Spread The Positive Podcast

Abby Walters is back. 12 years of Forever Friends Nashville, dog rescue with RARE, and Sunday nights with the Walters Band at Union Hill. Abby sits down with Trent six years after her first episode and goes back to the start. She grew up in Indiana, graduated high school at 17, and was teaching kindergarten at 21, walking out of her classroom on day one bawling to the teacher next door.

She moved to Nashville in 2010 right after the flood to sing, landed her first job at Farrago where she met Trent, and 12 years ago started Forever Friends Nashville, teaching herself to sew dog toys, leashes, and bandanas. By year ten it was a grind that didn't really make money, and she told herself something had to switch. The next day, waiting on the Biscuit Love family at table C10, a woman told her she'd emailed that week about carrying her products. A month later, wearing her Forever Friends shirt on the way to meet her newborn nephew, the woman at the airport shop counter said they'd been looking for a dog product business.

 Then it gets into the dogs. The Dino's and Dogs calendar is heading into year eight, and the first year was pure chaos, the same vibe as her first day teaching. Now they dress the dogs, pick a rescue every year, donate 100% of the proceeds, and have raised almost 20 grand. That's how she found RARE Rescue, a foster-based rescue with no building, and why she's fostering Carolina, a sweet hyper pup she pulled from a concrete building on a 105 degree day. And when she's not sewing or rescuing, she's at Union Hill Trading Post, home of chicken bingo and a Sunday open mic that turned into the six-piece Walters Band. Her stepdad came for her birthday and said it best: you're right, you can't explain this.

 1.Who is Abby Walters?

 A Nashville singer-songwriter, bartender, and dog advocate who founded Forever Friends Nashville 12 years ago.

2. What is Forever Friends Nashville?

Abby's handmade dog product company making toys, leashes, and bandanas, now carried at Biscuit Love, the Nashville airport, Bates Nursery, and Carter Vintage Guitars.

3.What is the Dino's and Dogs calendar?

A yearly dog calendar shot at Dino's Bar and Grill in East Nashville that donates 100% of proceeds to a rescue and has raised almost $20K.

4.How can you help RARE Rescue?

Follow them on Instagram, volunteer at events, foster, or join the Good Humans Club for $5 to $1,000 a month, and help raise $2,000 to unlock another $1,000 for their spay and neuter grant.

5.Where can you hear Abby sing?

Sunday nights at Union Hill Trading Post with the Walters Band, which she calls the every single week tour.

Where to find Abby Walters

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/abbywalters1/?hl=en

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/5yTqhT4uBRadtQlJFZkJGr

Apple Music: https://music.apple.com/us/artist/abby-walters/1440331613

 Where to find Furever Friends:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/fureverfriendsnashville/

Website: https://www.fureverfriendsnashville.com/

Where to find Spread The Positive:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/spreadthepositive.net

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/spreadthepositive/

Website: https://www.spreadthepositive.net/

Laura Dunnigan, the Riding Realtor, is biking Murfreesboro with a QR code on her back for 21 local nonprofits. Laura sits down with Trent to go back to Monongahela, Pennsylvania, a town of about 4,000 where her family did not have a car, so she walked and biked everywhere.

She wanted to be an artist, but her dad warned her about the starving artist thing, so she ended up in insurance for about 15 years, a lot of it working with Andy Weymouth. After selling her house in Tullahoma in 2020, she was sitting in Andy's office when it came over her: if not now, when? She jumped into real estate in July 2022, right as rates spiked, and started her design business at the same time.

She calls what she does staging on steroids, because people's first impression of a house is online now. Then it gets to the ride. Last year her friend Antoine challenged her to the Great Cycle Challenge for childhood cancer, and someone told her she was basically a rolling billboard. This year, riding around the square, she decided to bring it home. She asked the community to nominate their favorite nonprofits, and 18 people nominated 21 of them, starting with Interfaith Dental, which began in a broom closet in Nashville and now has a location in Murfreesboro.

She will ride with a big QR code on her back that goes straight to each organization, no money comes to her, and she did the math on what it would look like if the whole city pitched in.

