The Maverick Show: Global Travel Stories & Life Beyond Borders

Learn the mechanics of true speed reading and how to dramatically increase your pace without sacrificing comprehension.

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Get the Monday Minute my weekly email with 3 personal recs for travel, culture, and living beyond borders you can read in 60 seconds.

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ON THIS EPISODE

May Ling Lai shares her personal story of growing up on the Florida Gulf Coast where she became a musical performer on local stages starting at age 5 because her mother wanted to prevent any tendencies towards shyness. She talks about her ongoing passion for music and the business lessons all people can take from karaoke. May Ling even performs an a cappella song on the Maverick Show! She then talks about running her first marathon at age 35, and subsequently completing 3 full marathons and 20 half marathons in a dozen countries. She explains the concept of “meditation in motion” and how distance running enabled her to meditate at a much higher level, both while running and stationary. She talks about some of her most recent trips to Budapest, Rome and Kuala Lumpur, including a story about why you should always talk to your taxi driver. She then goes on to discuss her latest course “The 7 Skills of Speedreading” and explains how she can read at about 10x the average person’s speed. She talks about how she became a speed-reader out of necessity when she was managing a billion dollar “short portfolio” for a hedge fund when the economy started to collapse. She dismantles the misnomer about speed-reading being a “hack” and talks through the actual mechanics of how people can learn to speed-read without comprehension loss.re-discover herself and re-take control over her life and her future.

→ Full show notes with direct links to everything discussed are available here.

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Explore The Maverick Show Starter Packs — some of my favorite conversations curated by theme so you can easily find the episodes that match your interests.

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FREE RESOURCES FOR YOU

See my Top 10 Travel Apps

See my Top 10 Books that Shaped the Way I Travel

See my 7 Keys For Building A Remote Business (Even in a space that’s not traditionally virtual)

Watch my Video Training on Stylish Minimalist Packing so you can join #TeamCarryOn

See the Travel Gear I Use and Recommend

See How I Produce The Maverick Show Podcast (The equipment, services & vendors I use)

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Hear how world travel and leaving prescription drugs behind helped her confront trauma and rebuild life on her terms.

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Get the Monday Minute my weekly email with 3 personal recs for travel, culture, and living beyond borders you can read in 60 seconds.

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ON THIS EPISODE

Brooke Siem talks about her work as an Extreme Performance Training (XPT) certified coach and explains the theory and practice behind the XPT workshop she conducted in New York City the day before the recording, in which Matt participated. She discusses the value of sitting in 3-minute ice baths to practice calming your body down through breath work in high intensity situations, a technique that is subsequently transferrable to handling high stress situations in business, travel and life. She then explains how she works remotely as a “breath coach” with private clients that include professional poker players, and shares her tips for the most important steps to developing a meaningful breath practice. She also shares her personal back story of her professional ballet dancing career getting unexpectedly derailed and how she then pivoted and pursued a culinary career—becoming a chef, opening the Prohibition Bakery in Manhattan to sell “boozy cupcakes”, authoring a cookbook, and competing (and winning) on the Food Network TV show “Chopped”. Brooke also opens up about her personal struggles with eating disorders, suicidal tendencies and living half her life on a cocktail of anti-depressant and anti-anxiety drugs. She shares her life changing decision at age 30 to get off all prescription drugs, became a digital nomad, and joined the Remote Year program to travel the world with a community of 50 people for a year. Brooke explains how her discovery of non-traditional “self-compassion” therapy helped her heal past traumas, overcome her eating disorders, and begin a process of self-renewal. She also shares how the Remote Year experience and subsequent world travel helped enable her to re-discover herself and re-take control over her life and her future.

→ Full show notes with direct links to everything discussed are available here.

============================

FIND YOUR NEXT EPISODE

Explore The Maverick Show Starter Packs — some of my favorite conversations curated by theme so you can easily find the episodes that match your interests.

============================

FREE RESOURCES FOR YOU

See my Top 10 Travel Apps

See my Top 10 Books that Shaped the Way I Travel

See my 7 Keys For Building A Remote Business (Even in a space that’s not traditionally virtual)

Watch my Video Training on Stylish Minimalist Packing so you can join #TeamCarryOn

See the Travel Gear I Use and Recommend

See How I Produce The Maverick Show Podcast (The equipment, services & vendors I use)

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Learn how embracing failure, distributed teams, and intentional culture can turn an event into a truly loyal community.

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Get the Monday Minute my weekly email with 3 personal recs for travel, culture, and living beyond borders you can read in 60 seconds.

