True North Story® Original Podcast Series

“Jeff Leisawitz burns with a mission— to inspire writers, artists, musicians, filmmakers, entre’preneurs (and everyone else) to amp up their creativity, heal their hearts and shine in the world.”

Jeff is an award-winning musician/ producer, a critically acclaimed author and internationally distributed filmmaker who has devoted his life to creativity.

As the guy behind Electron Love Theory, Jeff fused interviews with Seattle’s WTO demonstrators into electronic music, garnering more than a quarter million downloads worldwide. Jeff has released five studio albums and has landed thousands of music placements in film, TV and multimedia for clients like HBO, MTV, Discovery, Microsoft, NBC and many others.

As the founding writer for Seattle’s taste-making alternative rock station 107.7 The End, he chronicled the alternative grunge scene in the 90s.

After training as a Life Coach and practicing NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Re-Patterning) Jeff landed a gig as an adjunct faculty member at Pacific Lutheran University— teaching college students to rock. (Seriously)

When creative businesses, schools and organizations like Brown Paper Tickets, Tacoma School of the Arts, Gage Academy of Art, Northwest Film Forum and others need to amp up the creativity, Jeff leads workshops and events to fire up the creative spirit and empower people to tap into their true potential.

Jeff is available for workshops and speaking gigs in the Seattle metro area and select cities across the country.

“Not F*ing Around— the No Bullsh*t Guide for Getting Your Creative Dreams Off the Ground” is Jeff’s very first book.

Say it. Ask it. Bring it. Jeff wants to hear from you. This is Jeff Leisawitz and this is his True North Story®

If you would like to connect with Jeff visit him @ www.jeffleisawitz.com and follow her on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram & YouTube. 

Please also follow, like & subscribe to True North Story®  on the following social platforms Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, SoundCloud, iTunes, GooglePlay & YouTube.

Learn. Love. Listen. Live. Your True North Story® 

#SomethingForEveryone #PurpleLOVE

Since making her debut in 2010, K.Flay has spun fearlessly detailed lyrics that show the bright and dark of the world in her head. For her second full-length Every Where Is Some Where, the L.A.-based alt-pop/hip-hop artist pushed deeper into introspection while adding an element of political commentary. The result is her most deliberate and dynamic work yet, a thrillingly vital album that channels the frenzy and anxieties of today’s world.

The follow-up to her 2016 EP Crush Me—whose lead single “Blood in the Cut” hit the top 5 on Alternative radio—Every Where Is Some Where amps up its defiant spirit with a densely textured yet gritty sound. “After Life as a Dog I was listening to so much late-’90s/early-’00s rock,” says K.Flay, aka Kristine Flaherty, referring to her 2014 full-length debut. “I was absorbing the energy of people like Karen O, Shirley Manson, and Emily Haines and feeling totally inspired by it, so there’s lots more live guitar, bass, and drums on this record.” Working with producers like Mike Elizondo (Twenty One Pilots, Fiona Apple, Regina Spektor, Skylar Grey) and Tommy English (BØRNS, Andrew McMahon in the Wilderness, Ladyhawke), K.Flay deftly infused the album with the same raw intensity she’s revealed in touring with such artists as Passion Pit, Icona Pop, Awolnation, and Theophilus London.

An inimitable lyricist who names novelist Marilynne Robinson among her inspirations, K.Flay also brought a literary sensibility to the making of Every Where Is Some Where. The album’s title, for instance, aims to “capture the flexibility of meaning, the way we fashion our own narratives,” according to Flaherty. “As a songwriter, that’s my main enterprise—looking at the events in my life and engaging in a constant framing and reframing of those events,” she says. “Experience is subjective. We get to decide what’s devastating, what’s beautiful, and what we do next. In the books of our lives, we are both protagonist and narrator. And narrators have incredible power.”

On the lead single from Every Where Is Some Where, K.Flay explores the power of lucid self-acceptance and delivers one of the album’s most blatantly upbeat tracks. Matching her seamless flow with sing-song melody, “High Enough” fuses breezy rhythm and gritty guitar lines into a hopeful meditation on keeping clear-headed.

“There are so many songs out there about getting fucked up,” says Flaherty of the song’s inspiration. “I think a part of me was asking the question: ‘What if I’m already high enough? What if I don’t need anything but what I’ve got?’ There are many moments in my life—whether it’s because of a person or a place—that I don’t want to feel altered or high or buzzed. I just want to feel exactly what I’m feeling.”