1. Who is Laura Dunnigan?

A Murfreesboro realtor with Compass Real Estate, known as the Riding Realtor, who also runs Dunnigan Design.

2. What is Miles for Good? Laura's initiative where she bikes around Murfreesboro with a QR code on her back that links directly to 21 community-nominated nonprofits.

3. Does the money go to Laura? No, every QR code donation goes straight to the nonprofit organization.

4. Which nonprofits are included? Among the 21 are Interfaith Dental, Greenhouse Ministries, Middle Tennessee Boxer Rescue, the Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault Center, and the Center for the Arts.

5. How can you help? Scan the QR code safely (have your passenger do it if you are driving), share the posts on social media, or ride along with her.

Where to find Laura Dunnigan

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/heyitslauradunnigan/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/laurandunnigan

Website: https://www.compass.com/agents/laura-dunnigan/

Where to find Spread The Positive?

Socials

https://www.facebook.com/spreadthepositive.net

https://www.instagram.com/spreadthepositive/

Website: https://www.spreadthepositive.net/ 

Robert Vaughn bootstrapped a pottery brand out of a 1950s garage to 1,000 retailers, then sold it. Here are his 13 optimistic notes.   Robert came in with thirteen written notes, and his reason for writing them is the episode's point.

Most business podcast guests work at large, impressive companies, and if you are a small business owner or an employee, a lot of those lessons are not relevant to you. So he started at 11 and 12 years old, buying and selling on eBay before he had a debit card, handing cash to his 18-year-old football coach so the coach could run it through PayPal. He talks about bobblehead night at Angel Stadium, walking the concourse picking up the ones people left on counters, then standing near the exit offering $5 for a bobblehead he knew he could sell for 30. Adults kept showing up to Craigslist meetups asking for Robert Vaughn, expecting a 40-year-old. Then it gets into the businesses. Signing up as a dog walker on Rover for $15 a walk on his lunch break. Buying two rental properties in Bakersfield with a friend because the agent told them straight up, you guys are going to be slumlords. Starting a pottery company with his now wife with $1,000, a $250 Chromebook that couldn't run Excel, and a garage built in the 1950s that became their office and their warehouse. Their first sale arrived, in the customer's words, blown to smithereens, and that kept happening for six months until they got the damage rate under half a percent. That business ended with 17 employees and over 1,000 independent retailers, and they sold it in two pieces. He is honest about the year it closed: his dad died, his son was born four months later, and they accepted the offer the week after that.

1. Who is Robert Vaughn?

He is the founder of a home decor brand and of Brand Launchpad, a boutique management consulting firm, and he has worked at six startups and six other small to mid-sized businesses with two exits.

2. What business did he build and sell? 

A pottery and home decor company he started with his wife in February 2018 out of a one-bedroom apartment garage, which grew to 17 employees and over 1,000 independent retailers before selling in two pieces at the end of 2021 and mid 2022. 

3. What are his 13 optimistic notes?

They are the notes he wrote for this episode, covering genuine interest, humble beginnings, being a first timer, learning from others, the rewards of ownership, endless opportunities, selling great products, working with people you like, headwinds and tailwinds, business agency, presentation and perception, relationships, owning your success, and building a dream life.

4. What does Brand Launchpad do?

It is his consulting firm, founded in early 2023, that works with startups through mid-sized companies at four inflection points: starting up, aggressive growth, turnarounds, and buying or selling a business.

5. How do you get in touch with Robert?

He gives his email in the episode, [email protected] and his website is brandlp.com. 

Where to find Robert Vaughn:

 https://www.linkedin.com/in/robertvaughn2/

Where to find Spread The Positive?

Socials 

https://www.facebook.com/spreadthepositive.net

https://www.instagram.com/spreadthepositive/  

Website:

 https://www.spreadthepositive.net/

Chuck went from wiring bicycle dynamos as a kid to now being a pioneer in AI and creating a bar built on six continents. Here is his story.