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ON THIS EPISODE

Johannes Voelkner takes us on his digital nomad journey, which started in 2010. He shares many of his initial failures and setbacks, all of which led him to start what would become one of the largest Facebook groups for digital nomads. He explains how that ultimately led to the founding of The Nomad Cruise, which now attracts nearly 500 participants per voyage and is one of the largest ‘workation’ events in the world. Johannes then takes us behind the scenes and talks about how he runs and grows The Nomad Cruise as a business. He explains his process for identifying and hiring his team, his process for managing distributed staff and volunteers across time zones, the project management software he uses, and the operational systems he has developed for organizing the Nomad Cruise conference. He also explains why he incorporates a “night of failures” on every cruise and shares his personal belief in the importance of repeated failure in order to create the eventual outcome of success, and wanting to foster a supportive environment on the cruise for people to talk about their failures. He also reflects on how he has been able to cultivate fierce brand loyalty from customers, staff and volunteers who continually return for cruise after cruise, and why building ‘community’ is his core passion and driving inspiration. He also discusses his personal day structure, work routines, and his passion for kitesurfing as a destination sport that inspires many of his personal choices in travel locations.

→ Full show notes with direct links to everything discussed are available here.

============================

FIND YOUR NEXT EPISODE

Explore The Maverick Show Starter Packs — some of my favorite conversations curated by theme so you can easily find the episodes that match your interests.

============================

FREE RESOURCES FOR YOU

See my Top 10 Travel Apps

See my Top 10 Books that Shaped the Way I Travel

See my 7 Keys For Building A Remote Business (Even in a space that’s not traditionally virtual)

Watch my Video Training on Stylish Minimalist Packing so you can join #TeamCarryOn

See the Travel Gear I Use and Recommend

See How I Produce The Maverick Show Podcast (The equipment, services & vendors I use)

============================

ENJOYING THE SHOW?

Follow The Maverick Show on Instagram and DM Matt to continue the conversation

Please leave a rating and review — it really helps the show and I read each one personally

Support the show by buying me a coffee — espressos help me produce significantly better podcast episodes!

Learn the seven-step sales system behind his growth and why product-market fit must always come before trying to scale.

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Get the Monday Minute my weekly email with 3 personal recs for travel, culture, and living beyond borders you can read in 60 seconds.

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ON THIS EPISODE

Sean Tierney shares his background as a musician, kite surfer, entrepreneur, podcast host, digital nomad and, since 2015, the Director of Sales at Pagely. Tasked with selling B-to-B to Fortune 500 companies, he explains the techniques he used to increase Pagely's sales by 70% in a single year while traveling the world with Remote Year, living in 18 countries, and closing his single largest deal from a Moroccan bowling alley. Sean then breaks down the sales systems he developed into 7 steps but emphasizes the importance of establishing product-market-fit before attempting any scaling techniques. Post-product-market-fit, he explains the importance of starting with "flow mapping" the lead experience. He then shares the next step of measuring metrics and KPIs. Next he explains how to build a sales "process". Then he explains his concept of "Flintstoning" and why it is so important. After that he explains how to start "delegating", and eventually to start "automating". And finally, he talks about the more advanced technique of "Scaling Personal Attention", and discusses the "Choose Your Own Adventure" interactive video experience he developed for Pagely. We then move on to talk about Sean's world travel adventures and his experience hosting The Nomad Podcast. He then explains the scope of his "Nomad Prep Academy" that he created as a course for helping people get into the digital nomad lifestyle. And finally he shares his vision of the future of remote work and how the digital nomad ecosystem is evolving, and he explains why he thinks people deserve to lead extraordinary lives and how nomadic travel can help them to do so.

→ Full show notes with direct links to everything discussed are available here.

============================

FIND YOUR NEXT EPISODE

Explore The Maverick Show Starter Packs — some of my favorite conversations curated by theme so you can easily find the episodes that match your interests.

============================

FREE RESOURCES FOR YOU

See my Top 10 Travel Apps

See my Top 10 Books that Shaped the Way I Travel

See my 7 Keys For Building A Remote Business (Even in a space that’s not traditionally virtual)

Watch my Video Training on Stylish Minimalist Packing so you can join #TeamCarryOn

See the Travel Gear I Use and Recommend

See How I Produce The Maverick Show Podcast (The equipment, services & vendors I use)

============================

ENJOYING THE SHOW?

Follow The Maverick Show on Instagram and DM Matt to continue the conversation

Please leave a rating and review — it really helps the show and I read each one personally

Support the show by buying me a coffee — espressos help me produce significantly better podcast episodes!

Learn how humor, audience feedback, and smart content strategy transformed her teaching into a thriving online business.