Kaleidoscopic in mood, Every Where Is Some Where also offers somber moments like “Mean It”—a stunningly vulnerable track built around K.Flay’s outpourings on love and family and lineage. Laced with subtle wisdom (“Remember what you love/So that when the world gets painful/You become your own god”), the starkly arranged song emerged from an especially cathartic writing session for Flaherty.

“I wrote ‘Mean It’ in my bedroom in L.A., pretty late at night…the song just came pouring out,” she recalls. “I remember I was crying while I wrote it, which is pretty unusual for me.” “It’s Just a Lot,” meanwhile, came to life while Flaherty was “thinking about the world and how it’s so big and beautiful and sad,” giving way to a blissfully uptempo but sweetly melancholic pop gem.

Scott Washburn can’t remember a time when he didn’t want to be an astronaut. “I wanted to serve my country in some form or fashion, so I started looking around. I first looked at becoming a pilot. However, I wore glasses back then and at the time – 1999 – the services allowed Lasik but NASA didn’t. I didn’t want to get Lasik and then eventually give myself a long term disqualification. I looked everywhere and I actually didn’t think about submarines very much,” he says.

“I got a postcard in the mail one day that said, ‘Hey, would you like to serve your country and use your engineering skills to be a submarine officer?’ I thought, that actually sounds pretty cool. At the time there had never been a submariner astronaut before. I thought, this is a great analog because you’ve got this confined isolated environment experience and that would translate really well to being an astronaut on a shuttle or a space station. I signed up in 1999, and in 2000 NASA picked up their first ever submariner astronaut.

Scott’s time in the Navy with submarines was a natural first step for a career in aviation.  “I was really passionate about the space industry and I had this great nuclear background so I ended up getting into radiation effects, which I thought was a great way to merge my nuclear and aerospace backgrounds.”

But just being a submariner, or a pilot is not all that is required to become an astronaut.  “NASA is looking for a broad set of skills,” Scott says. “Getting to that point has been a lifelong ambition of mine and I have been building up my skill set along the way. One is your primary career – [NASA] wants people who are good at their jobs and have some relation to space or exploration. There are additional skills that help you stand out too. I went and learned how to scuba dive, and got my private pilot’s license, and did all these other things to build up my resume so I would be interesting to them as an astronaut candidate.”

And in 2016, Scott made it to the finalist selection group, beating out nearly 18,300 other applicants and landing among the top 50 candidates to potentially go into space.“NASA takes all their applicants and filter down to 300-500 people they want to take a closer look at – the highly qualified. Then they pick 120 people, the semi-finalists. These people go to the Johnson Space Center in Houston for a three day interview. It’s nothing too crazy. Basic screenings and fancy physicals and you get to meet the astronauts and chat with them. Then it is 50 minutes in a room with the selection board. That is a little weird because you are sitting across the table from all of your heroes and just thinking ‘ok this is intimidating’. The selection board is made up of primarily active astronauts,” Scott explains.

“After that you make it to the finalist round, which is the top 50. Those 50 come in for a week long interview, which involves a whole slew of procedures and an in depth medical screening, which is one of the biggest fears for any astronaut applicant because they look for stuff you might not know about. You might have a small hole in your heart that allows blood to pass through different chambers when it is not supposed to. Most people don’t even know that they have it but you can’t have it as an astronaut. You’re basically crossing your fingers that nothing is wrong with you. You walk out of the ultrasound office and everyone is either cheering or has their heads down. Thankfully no heads down in my group,” he says.

As Scott reflects on the entire process – interviewing, meeting his heroes, and making it as far as he did – a smile spreads across his face.

“At the very least,

Betty J. Eadie, author of the international bestseller Embraced By The Light, had the most eminent, prominent and extensive near-death experience ever recorded. She has written several books in an effort to share with others what she was shown in the spirit world about God and man’s existence, the meaning of life and what awaits all in the after life. Betty has given countless speaking events, lectures, radio and television appearances and interviews across America and abroad informing others that death need not be feared, the exquisite beauty of the spirit world, meeting Jesus, reuniting with deceased loved ones and the most important message of God’s unconditional love: that all are here to learn to “love one another.”

In November of 1973, at the age of 31, Betty J. Eadie died following routine surgery. After undergoing what has been called “the most profound and detailed near-death experience ever recorded.” Her spirit separated from her body and she traveled home to check on her family who were unaware of her presence. She then traveled through a tunnel of blackness to a being of light whom she recognized as the Savior of our world, Jesus Christ. Betty was then sent to view various aspects of what she calls our “heavenly home.” She walked through a beautiful garden, was shown the creation of this world, experienced a “life-review” and then was told she must return to earth–and why. Betty was then returned to her physical body with a life-changing message for all who will listen.