Chuck sits down with Katie in his Harvard shirt to go back to the start. He talks about how he works best under stress, how he slows down and absorbs while everybody else panics, and why when a deadline slips he is the one who walks in, delivers the bad news, and hands over the solution in the same breath. By day he is a product manager building the next product for who you will be five years from now. But he keeps coming back to the same idea: a product is not successful until the user is happy with it.

He walks through predicting an onion shortage in management school, surveying five star hotel chefs about what they would substitute, and watching cabbage double in price six months later.

For the tinkerers, the fixers, the furniture flippers, and anyone who keeps a crazy idea brewing until it is real. If you like real conversations with people who build things with their hands and stay humble about it, this one is for you.

1. Who is Chuck? 

A friend Katie met through Harvard's Program for Leadership Development, a product manager in Tech and the owner of a bar called Six Cocktails.

2. What does he do for work? 

He is a product manager on cloud and software teams, focused on AI for the last three plus years after earlier work in the XR space.

3. What is Six Cocktails?

 His bar in California, where the menu rotates through six continents so customers can pick a country and try a different cocktail each time.

4. What is the onion and cabbage story?

 In management school he predicted a drought would spike onion prices and push people to substitute cabbage, surveyed five star hotel chefs to check, and watched cabbage double in price six months later.

5. Where can you find Chuck?

 He is barely on social media, so the two places to catch him are LinkedIn and behind the bar at Six Cocktails.

Where to find Chuck Thota

https://www.linkedin.com/in/chuck-thota-8726205/

Where to find Spread The Positive?

Socials 

https://www.facebook.com/spreadthepositive.net

https://www.instagram.com/spreadthepositive/

Website https://www.spreadthepositive.net/

Josh Chapman was born 3 months early and breathed through a straw. He now fixes chainsaws and works at Home Depot.

Trent sits down with Josh and his sister Katie taking it all the way back to expand his airway. Katie explains why that matters today: Josh's normal breathing is basically breathing through a straw, so physical activity is hard, but you would never know it watching him work.

From there it turns into pure Josh. He talks about the weed eater he found broken, how he took it home, and how he fixed it. He lays out the Josh Method, which is simpler than Marie Kondo: if it is not actively being used, it goes in the trash. The he speaks on seven years of stories from the Home Depot followed by the Big Texan 72oz steak challenge from the family's Amarillo trip.

FAQs

1. Who is Josh Chapman? 

Katie Chapman's older brother and Trent's guest, a Home Depot veteran who was born three months premature and is a working miracle.

2. What happened when Josh was born? 

He arrived three months early, his lungs collapsed, and he had emergency surgery where a rib was inserted into his trachea to expand his airway.

3. What is the Josh Method? 

Josh's take on minimalism: if you have not actively used something in about a year or two, it goes in the trash. No clutter kept out of just in case.

4. What is the Big Texan steak challenge? 

Eat a 72oz steak plus a shrimp cocktail, salad, baked potato, and dinner roll in one hour.

Watch to the end, meet Josh, and see why the title of this one had to be Building Character.

Alex Piedra, pediatric dentist, entrepreneur, and Harvard education graduate, joins us at Spread The Positive to share the mindset that helped him overcome poverty, family hardship, and setbacks to build a life centered on service. 

From immigrating to the United States as a young child to treating more than 60 patients a day, Alex explains why your circumstances don't define your future—your skills do.

Katie and Alex talk about growing up below the poverty line, the way the 2008 recession affected their childhoods, choosing dentistry over medicine, and leading with empathy.

His message is simple: success isn't about where you start—it's about what you're willing to learn and who you're willing to serve.

FAQs

1. Why does Alex believe success starts with skills instead of circumstances?

Because circumstances can change overnight, but the skills you develop stay with you and give you the ability to rebuild.

2. How did Alex choose pediatric dentistry?

After exploring many different passions, incuding medicine, he realized dentistry gave him the opportunity to serve others while maintaining a strong family life.

3. What helped Alex overcome childhood poverty and setbacks?

He credits mentors, lifelong learning, meaningful relationships, and consistently developing new skills.