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Get the Monday Minute my weekly email with 3 personal recs for travel, culture, and living beyond borders you can read in 60 seconds.

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ON THIS EPISODE

Anja Winter shares her journey from growing up in her hometown in Germany to becoming a “Teacher-Nomad” who has been travelling the world full time for 5 years and now makes over 6 figures a year teaching German online. She explains how she began teaching both German and English in Chiang Mai, Thailand in a traditional classroom setting and was able to re-connect with her passion for teaching.  She then tells the story of how she began making videos for her students and eventually realized that the humor and creativity she used when teaching German had a much broader appeal and was able to grow her YouTube channel to over 340,000 subscribers. She breaks down the techniques she used to build her audience and makes specific tactical recommendations ranging from posting frequency to production quality to marketing strategies to attract new viewers.  She then shares the moment when she first realized she could monetize her YouTube channel, and how she grew that from her first $3 to a six-figure annual income. She then explains how she listened to the needs of her audience, and created multiple courses to fill those needs that she was then able to market and sell directly to her YouTube audience. She also talks about her travel life, why she has chosen to travel the world very slowly over the last 5 years, what her favorite travel destinations have been, and why she chose to join the Remote Year program to travel the world with a community of nomads for all of 2019.

→ Full show notes with direct links to everything discussed are available here.

============================

FIND YOUR NEXT EPISODE

Explore The Maverick Show Starter Packs — some of my favorite conversations curated by theme so you can easily find the episodes that match your interests.

============================

FREE RESOURCES FOR YOU

See my Top 10 Travel Apps

See my Top 10 Books that Shaped the Way I Travel

See my 7 Keys For Building A Remote Business (Even in a space that’s not traditionally virtual)

Watch my Video Training on Stylish Minimalist Packing so you can join #TeamCarryOn

See the Travel Gear I Use and Recommend

See How I Produce The Maverick Show Podcast (The equipment, services & vendors I use)

============================

ENJOYING THE SHOW?

Follow The Maverick Show on Instagram and DM Matt to continue the conversation

Please leave a rating and review — it really helps the show and I read each one personally

Support the show by buying me a coffee — espressos help me produce significantly better podcast episodes!

Hear how years of wild mistakes and close calls became stories he monetized and lessons for living more boldly today.

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Get the Monday Minute my weekly email with 3 personal recs for travel, culture, and living beyond borders you can read in 60 seconds.

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ON THIS EPISODE

Nick Martin tells his story of leaving his corporate job in Germany in 2010 with 9,010 Euros in his bank account to embark on a year of adventure, “couch-surfing” around the world on a $30/day budget. He takes us through his journey starting with his first destination, Mexico, which began with lost-in-translation moments as he learned Spanish with a host family and culminating in a near-death experience on a catamaran caught in a storm with 36 foot waves, a ripped sail, busted motor and lost dingy. He then takes us through his hilarious trip through the U.S. where he wound up being a stripper at a bachelorette party in Las Vegas to make some travel money and later found himself on a naked bike ride in Seattle. He then shares his adventure in Fiji where, after island hopping and a day of beach volleyball, someone accidentally shot him with a spear gun and he had to be rushed to the hospital in a local fishing boat. After recovering and spending time in Australia to finish out his year, he explains how he decided to continue traveling, which has turned into 8 years of adventures and counting. He explains how he subsequently monetized his travel stories into a book, podcast, course, and professional stage show that has drawn paid audiences of over 1,000 people. He also explains how he landed his first TEDX talk in 2017 and what it was like. Nick concludes by sharing his biggest life lessons from his travel adventures, how to deal with haters, why he recommends making tons of mistakes, and his top advice for living life to the fullest.

→ Full show notes with direct links to everything discussed are available here.

============================

FIND YOUR NEXT EPISODE

Explore The Maverick Show Starter Packs — some of my favorite conversations curated by theme so you can easily find the episodes that match your interests.

============================

FREE RESOURCES FOR YOU

See my Top 10 Travel Apps

See my Top 10 Books that Shaped the Way I Travel

See my 7 Keys For Building A Remote Business (Even in a space that’s not traditionally virtual)

Watch my Video Training on Stylish Minimalist Packing so you can join #TeamCarryOn

See the Travel Gear I Use and Recommend

See How I Produce The Maverick Show Podcast (The equipment, services & vendors I use)

============================

ENJOYING THE SHOW?

Follow The Maverick Show on Instagram and DM Matt to continue the conversation

Please leave a rating and review — it really helps the show and I read each one personally

Support the show by buying me a coffee — espressos help me produce significantly better podcast episodes!