For 19 years, Betty shared the knowledge and message of her NDE with family, friends and small groups while continuing to practice all that she was taught during her experience. Eventually she began speaking publicly to larger groups, one of which was the International Association of Near-Death Studies (IANDS) as well as various grief groups and church gatherings. In 1987, Betty began writing her experience in pamphlet form to share with her cancer patients. Her efforts were brought to a halt when her father became ill and Betty became his sole caregiver. Then, in 1991, after the death of her father, she was prompted to pick up her writing again. However, this time she was “shown” how to finish the manuscript in book form. The result was the astonishing book, Embraced By The Light, whose phenomenal success quickly thrust Betty into the public spotlight. After “Embraced” was published, Betty gave up her hypnotherapy practice and began traveling extensively throughout the United States, Canada, Great Britain and Ireland, speaking on death and what awaits all beyond this life.

The extraordinary success of Embraced By The Light stunned the publishing world. Never before had a book by an unknown first time author, published by an obscure publishing house, demanded so much attention and become a long standing New York Times national bestseller. “Embraced” went on to sell over 13 million copies and stayed on the Times bestseller list in hardcover and paperback for more than two years, including a record 78 weeks in the prestigious #1 position.

The worldwide attention and acclaim that followed its publication changed many lives, including Betty’s. More importantly to Betty, the sharing of her near-death experience brought comfort and hope to millions of people by freeing them from the fear of death and dying. Its message of God’s unconditional love also taught people to be less judgmental, and to live each day with greater joy and happiness. Such a powerful and timely message eventually made Embraced By The Light the fifth best-selling book of the decade.

Today, Betty is extremely involved working with Native and First Nation Peoples through visits with various t...

Lauren (0100) & Emily (0025) are the co-founders of The BRANDED Collective.  Lauren and Emily started their company in 2012 to help survivors of trafficking in Nashville, TN.

They provide job training and employment for survivors through the creation of beautiful jewelry. 

Their hope is that each of our employees will be inspired to rediscover the dreams she has lost and be motivated to go forth and pursue them.

Emily and Lauren raised $10,000 in startup funds through word of mouth and social media marketing, and are involved in every aspect of creative direction, product development and financial management. 

The BRANDED Collective employs survivors of human trafficking from Nashville-based non-profit End Slavery Tennessee.

The women work with local artisans to design and handcraft the jewelry collection.

25% of the profits go to the rescue, restoration and employment of survivors of the human trafficking and sexual slavery trade.

When you receive your item from the BRANDED Collective, you are BRANDED. Each piece contains a unique number that represents one of the millions trapped in the nightmare of trafficking.

BRANDED:

To mark with a branding iron. Any mark of disgrace, stigma, shame. Many victims of human trafficking are BRANDED; their captors physically mark them with a number or symbol. The process is often violent: a forced tattoo, a burn or knife cut.

 

COLLECTIVE:

Something done by people acting as a group. Shared by all members of the group. A cooperative enterprise. If you have purchased a BRANDED product, you are part of our BRANDED family. BRANDED is a collective of abolitionists working together to affect change.

 

Once you make a purchase, you can register your number and share a message of hope with survivors who make the cuffs. Please tell BRANDED what freedom means to you and why you believe in the BRANDED Collective. Use your voice to share your message of hope with our BRANDED family. Learn more: www.brandedcollective.com

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▶︎Learn. Love. Listen. Live. Your True North Story® #SomethingForEveryone #PurpleLOVE

Chad Littlefield, M.Ed., is the co-founder and CEO of We!™ (www.weand.me) and author of the Pocket Guide to Facilitating Human Connections. Leaders call Chad when a lack of trust is getting in the way of results at their organization. His passion and energy for connecting people becomes immediately apparent when working with him.

Chad has shared his energy through designing and delivering programs for conferences, technology startups, corporations, nonprofit organizations, and the public sector as well as on the stage at TEDx.

As a speaker and professional facilitator, Chad designs fun, challenging, and engaging experiences and tools that connect people to people, break down communication barriers, and increase trust and employee engagement. He has worked as an instructor at Penn State University teaching the art and science of team development and dialogue facilitation.

Chad is also the creator of We! Connect Cards™ which are now being used to create conversations that matter within organizations in over 50 countries around the world and on 6 of the 7 continents. (Free deck if you live in Antarctica.) Some of Chad’s key clients include TEDx, JetBlue Airways, Conscious Capitalism, Starbucks, Cigna, United Way, Typeform, Goodwill, and dozens more.