4. What leadership lesson stands out most in this conversation?

Great leaders stay humble and listen to different perspectives to build strong teams instead of trying to succeed alone.

5. What's Alex's advice for someone starting over?

Value the people who invest in you, keep learning, and focus on building skills that no one can take away.

Connect with Alex Piedra on LinkedIn

https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexpiedra/

Where to find Spread The Positive?

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/spreadthepositive.net

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/spreadthepositive/

Website

https://www.spreadthepositive.net/

Licensed therapist Sarah Amos on when you actually need therapy, EMDR, and grief.

Stephanie sits down with Sarah Amos, owner and lead therapist at Sparrow Creek Counseling in Nashville, for a full conversation about mental health. Sarah explains the name behind her practice: sparrows know how to protect themselves, so when a storm rolls in or food gets scarce, they find a cool dry place to rest and preserve their energy instead of powering through. That's how she sees therapy, a creek where you rest before you go back out to fly.

They get into the real stuff. Sarah gives the honest signal that it's time to seek help. When Stephanie brings up losing her grandmother in November and going through her things box by box, Sarah names why that grief keeps surfacing: you're not going backward, you're a different person now, living in a different reality than before.

You do not have to do this alone. That's the whole point.

FAQs 

1. How do I know if I actually need therapy or if I'm overreacting? 

When the people around you start responding to your pain with "I don't know what to tell you," that's the sign your support system has given all it can and you probably need more than a listening ear.

2. What is EMDR and how does it help with trauma and grief? 

EMDR uses bilateral stimulation to calm your nervous system while you process, so you can observe that something happened instead of dropping into fight or flight every time you think about it.

3. Why do I still feel grief hit me when I thought I was doing better? 

Because the loss stays in your body and your mind, so those waves aren't setbacks, they're you still living with something that's part of your life now.

4. What's the difference between talk therapy and EMDR? 

Talk therapy uses your thinking to work through your story and beliefs, while EMDR works through your body and doesn't require much talking at all.

5. Where can I find Sparrow Creek Counseling and do they offer virtual sessions? 

You can find the whole team at Sparrow Creek Counseling online, with in-office sessions in Midtown Nashville and virtual therapy available across the state of Tennessee.

Follow Sparrow Creek Counseling on Facebook and Instagram for free mental health tips, 

https://www.facebook.com/saraamoscounseling/

https://www.instagram.com/sparrowcreekcounseling/

and visit their website to meet the team.

https://www.sparrowcreekcounseling.com/

Where to find Spread The Positive?

Socials 

https://www.facebook.com/spreadthepositive.net

https://www.instagram.com/spreadthepositive/

Website https://www.spreadthepositive.net/

Annlee Head and Rachael Jarman on their experiences in the 2026 MTSU Truck/ Bonnaroo course offered by the university. 

Both Juniors, the two have a strong passion for live video production and were determined to make this year's road crew for Bonnaroo. While in the program the two learned valuable skills for running a broadcast on stage at festivals, working on the 2026 "This Tent" with Hulu. 

Rachael and Annlee reminisce on their younger selves while naming all the artists they were able to work with. Naming notable artists like Mother Mother, Modest Mouse, and the Kesha Super Jam. 

On this episode we explore just how intense the program truly is as well as the amazing professors and students behind it all. 

FAQs

1. What sets did they direct?

Annlee directed Mother Mother and Rachael directed Modest Mouse, as well as assisting on multiple other student directors sets. 

2. How did they get into the program?

You have to be an MTSU Student with the required prerequisites or approval by the Dean of the program. 

3. When is the class?

It is a summer course in person on the MTSU campus and hands on in the Truck.

4. What is the Truck?

The Truck is a mobile live production studio run by the MTSU VFP department. 

5. What was their biggest lesson?

The crowd comes first, Annlee mentions how important it is to protect the people over getting the perfect shot. 

All in all the two say this experience solidified their desire to stay in the live production industry and encourage others to follow their dreams too.