Learn how a self-taught musician used creative teaching and audience building to create recurring income on his terms.

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Get the Monday Minute my weekly email with 3 personal recs for travel, culture, and living beyond borders you can read in 60 seconds.

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ON THIS EPISODE

Tobias Rauscher shares his story of being unable to sing or read music and yet teaching himself by ear to be a modern percussive finger-style guitarist.  He explains why he became so passionate about this form of music and how he started creating and performing his own songs on his YouTube channel which now has over 300,000 subscribers and has gotten over 14 million views on a single video.  He then shares the story of his entrepreneurial trajectory, including lessons learned from his first failed business venture in his home country of Germany. He goes on to explain how he then built his Guitar Academy into an online business that generates him 6 figures/year in net passive income.  The membership site teaches students not only how to play his songs but teaches the actual creative process for creating their own original songs as well. He also talks about strategies for building audience on YouTube, and outlines the biggest mistake that most musicians make when trying to build a fan base.  He then discusses his “Tube Accelerator” business where he teaches musicians how to most effectively build audience on YouTube. He also explains his latest project of creating an online “Digital Lifestyle Conference” that interviews successful location independent entrepreneurs. He concludes by sharing how he structures his personal work/travel lifestyle, his top book and app recommendations, and his number one tip for early-stage entrepreneurs.  

→ Full show notes with direct links to everything discussed are available here.

============================

FIND YOUR NEXT EPISODE

Explore The Maverick Show Starter Packs — some of my favorite conversations curated by theme so you can easily find the episodes that match your interests.

============================

FREE RESOURCES FOR YOU

See my Top 10 Travel Apps

See my Top 10 Books that Shaped the Way I Travel

See my 7 Keys For Building A Remote Business (Even in a space that’s not traditionally virtual)

Watch my Video Training on Stylish Minimalist Packing so you can join #TeamCarryOn

See the Travel Gear I Use and Recommend

See How I Produce The Maverick Show Podcast (The equipment, services & vendors I use)

============================

ENJOYING THE SHOW?

Follow The Maverick Show on Instagram and DM Matt to continue the conversation

Please leave a rating and review — it really helps the show and I read each one personally

Support the show by buying me a coffee — espressos help me produce significantly better podcast episodes!

Hear how encounters with local generosity transformed epic adventures into a mission to empower communities worldwide.

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Get the Monday Minute my weekly email with 3 personal recs for travel, culture, and living beyond borders you can read in 60 seconds.

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ON THIS EPISODE

Tarek Kholoussy tells his story of growing up in Philadelphia, going to top academic institutions, and working in world leading financial institutions in New York and London until one day he decided to completely change his life course. He explains what inspired him to quit his job and travel the world, having now been to 100 countries before the age of 40. He shares stories about his epic adventures including racing a rickshaw across India and taking a matatu across Kenya and illegally crossing the border into Uganda by accident. He also shares stories about the humanity, thoughtfulness and authentic warmth he encountered from local people in country after country. He then explains how he began setting physical fitness goals and started pushing his body to the next level by running 25 marathons around the world. Those included the world’s highest marathon at Mount Everest Basecamp, two ultra (double) marathons, and running 16 marathons in 16 months across 13 countries. He then talks about his true passion of supporting socially sustainable initiatives that empower marginalized and impoverished communities around the world. He explains how and why he decided to found Nomads Giving Back, a social enterprise which creates awareness and opportunities for nomads and travelers to give back in a manner that supports and empowers local communities. And finally he concludes by sharing his tips on how everyone can begin finding and pursuing their own purpose in life. 

→ Full show notes with direct links to everything discussed are available here.

============================

FIND YOUR NEXT EPISODE

Explore The Maverick Show Starter Packs — some of my favorite conversations curated by theme so you can easily find the episodes that match your interests.

============================

FREE RESOURCES FOR YOU

See my Top 10 Travel Apps

See my Top 10 Books that Shaped the Way I Travel

See my 7 Keys For Building A Remote Business (Even in a space that’s not traditionally virtual)

Watch my Video Training on Stylish Minimalist Packing so you can join #TeamCarryOn

See the Travel Gear I Use and Recommend

See How I Produce The Maverick Show Podcast (The equipment, services & vendors I use)

============================

ENJOYING THE SHOW?

Follow The Maverick Show on Instagram and DM Matt to continue the conversation

Please leave a rating and review — it really helps the show and I read each one personally

Support the show by buying me a coffee — espressos help me produce significantly better podcast episodes!

Learn how early failures shaped his approach to automation, risk reduction, and creating courses people want to buy.

