Weirdly Helpful (formerly The Best Advice Show)

By Zak RosenHealth & Fitness Mental Health Education Self-Improvement How To

Weirdly Helpful (formerly The Best Advice Show) episodes

August 27, 2025 It's About How You Listen, How You Interpret, How You Care with Jay Allison and Erica Heilman
This is a conversation from the divine podcast, Rumble Strip. It features Jay Allison about the recent attack on the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Recently, Congress passed a rescission bill that eliminates $9 billion in previously allocated funding, including $1.1 billion for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), which effectively defunds public media, which includes NPR, PBS and member stations around the country. This is a conversation about what that means and what we stand to lose.
Jay Allison has been working in and around public radio since it’s beginnings a half century ago. He's been an independent public radio producer, journalist, and teacher since the 1970s. He is the founder of Transom, where I learned to make radio, and 25 years ago he founded WCAI, a public radio station in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. Jay's work has won most of the major broadcasting awards, including six Peabodys. He produces The Moth Radio Hour and was the curator of This I Believe on NPR.
Links
Adopt a Station: Where you can donate to your local public radio station or find stations to support
Transom: The place where good radio begins
Information on Transom story trainings
Recent New York Times interview with Bill Siemering about the fate of public radio
Rumble Strip episode w Jay called Fishing with Jay

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28 min
August 20, 2025 When There Might Not Be a Solution with Dr. Chioke I'Anson⁠
Dr. Chioke I'Anson is the visionary force behind the establishment of the VPM + ICA Community Media Center, an innovative collaboration between Virginia Public Media and the Institute for Contemporary Art at VCU. He's also the founder of RESONATE Podcast Festival
Congress has voted to rescind public media's funding. Help preserve independent journalism and community programming across America by adopting a station.

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15 min
August 13, 2025 How To Plant a Garden with Limited Space and Time with Alice Bagley
Alice Bagley is a farmer, biker and time banker based in Detroit. She was last on the show. Don't miss her episode from 5 years ago on the joyus virtues of throwing seeds!
Courtney Daniels is a filmamker and author based in LA. Her new podcast is called Gen X at Midlife, where she talks to people about their experience of life after 50. Subscribe wherever you listen to TBAS! She was last on the show discussing the importance of a good cry.

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9 min
August 06, 2025 Begin Your Day with Discomfort
Teresa Gretsen and Naomi Kreitman are friends based in Amsterdam who love to swim.

READ THIS COLD WATER SWIMMING GUIDE

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9 min
July 30, 2025 Two Strategies to Look at Your Phone Less and the World Around You More with Daphne Silbiger
Daphne Silbiger is a playwright, musician, and collage artist based in Brooklyn currently teaching at The School of Making Thinking.
You can see all the course offerings @ The School of Making Thinking @ https://www.theschoolofmakingthinking.com/
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Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow
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Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.
https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9
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Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at [email protected]
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12 min
July 23, 2025 Never Change Your Clothes with Anne Kadet
What advice from this show do you use in your life? Call Zak and let him know at 844-935-BEST. Thanks!
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CAFÉ ANNE is a weekly newsletter with a focus on New York City that takes a fresh look at the everyday, delights in the absurd and profiles unusual folks who do things their way.
It is created and written by Brooklyn journalist Anne Kadet, former NYC business and trends columnist for the Wall Street Journal and NYC startups columnist for Crains’ New York Business.

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Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow
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Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.
https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9
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Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at [email protected]
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Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow

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8 min
July 16, 2025 Become the Animal You Are with Morrison Gong
Sign up for Morrison's online class, EXTREME PRIVATE EROS: PHOTOGRAPHY & DIARISTIC WRITING at The School of Making of Thinking. MORE INFO HERE @ https://www.theschoolofmakingthinking.com/private-eros.html
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Morrison Gong is a Chinese photographer with a background in performance and experimental filmmaking. They invoke the body as a site of haunting, wounding, conjuring and mythmaking. Their work converses with photography's ability to anchor eros and losses within the realm of the physical and the metaphysical. They have been invited as a visiting critic and guest speaker at esteemed institutions such as the Center for Photography at Woodstock, SUNY New Paltz, Haverford College, and Western Washington University. Their video works have been shown at Anthology Film Archives, Microscope Gallery, Vox Populi Gallery, CROSSROADS presented by San Francisco Cinematheque, Hong Kong Arthouse Film Festival, among others. Their photography has been featured on It’s Nice That, Whitehot Magazine and Lomography Magazine. Gong received their BFA from Parsons School of Design and their MA at the New School for Social Research. They are based in Brooklyn, NY.
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Howl with Laura Hawley
Get Froggy with Lauren Helmbrecht
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Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow
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Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.
https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9
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Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at [email protected]
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Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow

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10 min
July 09, 2025 Do the Show YOU Want to Do with Phil Rosenthal
Phil Rosenthal hosts “Somebody Feed Phil” on Netflix. He also created Everybody Loves Raymond.
This episode first aired in November of 2020.
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Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow
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Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.
https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9
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Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at [email protected]
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Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow

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7 min
July 02, 2025 This Maneuver Will Get You To Drink More Water with Karen A. Chase
Karen A. Chase is an author, speaker, and brand designer. Her first book, Bonjour 40: A Paris Travel Log, garnered seven independent publishing awards, and her first novel, Carrying Independence, was a nominee for the 2020 Library of Virginia Literary Awards.
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From the Advice Show archive: FLUSH YOUR PSYCHIC TRESPASSERS DOWN THE DRAIN
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Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow
---
Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.
https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9
---
Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at [email protected]
---
Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow

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7 min
June 25, 2025 Put Your Energy Into What Makes the Fire, Not What Puts it Out with Malissa O'Donnell
Malissa O'Donnell is an advisor and consultant helping clients realize their creative ambitions to the fullest.
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Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow
---
Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.
https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9
---
Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at [email protected]
---
Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
7 min

About Weirdly Helpful (formerly The Best Advice Show)

From the publisher's feed

Weirdly Helpful (formerly The Best Advice Show) is a short, weekly infusion of delightful, unexpected and strange ways to make life slightly and sometimes profoundly better. In each episode a…