Work is also Chad’s play because he is passionate about what he does. However, when he is really playing, he can be found in a cave, on a mountain bike, underwater with a SCUBA tank on his back, or traveling the world with his wife. His personal mission is to create moments worth remembering for people. Chad is currently headquartered in Asheville, North Carolina, yet travels all over to “meet clients where they are at” – literally and figuratively.

Will Wise, M.Ed., is the co–founder of We!™ (www.weand.me), a consulting practice where leaders call when a lack of trust is getting in the way of results in their organization.

He is the author of Ask Powerful Questions: Create Conversations that Matter and has been asking powerful questions for over two decades as a corporate development consultant, non-traditional school principal, university instructor, adventure guide and facilitator for team development.

Will is passionate about bringing out the best in people. He works with clients to create programs that match with clients’ strategic and cultural goals. Hundreds of facilitators have been trained by Will to walk into a room full of people to talk about things they would normally be afraid to confront such as long-term conflicts.

Will has earned a reputation as one who can transform groups and people into their best selves. Tens of thousands of people have been empowered with positive communication skills after spending some time with Will and We!™

Will’s key clients have included JetBlue, TEDx, Mead, World in Conversation, Typeform, Conscious Capitalism, and Penn State. He lives in Central Pennsylvania with his wife and three children though he travels the world to serve clients.

This is Chad Littlefield and Will Wise and this is their True North Story®! If you are interested in learning more about Chad and Will…visit their main site (www.weand.me) and on YouTube.

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Christopher Kelly was born in Sacramento, California and graduated from of the University of California at Berkeley in 1981. Mr. Kelly worked for nearly twenty years in the television industry mainly on the West coast where he served as a director and partner in several local TV stations in Seattle and Sacramento. He is as the former chairman of Chyron Corporation (now ChyronHego, ticker: chyr) and a retired television executive.

Chris has always had a lifelong passion for military history, with many of his family members having fought in previous American wars including one, Stephen Van Rensselaer of New York, who led an ill-fated invasion of Canada.

It was only natural that his love and passion would manifest itself into a book and this in case several books. America Invades: How America has invaded or been “militarily involved with” nearly every country on Earth, which he co-authored, with Stuart Laycock, was their first book.

Italy Invades: How Italians Conquered the World, by Kelly/Laycock was published in 2015. This book covers Italian Invasions in a broad sense including the Romans invading Iraq, the explorations of Columbus, Mussolini’s misadventures, Italian-Americans serving in WW2, and Italian peacekeepers serving around the globe.

Mr. Kelly also edited a memoir about the outbreak of World War I that was written by his great grandfather, Thomas Tileston Wells. It was published as An Adventure in 1914 in November 2016.

Chris and Stuart recently published their 4th book, America Invaded: A State by State Guide to Fighting on American Soil which will treat the waves of invasions that shaped the USA on a state by state basis. Italy Invades…Il popolo che ha conquistato il mondo was also translated into Italian and published by Polistampa in the summer of 2017.

Mr. Kelly is married and has three children, currently residing in both London and Seattle. This is Christopher Kelly and this is his True North Story®.

If you would like to learn more about Chris and his incredible books, please visit his main site www.americainvades.com and follow him on Twitter and Facebook.

Please also follow, like & subscribe to True North Story®  on the following social platforms Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, SoundCloud, iTunes, GooglePlay & YouTube.

▶︎Learn. Love. Listen. Live. Your True North Story®

#SomethingForEveryone #PurpleLOVE

Justin Young sounds utterly natural when he plays, as if his extraordinary saxophone talent never needed formal training. But those mellifluous lines of soulful notes come through years of study, training and commitment to his love of music, as well as a constant desire to move forward.

Young grew up in a musical household just minutes from downtown Detroit, where his father, Jim Young, led a band called Kaleidoscope, that often times would rehearse in the family’s livingroom.

“I was growing up seeing and hearing drummers, keyboardists and vocalists…hearing how all the sounds meshed together. “It was always in the back of my mind and in my blood, plus Detroit was so eclectic at the time, you know, everything from R&B and Pop to Top 40 and Motown – just a melting pot of different sounds, and I was absorbing it all,” Young muses.

