Mindful FIRE : Life Design for Financial Independence

Welcome to the Mindful FIRE Podcast, where we explore living mindfully on the path to financial independence and beyond. I’m your host Adam Coelho and I’m glad you’re here. 

Today we dive into part 2 of my conversation with my friend, Nicholas Whitaker. If you haven’t yet listened to Part 1 of our conversation where we dig into Nick’s backstory of going from poverty to working at Google,  you can check it out here. It’s one you don’t want to miss. 

Nicholas has an incredible story of going from living in poverty, with housing insecurity and just scraping by, to changing his mindset and his entire life to ultimately be working at Google for the last 10 years. 

For the past decade, Nicholas has leveraged the scale and resources of Google to support the journalism industry through high impact educational products, programs, and strategic partnerships, reaching more than half a million journalists worldwide.

Throughout his time at Google, Nicholas has also managed stress and anxiety through an active mindfulness practice, extensive study of emotional intelligence, resilience, and the impact of technology on well being as well as regular therapy. 

He spends a portion of his time facilitating mental health talks, meditations, host experts in the industry to talk about mindfulness and resilience, and facilitate team development experiences to help teams and colleagues manage stress, cultivate trust and psychological safety, and learn more mindful ways to communicate. I'm also coaching a limited number of clients outside of Google.

In Part 2 of our conversation Nicholas and I dive into:

• How Nick thinks about Financial Independence Retire Early with what he calls a “modified FIRE approach”
• How and why Nick places a huge value on where he is spending his attention.
• Quote: “Attention is the cash value of time” - Sam Harris
• Nick’s practical advice for living in alignment with your values and using your attention wisely.
• The importance of becoming aware of the stories we’re telling ourselves
• Why Nick says everyone can benefit from therapy. 
• How you can take an inventory of where you’re spending your attention with a time audit
• Why making sure you’re getting enough sleep is critical
• Bringing mindfulness into every moment of your life
• Designing your life intentionally by creating routines
• Why its so important to become aware of where I’m spending my time and attention. 
• Nick’s mindfulness journey. 
• Books that kicked off Nick’s mindfulness journey:
  • Zen Mind Beginners Mind
  • Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

And so much more. I hope you enjoy Part 2 of my conversation with my friend Nicholas Whitaker. As a reminder you can check out Part 1 here.

Check out Nick's website:

Need I say more? 

2020 is brutal and life is crazy.

One thing is for sure. 

You deserve a break! 

Yeah YOU!

Here it is. Press play.

Subscribe for new meditations and inspiring interviews about mindfulness and financial independence every Tuesday.

I hope you enjoyed this practice. If you do, please share it with your friends...I bet one or two could really use it right now.

Please write a 5 Star review on Apple Podcasts! It REALLY helps more people find out the show.

“What are my values and what are my goals? Am I moving myself in that direction. If I'm not moving myself in that direction, what am I doing?” - Nicholas Whitaker

Welcome to the Mindful FIRE Podcast, where we explore living mindfully on the path to financial independence and beyond. I’m your host Adam Coelho and I’m glad you’re here. 

Today we talk to my friend, Nicholas Whitaker. Nicholas has an incredible story of going from living in poverty, with housing insecurity and just scraping by, to changing his mindset and his entire life to ultimately be working at Google for the last 10 years. 

For the past decade, Nicholas has leveraged the scale and resources of Google to support the journalism industry through high impact educational products, programs, and strategic partnerships, reaching more than half a million journalists worldwide.

Throughout his time at Google, Nicholas has also managed stress and anxiety through an active mindfulness practice, extensive study of emotional intelligence, resilience, and the impact of technology on well being as well as regular therapy. 

He spends a portion of his time facilitating mental health talks, meditations, host experts in the industry to talk about mindfulness and resilience, and facilitate team development experiences to help teams and colleagues manage stress, cultivate trust and psychological safety, and learn more mindful ways to communicate. I'm also coaching a limited number of clients outside of Google.

In this episode Nicholas and I dive into:

• Nick’s philosophy on life: Figure out how I can have the most impact on the world around me, in a positive way.  How can I do that in a sustainable way. Is there some reality where I could be doing that full time? 
• Why he’s inspired by the quote “Chance favors the prepared mind”
• What is neuroplasticity and how does it shape our lives?
• How he went from poverty to financial stability
• How he used education as the first step to move forward
• How he developed awareness of his inner critic 
• How the words of his mentor inspired him to think bigger about his life
• How do I make the most of the resources I do have in this moment and best set myself up for the future? 
• What does Nick’s long term vision look like?
• How he thinks about quality of life investments 
• Advice to someone who feels stuck in his/her life
• Advice to someone getting started with Mindfulness
• Advice to someone on the path to financial independence

And so much more. I hope you enjoy Part 1 of my conversation with my friend Nicholas Whitaker. Remember to subscribe to be the first to know when Part 2 is available. 

