Gilbert, Martha Beck and Marie Forleo, and she hosts the number one ranking podcast The Shift Series. With a level of compassion and wisdom only gained through extraordinary life experience, Kemi is a powerful advocate for connected, value-based living.

Episode 188: Kemi Nekvapil

On the unexpected places of practice in our lives, the freedom of rigor, and the wisdom of closing the chasm between our values and our actions.    (2:06)- Zen Buddhism’s Eightfold Path and personal growth. (6:47) – Buddhism, compassion, and social justice. (14:43) – Buddhist ceremony and personal growth. (20:43) – Meditation, mindfulness, and personal growth. (27:06) – Zen Buddhism and practice in Japan. (36:21) – Meditation, routines, and finding peace. (40:38) – Finding freedom through rigor and discipline.   Sensei Koshin Paley Ellison, MFA, LMSW, DMIN, is an author, Zen teacher, Jungian psychotherapist, and Certified Chaplaincy Educator. After many years as a chaplain and psychotherapist, Koshin co-founded the New York Zen Center for Contemplative Care, which offers contemplative approaches to care through education, personal caregiving, and Zen practice. Today, New York Zen Center’s methodologies are internationally recognized—and have touched the lives of tens of thousands of individuals. Koshin is a world renowned thought leader in contemplative care. He is the author of Untangled: Walking the Eightfold Path to Clarity, Courage, and Compassion (Balance/Hachette, 2022); Wholehearted: Slow Down, Help Out, Wake Up (Wisdom Publications, 2019) and the co-editor of Awake at the Bedside: Contemplative Teachings on Palliative and End of Life Care (Wisdom Publications, 2016). His work has been featured in the New York Times, PBS, CBS Sunday Morning, Tricycle among other publications.  Koshin's new book, Untangled: Walking the Eightfold Path to Clarity, Courage, and Compassion, is a welcoming guidebook for finding expansive ease and deep compassion within oneself and through relationships with others based on the Eightfold Path, one of Buddhism’s foundational teachings. In his book, Koshin weaves together anecdotes from his own life dealing with abuse and discrimination, insights from many wise teachers, and invitations to constantly practice showing up to our lives in every moment.

Episode 187: Koshin Paley Ellison

  On shifting the way we perceive our capacities as humans and as parents, focusing on relational connection and possibility.  (4:14) – Mindset shift for work-parent conflict. (13:28) – Work-parenting challenges and unhelpful labels. (18:50) – Embracing challenges and finding opportunities in life. (26:50) – Managing stress and finding resilience through self-compassion. (33:18) – Nonviolent communication and parenting.  In Work, Parent, Thrive, Yael shares practical strategies from clinical psychology and social science to better manage the conflict and enhance enrichment in work, parenting, and the balance of these meaningful roles. While these strategies won’t create more hours in the day, they can shift how we label our experiences, revise the stories we tell ourselves about working and parenting, and recognize the value we get from each role on its own, and in combination with one another. Yael Schonbrun, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist, assistant professor at Brown University, co-host of Psychologists Off the Clock: A podcast about the science and practice of living well, and mother of three. Yael’s academic research explores the interaction between relationship problems and mental health conditions. She has authored chapters in several books and has written dozens of scientific articles. In her private practice, writing, and podcasting, Yael uses evidence-based science to help individuals and couples learn to manage work, parenting, and marriage in more effective and fulfilling ways. She draws upon treatments that integrate ancient Eastern philosophy with scientifically backed practices. Yael’s writing on work, parenting, and relationships has appeared in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Greater Good Science Center, Behavioral Scientist, Kveller, Lilith Magazine, The Wise Brain Bulletin, Psychology Today, and Motherly. Her new book is Work, Parent, Thrive: 12 Science-Backed Strategies to Ditch Guilt, Manage Overwhelm, and Grow Connection (When Everything Feels Like too Much). Yael lives outside of Boston with her husband and their three small comedians. https://yaelschonbrun.com/   

Episode 186: Yael Schonbrun PhD

 On the Way of Tea, the practice of service, the meaning of presence and the medicine of silence.  (1:46) – Tea, presence, and mindfulness. (5:48) – Tea, meditation, and prison reform. (11:52) – Buddhist chaplaincy training and tea practices. (16:26) – Acting, producing, and healing. (22:37) – Meditation, mindfulness, and Zen Buddhism. (32:14) – Music, prison reform, and personal growth.   Mia Maestro most recently wrapped Oscar-nominee Jose Rivera’s Castro’s Daughter, directed by Miguel Bardem. She appears in the Apple+ Scott Z. Burns’ climate change anthology Extrapolations starring opposite Ed Norton.  Mia is a citizen of the world, traveling, surfing, scuba diving, and warming her spirit through the practice of Cha Dao, The Way of Tea. She’s passionate about prison reform and serves tea to the incarcerated through Healing Dialogue and Action in the state of California.   https://miamaestro.com

Episode 185: Mia Maestro

On the ecological, mythical and cultural understandings that shape our history of extraction and exploitation, and how one conversation can truly make a difference in our future.  (1:42) – Reconnecting with nature and protecting forests. (11:41) – Feminism, patriarchy, and earth-centered traditions. (17:11) – Regenerative farming and indigenous knowledge. (22:40) – Indigenous worldviews and language revitalization.  Founder and executive director of the Women’s Earth and Climate Action Network (WECAN), Osprey Orielle Lake works internationally with grassroots, BIPOC and Indigenous leaders, policymakers, and diverse coalitions to build climate justice, resilient communities, and a just transition to a decentralized, democratized clean-energy future. She sits on the executive committee for the Global Alliance for the Rights of Nature and on the steering committee for the Fossil Free Non-Proliferation Treaty. Osprey’s writing about climate justice, relationships with nature, women in leadership, and other topics has been featured in The Guardian, Earth Island Journal, The Ecologist, Ms. Magazine and many other publications. She is the author of the award-winning book Uprisings for the Earth: Reconnecting Culture with Nature. Osprey holds an MA in Culture and Environmental Studies from Holy Names University in Oakland and lives in the San Francisco Bay Area on Coast Miwok lands.   https://ospreyoriellelake.earth/   https://www.wecaninternational.org/

Episode 99: Melissa Wood

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