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Get the Monday Minute my weekly email with 3 personal recs for travel, culture, and living beyond borders you can read in 60 seconds.

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ON THIS EPISODE

David Dang Vu talks about his working-class upbringing in a Vietnamese immigrant household in Southern California and credits his mother as his primary inspiration to become an entrepreneur. He explains his pure-bred entrepreneurial tendencies, selling and flipping products to his classmates going all the way back to middle school, and his decision to drop out of college after one semester to go build businesses. David shares his initial business failures before building his first multi-million dollar company selling t-shirts. He explains that innovation and creating a unique user experience is what helped his t-shirt company land celebrity clients like Taylor Swift and LMFAO. He explains his decision to sell his interest and how he moved on to build a $3 million gift card company. David then talks about how he discovered the ability to dropship on Ebay and built that into a business which now nets him over $300K/year. He then documented exactly how he did it in a course that he sold on the Udemy platform, which became the bestselling Business course on Udemy in both 2016 and 2017. He then shares his latest business venture doing AirBNB Arbitrage (renting an apartment on a long-term lease and then subletting it out for short-term rental rates on AirBNB) which now nets him over $300K/Year. He talks about how he selects the location, mitigates downside risks, creates systems and automates the business. He explains how he then made another successful Udemy course about the AirBNB arbitrage business. Having now sold over $1 million in courses on Udemy, David also shares his tips on creating and selling a successful online course. He concludes by telling the story of how he met his wife while traveling the world as a digital nomad.

→ Full show notes with direct links to everything discussed are available here.

============================

FIND YOUR NEXT EPISODE

Explore The Maverick Show Starter Packs — some of my favorite conversations curated by theme so you can easily find the episodes that match your interests.

============================

FREE RESOURCES FOR YOU

See my Top 10 Travel Apps

See my Top 10 Books that Shaped the Way I Travel

See my 7 Keys For Building A Remote Business (Even in a space that’s not traditionally virtual)

Watch my Video Training on Stylish Minimalist Packing so you can join #TeamCarryOn

See the Travel Gear I Use and Recommend

See How I Produce The Maverick Show Podcast (The equipment, services & vendors I use)

============================

ENJOYING THE SHOW?

Follow The Maverick Show on Instagram and DM Matt to continue the conversation

Please leave a rating and review — it really helps the show and I read each one personally

Support the show by buying me a coffee — espressos help me produce significantly better podcast episodes!

Hear why he sold everything at 50 and how slow travel lets him pursue every country while continuing to lead a company.

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Get the Monday Minute my weekly email with 3 personal recs for travel, culture, and living beyond borders you can read in 60 seconds.

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ON THIS EPISODE

Palle Bo (aka “The Radio Vagabond”) shares his story of deciding to become a full time digital nomad at age 50. He explains what led up to his decision to sell all his stuff and slow-travel the world on a quest to visit every country while documenting it all on his podcast The Radio Vagabond. He tells stories from his travel adventures, including his trip to Macao where he took the highest bungee jump in the world, his hot air balloon ride over Siem Reap, Cambodia, and what it was like to visit North Korea. He also talks about his professional journey founding radio stations in Denmark (he now co-owns 17 stations), and then founding RadioGuru, an award-winning company that produces radio commercials and podcasts, which he now runs remotely as the CEO while traveling the world. He explains how he landed LEGO as a client, and both produced and hosted the LEGO Technic podcast. He tells the story of how that project got him secret and confidential access to the Bugatti factory, what it was like inside and what he learned from interviewing their staff. He also shares his professional tips on what makes a truly great and effective audio commercial for radio or podcasts, and tells you how you can follow his travel adventures.

→ Full show notes with direct links to everything discussed are available here.

============================

FIND YOUR NEXT EPISODE

Explore The Maverick Show Starter Packs — some of my favorite conversations curated by theme so you can easily find the episodes that match your interests.

============================

FREE RESOURCES FOR YOU

See my Top 10 Travel Apps

See my Top 10 Books that Shaped the Way I Travel

See my 7 Keys For Building A Remote Business (Even in a space that’s not traditionally virtual)

Watch my Video Training on Stylish Minimalist Packing so you can join #TeamCarryOn

See the Travel Gear I Use and Recommend

See How I Produce The Maverick Show Podcast (The equipment, services & vendors I use)

============================

ENJOYING THE SHOW?

Follow The Maverick Show on Instagram and DM Matt to continue the conversation

Please leave a rating and review — it really helps the show and I read each one personally

Support the show by buying me a coffee — espressos help me produce significantly better podcast episodes!