Year-End Reflection Part 4 | Our Contribution Bucket

Elizabeth Gilbert exploded into the public's consciousness in 2006 with the release of her mega-bestselling memoir, Eat Pray Love.Since then, she's published a series of books, given a TED talk on creative genius that's been viewed more than 10 million times, become a leading voice on the pursuit of a creative, connected and vital life.Liz's latest book, Big Magic, takes you deeper into what it means to live a creative life, offering a wonderful blend of wisdom, unabashed magical thinking, amazing stories and a whole lot of unexpected myth-busting and contrarian insights.I had a chance to sit down with Liz and, as often happens with these Good Life conversations, we ended up going all sorts of places I'd never planned. We touched on the power of curiosity and the fallacy of passion, where creativity comes from, what stops us from doing the thing we're here to do, the importance of caring for your vessel, what happens when you think you've reached the end of your capacity and her powerful lens on what it means to life a good life.This is deeply moving, revealing, insightful and sometimes pretty funny conversation. In fact, we begin with a hard-hitting reveal of a relationship that Liz had kept secret for more than four decades. And, along the way, this beautiful thought came tumbling forth:"When you come to the end of yourself is where all the interesting stuff starts." Tweet this.If you've ever wondered how to step into a creative life, how to get that thing in your head and heart out into the world, this is an absolute "do not miss" conversation.Check out our offerings & partners: Beam Dream Powder: Visit https://shopbeam.com/GOODLIFE and use code GOODLIFE to get our exclusive discount of up to 40% off. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

22 Sep 201559min

This is the first episode I've ever wished I didn't have a reason to air...On Sunday, a good friend of mine, an amazing man, husband, brother and son, founder of Live Your Legend and beloved member of the Good Life Project family, Scott Dinsmore, lost his life.Hiking Kilimanjaro with another amazing soul, his wife Chelsea, Scott was killed in a rockfall.He was only 33.I've shared more thoughts in writing here.For now, I wanted to do something to keep Scott's beautiful energy and words alive. So, I'm airing a conversation Scott and I filmed a few years back as an audio podcast in tribute to him.My heart is heavy, and my love and wishes for healing go out to Chelsea, to her and Scott's families and to all who've been touched by Scott's message, his presence and what he's created and now left behind.With love & gratitude,JonathanCheck out our offerings & partners: Beam Dream Powder: Visit https://shopbeam.com/GOODLIFE and use code GOODLIFE to get our exclusive discount of up to 40% off. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

22 Sep 201545min

The story of a lifetime only comes around once...Dale Russakoff spent more than three decades as a top news journalist, reporting for The Washington Post for more than 28 years.When Facebook co-founder, Mark Zuckerberg, announced a $100 million grant, teaming with then rock-start mayor, Cory Booker, to revolutionize the Newark schools and create a model for national education reform, she'd found a story worthy of her full attention and her first-ever book.Leaving her job, she spent four and a half years embedded in the lives, conversations and inner-most workings of what seemed, at first, to be positioned as a stunning transformational endeavor. What unfolded on the ground, though, was a profoundly different story. One that seemed straight out of a Shakespearian drama with a complex cast of players, each driven by their own personal and social agendas.At play wasn't just the lives of tens of thousands of kids, many living in desperate poverty and violence, but also a $1 billion budget and thousands of jobs.Russakoff tells this story in her riveting new book, The Prize: Who's in Charge of America's Schools? In this week's conversation, we dive into this tense and complex drama, played out on both the highest levels of government and business and the most basic level of human interaction, one teacher, one kid, one life at a time.We also explore how growing up in the deep south, the child of an "outlier" family who never bought into segregation, cultivated Russakoff's lens on people and equality. We dive into her career as a journalist and how that world is changing and being largely dismantled. We talk about the good and the bad and explore how the new golden age of podcasting just might end up saving the field.Even if you have zero interest in education, you will love this conversation. Because it's about a breathtaking human drama. It's about power and corruption. It's about the desire to do the right thing and how that gets almost perversely "bent" to the will of too many interests along the way.It's about the need for access to truth, to stories not only well-told but also vigorously researched and validated. It's about one woman's quest to shine the light, even when those who've given her the batteries for her flashlight end up unhappy with what that light ends up illuminating.Check out our offerings & partners: Beam Dream Powder: Visit https://shopbeam.com/GOODLIFE and use code GOODLIFE to get our exclusive discount of up to 40% off. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