Where to find Annlee?

https://www.instagram.com/lee.s_lenses/

https://www.instagram.com/annleehead/ 

https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61557554759652 

Where to find Rachael?

https://www.instagram.com/rachael.presley/ 

https://www.facebook.com/rachael.jarman.5 

Where to find Spread The Positive?

Socials 

https://www.facebook.com/spreadthepositive.net

https://www.instagram.com/spreadthepositive/

Website https://www.spreadthepositive.net/

Contractor Justin Edwards on 50 years building Murfreesboro's square, from horsehair plaster to a hidden room full of Civil War boxes. Justin grew up going to job sites with his dad, who started the business back in 1979. He went to MTSU thinking he might do something else, but he always kept one foot in construction, and now he and his dad meet every single day to run the company together.

As he puts it, they've learned how to argue and still get along. Working on the square means no bid ever really holds, because you never know what's inside a 100-year-old wall. Justin has found plumbing looping into units that don't own it, wiring running to nothing, a walled-off basement full of Civil War ammunition boxes, and Levi's pamphlets that fell out of a ceiling from back when the building was a JC Penney. He also gets into the old courthouse, where they patched horsehair plaster at night over the Christmas shutdown.

FAQ's

1. Who is Justin Edwards? A second-generation contractor with Barry Edwards Construction, working on Murfreesboro's square and across Middle Tennessee.
2. How long has the business been around? His dad started it in 1979, so it's coming up on 50 years.
3. What does the company specialize in? The complicated and difficult jobs, especially old buildings, permits, code, and investigatory work on bad construction, water, and fire damage.
4. What's the weirdest thing they've found in a building? A walled-off basement storeroom full of Civil War ammunition boxes on the north side of the square.
5. Where can I find Barry Edwards Construction? Search "Barry Edwards Construction" on Google, where the office and cell numbers are listed. If you've ever opened up an old wall and held your breath, you'll get this one

Barry Edwards Construction: https://buildbec.com/

Spread The Positive website: spreadthepositive.net

Socials: @spreadthepositive

0:00 The thing about old buildings: Earth moves

0:29 A word from Bryan Nale, Premise Bank

1:15 Meet Justin Edwards, Edwards Construction

1:59 Growing up on job sites with his dad

3:09 Specializing in the jobs nobody else wants

6:34 The strangest things found on the square

7:20 Civil War ammo boxes and JC Penney pamphlets

9:32 Horsehair plaster at the old courthouse

12:34 What's going right, and following God

14:30 Trust, poker, and why hiding your budget hurts

#JustinEdwards #BarryEdwardsConstruction #EdwardsConstruction #MurfreesboroSquare #HistoricRestoration #OldBuildings#SpreadThePositive #STPPodcast #TrentDenson #PositivePodcast

Jaylene Hall on pivoting from music business to tech, starting a design TikTok, and leaving it all to move to Charleston.

Jaylene graduated college in 2020 with a music business degree and a touring internship that Covid wiped out, and for the first time she felt relief instead of disappointment. She picked up a design certification, messed around in Figma building app mockups, and realized tech was pulling at her. Four plus years later at Asurion, she had stability, mentors, and good income, and she's now stepping away from it to start over by the beach.

At 25 she bought her first rental, lived in it for a year, and repainted every wall and swapped light fixtures herself. That revamp became her interior design TikTok, where she mixes feminine colors with darker masculine tones. 

Now she's packing boxes from for the move to Charleston, and the conversation lands on something meaningful: be intentional about fun, and don't save it for one week a year.

FAQs 

1.Why is Jaylene leaving tech? 

She's moving to Charleston with her fiance and giving herself space to choose what's next instead of rushing to the next thing.

2.How did she get into tech?

 A UX design certification she earned at home during Covid pointed her toward the industry.

3.How did her interior design TikTok start? 

She started documenting the revamp of the rental property she bought at 25.

4.What does she want to do next? 

She's leaning toward project or change management, possibly in design, but she's letting herself decide without a fixed plan.

5.What's the one piece of advice she keeps hearing from older people? Be intentional about fun and don't put it off for someday.

It's okay to not have it all figured out, so find a creative outlet and pick the next thing on purpose.