Check out N

“Anytime we connect with others, if we're open to the possibility, we can find ways to benefit each other” - Valerie Poon

Welcome to the Mindful FIRE Podcast, where we explore living mindfully on the path to financial independence and beyond. I’m your host Adam Coelho and I’m glad you’re here. 

On this episode I’m joined by my friend Valerie Poon, who I met through a Grow with Google coaching session a few months back. Val and I connected about our shared interest in mindfulness and financial independence. 

After our conversation, I knew I had to bring her on the podcast to share her perspective on FIRE and mindful living as a young person. The concepts and practices surrounding mindfulness and financial independence are powerful at any age but starting early makes an incredible difference. I often think how powerful it would have been for me to have the knowledge and practices of FIRE and mindfulness early in my twenties. 

Val is currently a student in her last year at OCAD University where she studies design. On top of her studies she’s keeping herself busy with exploring social innovation, emotional intelligence, community building, sustainability and youth empowerment. 

In this episode Val and I dive deep into living intentionally amidst a world full of uncertainty. 

In this episode we explore: 

• The concept of uncertainty, including what the ocean has to teach us about it as a part of life.  
• That there is power in trusting in the uncertain nature of the world.
• What a 10 day silent meditation retreat taught me (Adam) about uncertainty and the constantly changing nature of experience
• How Val attempts to infuse her life with intentionality, from how she starts her day to how she approaches her time at university and with each person she interacts with
• My thoughts on living intentionally as a practice of making the most of each moment and this one life I have to live.
• How Val sees being a student as a tremendous amount of opportunity to experiment, learn and grow and fail with a supportive safety net while being surrounded by other people who are there to learn as well.
• How Val is working on a design project to explore how we can make our relationship with technology more mindful.
• How Val approaches networking or rather “connecting with curiosity” and how she aims to add value to everyone she interacts with, especially mentors. 
• How Val thinks about pursuing financial independence as a 23 year old student
• My (Adam) thoughts on pursuing financial independence mindfully

This episode was a great reminder to me of the simple ways we can all choose to be a bit more intentional to make the most of each moment and this one life we have to live. I learned so much from this conversation and I hope you do as well. 

Full show notes at

Feeling stressed or worried about tomorrow’s presidential election? You’re not alone.

That’s why I created a special mindfulness and compassion guided meditation practice and am releasing it a day early. Please share it! #ShareKindness

No matter who you support in this election, Biden or Trump, blue or red, I made this meditation for you and you’re welcome here. I hope you find it supportive during this stressful time.

It starts with a simple mindfulness practice of checking in with yourself and noticing how you’re feeling. Then I invite you to relax into peace and ease with each exhale. Finally I guide you through a simple compassion practice where you’ll practice sending compassion to yourself, people who agree with you, people who don’t and finally all beings.

I hope you enjoy this practice and would love to hear what you think! Please share your feedback with me in the comments below.

Please share this with your friends and write us a 5 Star review on Apple Podcasts!

Full show notes available mindfulfire.org..

“I found that work was an ability for me to bring out my spiritual teachings and share my values with other people.”

Welcome to the Mindful FIRE Podcast, where we explore living mindfully on the path to financial independence and beyond. I’m your host Adam Coelho and I’m glad you’re here. 

Today we talk to my friend, Colm Dolan who was one of the first people I met when joining Google back in 2010. Colm is a former Googler and founder of Publift - an adtech business that helps online publishers build sustainable revenue streams. He is an ad ops veteran and sports fanatic with a passion for self-improvement and creating better life situations for all.

I’m excited to share this episode with Colm where we explore his entrepreneurial and mindfulness journey both of which started after he and I had dinner together in Sydney, Australia 7 years ago. After that dinner he quit his job and set out on his own path. His mindfulness practice developed alongside his business and provided incredible support to him and all of the people that his business touches. 

In this episode Colm and I dive into:

• Colm’s thoughts on how entrepreneurship is a spiritual path in it’s own right
• How there is so much learning and growth that come from building a business and dealing with the challenges that come along with it.
• Why Colm has found it essential to build structure in the your day
• How Colm thinks about his metal diet to keep a healthy mind by avoiding news and social media
• Why Colm says it’s important to find a few minutes of mindfulness throughout the day to reset and flush out the “mental build up” that comes from living and working in the modern world. 
• How to discover what your values are and how you can check in with yourself from time to time to see if you are actually living in alignment with those values 
• How Colm learned his core values from his parents who ran a bed and breakfast in western Ireland. 
• How Colm led his teammates to develop the company values and how they built them into every aspect of their work from big decisions, one on ones and team meetings and more. 
• How advice from a friend helped Colm realize that he can combine his passion for mindfulness with his business instead of having to leave the company to focus on them. 
• How Colm creates a culture where people can learn and grow while having fun and making an impact 
• Colm’s top advice for people starting out with meditation and mindfulness
• Colm’s top advice for people pursuing financial independence
• The advice Colm would give to his younger self 

And so much more. I hope you enjoy my wonderful conversation with my friend Colm Dolan.