22 Sep 20151h 5min

You want to be known as someone who changes the game.Someone who brings amazing ideas, solutions, insights and potential to everything you do. You want to make real things happen. Things that matter.So you plug in. You mainline digital information, entertainment, pretty much any and all forms of data. You squeeze every possible moment out of the time you have, consuming, creating, connecting, rinsing and repeating. Occasionally, you breathe, but only if forced.Partly because it gives you more to think about, talk about and integrate and create. But, also, because it's just become your default. Space terrifies you. And maybe, just maybe, you're even driven by a little bit of FOMO.Thing is...It doesn't matter how productive you or how busy you are if the ideas you're building on don't represent the best you have to offer.And your best ideas rarely, if ever, come when you're filling every millisecond of your life with something to do.Genius comes when you disconnect from tasks and reconnect to space.To plug into your best self, you've first got to unplug. To create the space for brilliance to emerge.That's what we're talking about in today's short and sweet GLP Riff.Check out our offerings & partners: Beam Dream Powder: Visit https://shopbeam.com/GOODLIFE and use code GOODLIFE to get our exclusive discount of up to 40% off. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

10 Sep 20153min

Most people look at meditation as a practice. Something you do daily, most often seated on a cushion.New York Times bestselling author of eight books, and Shambhala Buddhist meditation teacher, Susan Piver, has a different take.What if it's not just a practice, she offers, but a path? A way of life. An approach to seeing and being in the world that plants the seeds of awareness, compassion and life in a more awakened and joyful state.She's written about this in her wonderful new book, Start Here Now. I had a chance to sit down with Susan and record a conversation live from the stage of Camp GLP in August, before a room of 350 people. The energy was electric.We talked about Susan's serendipity-driven journey through the hip-hop side of the music industry, her constantly yearning for answers to the big questions and her discovery of Buddhism, decision to eventually take her vows and what that even means.We also explore what Buddhism is and isn't and why so many people seem to be "Buddha-curious" these days. We talk about what it means to be brave, along with the potential upside and downside of belief. Then, we dive into meditation as both a daily practice and a path, do a bit of "white light" myth-busting and explore how this practice tends to work its magic over time.And, just for fun, you'll also discover how Susan watched the entire movie, The 40-Year-Old Virgin, in the middle of a 30-day meditation silent retreat...entirely in her head!Check out our offerings & partners: Beam Dream Powder: Visit https://shopbeam.com/GOODLIFE and use code GOODLIFE to get our exclusive discount of up to 40% off. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

6 Sep 20151h 2min

Is creativity tied to your biological clock? A 2010 Global Chief Executive Officer study by IBM revealed the most sought after trait in emerging leaders. It’s not work-ethic or efficiency. It’s not motivation or productivity. Creativity is the trait most desired by those in charge. Understandably so. Because the ability to come up with new ideas, […]The post Unlock Creativity: Time of Day Matters appeared first on Good LifeProject.Check out our offerings & partners: Beam Dream Powder: Visit https://shopbeam.com/GOODLIFE and use code GOODLIFE to get our exclusive discount of up to 40% off. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

3 Sep 20157min

Today's episode is our second experiment, with a new show format, we're calling 9Things™. What is it? A three-person roundtable, where each person shows up with three topics to jam on. And, the thing is, nobody knows what the other person's topics will be until they hit the conversation.My guests for today's episode of the 9Things format are two good friends, Gabra Zackman and Dan Lerner.Covered in this episode:Hashtags: funny new weird thing or business tool?Hamilton on Broadway: the birth of creative geniusInnate Goodness: are we wired to be helpful?Yazidi Women and the brutality of ISISFoodie Culture: more than what's on the plateBizarre Bat Discovered: fascinating that we can still discover new speciesFour Year Long Collaborative Online Story: oops...I didn't mean to end it that wayGarbage: how can one person collect so much?Workplace Culture: people are the new greenFrom Lawyer to Children's Entertainer: helping others pursue their interestsIt's fast-paced, fun, utterly unscripted and at times a bit raw, but always good-natured and very real. Enjoy! Check out our offerings & partners: My New Book SparkedMy New Podcast SPARKEDVisit Our Sponsor Page For a Complete List of Vanity URLs & Discount Codes.Check out our offerings & partners: Beam Dream Powder: Visit https://shopbeam.com/GOODLIFE and use code GOODLIFE to get our exclusive discount of up to 40% off. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

31 Aug 20151h 14min

What if you spent more time making?We tend to spend our work lives dancing between two modes: maker mode and manager mode.The idea first came to me through a friend, Brad Feld. Maker mode is where we are immersed in the process of creation, innovation, problem-solving, artistry. It's a powerfully generative state that often creates the giant leaps forward, the big ideas and awakenings that propel us.Manager mode is all the administrative, process-driven stuff you need to do to breathe life into the genius that emerges from maker mode. It's a necessary adjunct and, for some, it's also the place where they become most alive and aligned.Problem is, they often have trouble happening at the same time. One pulls you almost violently from the other and you end ping-ponging between the two and never really make much progress on each.What if you took a different approach? What if you created designated, longer-term windows for each. Then took it even farther and, when in maker mode, focused only on the 2% of making that yielded the most stunning outcomes?That's what we're talking about in today's short and sweet GLP Riff.Check out our offerings & partners: Beam Dream Powder: Visit https://shopbeam.com/GOODLIFE and use code GOODLIFE to get our exclusive discount of up to 40% off. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

27 Aug 20154min