That fertile environment, both at home and all around him in Detroit, gave Young a world-class musical education. He picked up drums in elementary school and started hearing the music that would inform his life and work: saxophonists Maceo Parker, Lenny Pickett and Gerald Albright, along with superstar pop, funk and jazz acts like Earth, Wind and Fire, Boney James, The Gap Band, Herbie Hancock, the Commodores and Michael Jackson. Then his father suggested that he try the saxophone, and a few months later, Young was playing Stevie Wonder’s “I Just Called to Say I Love You” in a 4th grade talent show.

Having found his true musical love, Young practiced three to five hours a day and began playing in his father’s bands as a teenager, performing his first professional gig at a wedding when he was 16. As Young prepared for college, his father encouraged Young to pursue his dreams of becoming a premier saxophonist, but with one caveat, have a backup plan. So, Young enrolled in the mechanical engineering program at Michigan State University and used his musical talents to pay for his college education.

“I put myself through college by playing regular gigs,” he said. “I was playing 20, 30 gigs a month and that’s really where I honed my skills as a player and a performer and was really making it a show.”

Young became a major draw at Detroit area venues such as Signature Grill, Greektown Casino, MGM Grand Casino and Motor City Casino, and he developed the keen business sense that is needed to run a successful band.

“A band is a start-up business,” Young said. “Anyone who wants to obtain a qualified work force may want to check out the local music scene. When you’re in a band, you have to know how to budget, how to get to shows, how to be on time, what the crowd wants, how to look, how to dress and how to market yourself.

“I had to learn how to make money, and I couldn’t do it Monday through Thursday, because mechanical engineering was insanely tough for me. I was working harder than I’d ever worked in my life: I remember being in Calculus and wondering how am I going to afford tuition? I figured I could play Friday nights, Saturday nights and Sunday mornings with a band, so I played gigs with my father’s band and picked up college gigs at hotels and clubs.”

Once he finished his bachelor’s degree and began pursuing his MBA, Young became a music machine, calling hundreds of clubs to pull in a handful of shows, but his determination and talent paid off when he won the Capital Jazz Fest in 2007. This major success, coupled with valuable mentorship from Spyro Gyra keyboardist Tom Schuman, gave Young the courage and experience to move forward with his first official album, 2007’s On the Way.

Brooks Gibbs is an award winning social skills educator and public speaker. He has addressed thousands of different audiences with his powerful strategies for conflict resolution and a special emphasis on emotional resilience and the “Golden Rule.”

Brooks is an elite, multi-platform, communicator whose messages have reached millions through a skillful balance of both wit and wisdom.

Brooks has an amazing gift, powered by an incredible message. He has currently spoken at over 2000 different “live events” for schools, churches and various youth leadership organizations.

This is Brooks Gibbs and this is his True North Story®.

If you would like to connect more with Brooks, please visit his sites @ www.brooksgibbs.com and follow him on Twitter, Facebook, & @ YouTube.

Please also follow, like & subscribe to True North Story®  on the following social platforms Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, SoundCloud, iTunes, GooglePlay & YouTube.

▶︎Learn. Love. Listen. Live. Your True North Story®

#SomethingForEveryone #PurpleLOVE

Bob Glouberman left his corporate law practice on September 15, 1995 realizing that “L.A. Law” had lied to him about what it was like to be a lawyer. He began an acting career, much to the chagrin of his parents, who had put him through four years of college at Stanford University and three years of UCLA Law School.

Bob has appeared in nearly 100 films, T.V. shows and dozens of commercials and voice-over spots. Bob holds the distinction of having appeared in the Best Film of the Year (“The Artist”) and the Worst Film of the Year (“Dirty Love”).  

Bob spoke the first uttered word in the Oscar winning film “The Artist”,  yet none of this puts a dent in the guilt.  He is also a co-founder of a company called Fantastic Race, a “scavenger hunt” type company for grown-ups. 

In 1996, Bob met lovely psychotherapist Stefanie Klein and successfully duped her into marrying him three years later.

On November 23, 2002, the couple was blessed with a daughter, Lexey Evan Glouberman. Bob is currently saving up for his daughter’s much needed future therapy.

The Gloubermans live in Beverlywood, California with their chihuahua who “rage defecates” and their pit-bull mix who eats her own feces.   Even though he once broke his elbow and nose in an air guitar incident, his one regret is that he is not someone else.

He is Bob Glouberman and he is FOR HIRE and this is his True North Story®

Please also follow, like & subscribe to True North Story®  on the following social platforms Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, SoundCloud, iTunes, GooglePlay & YouTube.

▶︎Learn. Love. Listen. Live. Your True North Story®

#SomethingForEveryone #PurpleLOVE