Find

In this 18 minute guided meditation, Adam Coelho leads us through the practice of visualizing how we’d like to show up in our lives. I generally consider this an affirmations practice, one in which I’m affirming the belief or way of being I’d like to cultivate in my life. It’s also a great meditation to try if you enjoyed the last episode of the podcast with Frazer Kirkman on Brain Programming. 

This session begins with a simple mindfulness of breath practice, simply resting in awareness of the sensations of breathing in the body. No where we need to go, nothing we need to do, simply observing this in breath and this out breath, as it is, right now. 

After settling the mind on the breath, I invite you to bring to mind a belief or way of being you’d like to embody as you show up in your life. Then I guide you as you practice visualizing yourself embodying that belief in the past, present and future. You’ll practice seeing how you’ve lived that belief in the past, how you’re living it in the present and how you will live it in the future. 

This is an incredibly powerful practice and one that I do most days. This practice had a profound impact on me during one of the most difficult times in my life. The more we practice visualizing ourselves living out these beliefs, including providing evidence to our mind’s of times we’ve lived them in the past, the more we orient our minds to living them out in the future. 

I hope you enjoy this practice and would love to hear what you think! Please share your feedback with me in the comments below. 

Please share this with your friends and write us a 5 Star review on Apple Podcasts!

Full show notes available mindfulfire.org. 

Welcome to the Mindful FIRE Podcast, where we explore living mindfully on the path to financial independence and beyond. I’m your host Adam Coelho and I’m glad you’re here. 

Today we talk to my friend, Frazer Kirkman, a very interesting character who I met teaching meditation at work. Frazer is now a software engineer but has an incredibly interesting story which includes him traveling the world teaching mindfulness and positive thinking for 10 years while living an incredibly minimalist lifestyle.   

In this episode Frazer and I dive into:

• What “brain programming” is and why it’s so powerful
• How we can use mindfulness to become aware of our current “programming” 
• How we can choose a different “program” for our minds that will take our lives in a different direction
• How “brain programming” can be applied to any area of our life
• How Frazer traveled the world for 10 years teaching mindfulness and positive thinking
• How Frazer lived on less than 10k per year
• Frazer’s thoughts on the positives and negatives of being a minimalist
• Frazer’s thoughts on the Financial Independence Retire Early movement 
• How Frazer builds community in his life and has a ton of fun while spending almost no money
• His thoughts on what it means to be and have enough
• How we can be more intentionally loving to our partners and people we care about
• Frazer’s top advice for people starting out with meditation and mindfulness
• Frazer’s top advice for people pursuing financial independence

And so much more. I hope you enjoy my wonderful conversation with my friend Frazer Kirkman.

Full Show Notes at MindfulFIRE.org

Welcome to the Mindful FIRE Podcast, where we explore living mindfully on the path to financial independence and beyond. 

In this 20 minute guided meditation, Adam Coelho leads us through the practice of Open Awareness. This practice is a bit different than what we’ve practiced in past weeks but I think you’ll really enjoy it. 

As you may know, meditation is not something mystical or magical, it’s simply mental training. It’s literally exercise for your brain, specifically the mental muscles of attention and meta-attention. 

Attention, everyone understands, as simply directing your focus to a particular object, for example the breath. Meta-attention however is “the attention of attention” or the ability to know your attention has wandered. 

Both the mindfulness practice I posted a few weeks ago and this practice train the mental muscles of attention and meta-attention, but do so in different ways, much like different exercises at the gym can strengthen certain muscles in your body. 

This practice begins with focusing our mind on the breath. From there we expand out until we’re resting in an open, choiceless awareness. In this open awareness, we’re practicing simply observing our experience as it comes, stays for a moment and then moves along. We notice the breath, sounds, sensations in the body, and thoughts in the mind as they come and go. 

I find this practice very helpful, especially when I want to be creative or would like to open my mind to new possibilities. That’s not exactly the point of the practice but I find it to be a nice side effect. The point is, as with most mindfulness practices, to develop awareness of what’s happening right now with an attitude of openness, curiosity and kindness. 

I hope you enjoy this practice and would love to hear what you think on Facebook or LinkedIn (#mindfulFIRE)

Please share this with your friends and write us a 5 Star review on Apple Podcasts!

See the full show notes at mindfulfire.org