Travel Wisdom Podcast -travel and learn languages for success and money

Lawrence Leyton is a therapist who has helped people overcome fears. In this episode, Ladan interviews Lawrence Leyton and one of his clients, Mark Wein, whom Leyton has helped to overcome his fear of flying. Lawrence Leyton and Mark Wein have since created a course to help people overcome the fear of flying. In this episode, they discuss the fear of flying in detail, what it is, and how it affects people's lives.

Top three takeaways:

1. People don't realize how small the risk of being involved in an aircraft accident is. There is a higher chance of dying from falling down stairs or being kicked by a donkey than there is of dying in a plane crash. However, the fear of flying often stems from the perception of a plane crash, rather than the actual statistics.
2. A phobic creates fear by concentrating on the worst-case scenario of a situation. Whereas most people would view a vacation as a positive experience, a phobic person focuses on what can go wrong, like for instance the plane crashing on the way to their destinations.
3. Sometimes after gaining new major responsibilities, such as having children, people become more conscious about the risks they take. In the case of flying, people worry more about being involved in a plane crash and not being able to be there for their children.

In this episode, Ladan discusses his trip to China. He discusses the sights he saw, the experiences he's had, as well as how China is modernizing.

Top three takeaways:

1. A lot of China's advancements, such as the proliferation of electric vehicles, bullet trains, and more modern ways of paying for goods and services (such as facial recognition) are mostly a matter of the last 3 or so years.
2. China is not a democratic country, as is clearly illustrated by the "Great Firewall", which censors the internet for its citizens. VPNs are required to access common sites such as Google, Facebook, Instagram, etc. However, the lack of democracy may be how China is able to advance so quickly without much hindrance.
3. The best way to know what a country is truly like is to go and see it for yourself. Propaganda and hearsay do not paint the true picture of what a country is like. By visiting China, one can see how modern and advanced they truly are.

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David Wood is a coach who teaches people to have tough conversations. These conversations are the most important things you can do otherwise you will repeat the thing you didn't want to happen over and over.

After a long hiatus here is my first episode talking about my trip to Thailand this summer

Shawn Paris has spent the last 4 years of his life essentially homeless. He has stayed with around 200 couchsurfing hosts in the US, France and Japan while going around and performing. I hosted him for a few days and we ended up talking about the benefits of living like this. I had done something similar in 2017 and although I got sick of it after a year, it definitely had its benefits.

It is definitely possible to save rent money or money on a mortgage and spend that on travel instead.

I talk to my friend here in Gainesville, Joe Uong. We met because of his great language ability in German which he had only been learning a few months.

His secret was using a service called Lingoda. Here they offer group language lessons in German, French, Spanish, or Business English. You have a teacher and go through specific language lessons with up to 4 other students via a video Zoom meeting.

Joe ended up doing their quarterly language half Marathon where you if you complete 15 hour-long classes per month for 3 months then you get half of the 109 euro (~$122) monthly course fee refunded!! For the language full Marathon you would get all of the 219 euro (~$245) monthly charge refunded if you completed 30 hour-long courses!!!

You can get free language lessons!

Joe and I talk about the service and some of the benefits over using a free service like Duolingo. Each has its purpose. I ended up using Lingoda for the half Marathon also and I really ended up enjoying how much my language learning improved.

Get a $75 discount off the first month using the code

G-7CEA3R

This also gives me a few free lessons, everyone wins!

I met Tom at a conference last year and we really hit it off because of both of our travels. Turns out he travelled all around the world many decades ago when the world was a different place. He was able to go to Iraq, Afghanistan, and saw India as a different place than it is now. This conversation was very interesting to see how things have changed over the last few decades. It was also interesting to see the change in him, going from travelling hippy to successful in his profession.

Mikkel Thorup is the host of the Expat Money Show where he talks about the advantages of setting up many of life's things abroad.

"PROTECT THE MONEY YOU WORKED SO HARD TO EARN FROM AMBULANCE CHASING LAWYERS, NEFARIOUS CREDITORS AND GREEDY UNJUST GOVERNMENTS"

It was a pleasure to talk to Casey Fenton, the founder of Couchsurfing again. We had met a year ago in Bali but with a tight schedule and us celebrating his 40th birthday we never ended up recording an episode at that time.

Luckily, he is now writing a book about his experiences building my favorite community for travel. Couchsurfing allows you to stay with strangers for free while travelling and its all backed on a review system that makes sure you stay safe. I've used it over 100 times and I have to say that some of my best friendships have come from the site!

Matt Ward is the host of the Disruptors podcast which was formerly Fringe FM. He had built a company to a million dollars within about a year all while maintaining his love for podcasting. Now he is working on a podcast around the future of humanity, scientists, education, healthcare and manned space travel.

In this episode we talk about how he started on his path by going to go travel and knowing he couldn't work for anyone else.