Podcast 57: Running Home – 35 Moving Meditations for Runners with Toby Estler

Toby EstlerI had the wonderful opportunity to meet and get to know Toby Estler as a result of our mutual connection through the University of Santa Monica.  Toby was one of the assistants at the University during my second year.  I always knew that he possessed a special energy, and was a very loving and gentle soul from the first day I met him.

I received a call from Toby about two years after my graduation as a result of our connection to Team in Training an organization affiliated with Leukemia and Lymphoma Society that helps budding athletes get prepared for a 100 mile bike rides or a 26.2 mile marathons.  Toby had learned about Compassionate Communications, (a patient outreach program I founded), through some mutual friends and wanted to find out how he could help. He did help by becoming one of our initial “compassionate communicators” in our pilot program.  Toby has since gone on to become my personal coach and a very good friend.  He does writing for our organization, and is also involved in helping design and deliver an upcoming workshop that we are facilitating called “Facing Change: From Breakdown to Breakthrough.

I don’t know how many of you are runners, but Toby’s love for running and his 35 moving meditations for runners is the topic of this podcast. I use to be an avid runner some years ago, but due to an injury, I shifted to cycling.  I remember the long hours pounding the pavement, and just how meditative running can be.  Toby’s book entitled, “Running Home,” is more than a how to manual or motivational on sports and fitness. It is a book about focus. The book is made up of thirty-five meditations based on character qualities, core values, and affirmations. These stories are captivating and grab the reader’s attention. They are designed to encourage runners to carry the satisfying experience of running into an enriching and deepening growth in their personal and professional life. These short inspirational chapters are equally appropriate for any chosen sport. Toby writes from his heart with a rare combination of the sportscaster, a poet, and a spiritual sports chaplain. Toby relates the joy of running to accessing the inner essence of man’s spirit.

Toby Estler is a remarkable communicator. He masterfully articulates how running has transformed his life, empowering him to overcome his past. As he shares these experiences and his new freedom, it is his hope that others will turn their lives around and move toward bigger goals and more rewarding behavior.

I encourage anyone who is into running to read, “Running Home“. It is a powerfully transforming and you will never look at running the same once you have implemented some of Toby’s meditative practices.  You can also visit his personal website by clicking here. Enjoy this great podcast!!!!

Podcast 56: The Essential Laws of Fearless Living with Guy Finley

Guy FinleyI had the pleasure of being able to meet Guy Finley at a recent conference in Irvine, CA called the, “Inside Edge“.  His speech entitled, “The Essential Laws of Fearless Living: Find the Power to Never Feel Powerless Again“, (which is also the title of his newly release book), was fantastic.  I have been to literally 100’s of seminars, workshops and retreats over the last 35 years and this hour long speech was among the best that I have heard.

Guy Finley’s message is simple, yet harder to integrate into your life.  It is one thing to hear something, but another to live it.  It requires that you read and re-read his book to really start to understand the wisdom that he teaches.  In this podcast you will just begin to understand the depth of his message and wisdom.  Guy will discuss how fear compromises your life and what action you can take to eliminate fear by transforming your thoughts and thinking.  He discusses how everything that happens to you happens for you to be able to transcend fear, and for each of  us to look at the lessons.  As Guy articulates “the fear is real, but the why is a lie.”

No fear exists other than our negative imagination. Our mind extrapolates what could happen, then creates a picture in our mind, then we spend our time resisting the picture we have created in our mind. If you really look at that statement and understand the wisdom within it you will begin to understand just a small portion of how our mind operates, and why we spend so much energy battling with ourselves.  It is a little insane wouldn’t you agree?  There is a great price for the stress we live with, but the reason that it is happening is to help us grow.  It is a marvelous moment when we don’t have to play the game with ourselves.

In my interview with Guy he will discuss The Essential Laws of Fearless Living: Find the Power to Never Feel Powerless Again, and I know that this podcast will provide you with much food for thought and contemplation.  I have not met an author with as much insight, wisdom and understanding about how fear controls our life.  He gives us practical advice and practices to follow to help reduce and eliminate the fear that often controls us.

Guy is the best-selling author of, “The Secret of Letting Go”, and more than 36 other books and audio albums that have sold over a million copies in 16 languages worldwide. In addition, he has presented over 4,000 unique self-realization seminars to thousands of grateful students throughout North America and Europe over the past 20 years and has been a guest on over 400 television and radio shows, including national appearances on ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, NPR, Wisdom Network, and many others. His radio program, “Guy Finley Live,” is a live chat that airs monthly on HealthyLife.net as part of the network’s “Visionary Celebrity Host Series.” His syndicated weekly radio program is aired on several international networks including, Healthylife Radio Network, WorldTalkRadio Network, and Contact Talk Radio International. His work is widely endorsed by doctors, business professionals, celebrities, and religious leaders of all denominations.

Guy’s career reached this point through a circuitous path. Born into a successful show business family, he is the son of Late-Night TV and radio pioneer Larry Finley. His childhood friends were the sons and daughters of the most famous celebrities in the world. As a young man Guy enjoyed success in a number of areas including composing award-winning music for many popular recording artists including Diana Ross, Debbie Boone, The Jackson 5, Billy Preston, The Four Seasons, as well as writing the scores for several motion pictures and TV shows. From 1970-1979 he wrote and recorded his own albums under the Motown and RCA recording labels.

Throughout his youth, Guy suspected there was more to life than the type of worldly success that led to the emptiness and frustration he saw among his own “successful” friends and colleagues. In 1979, after travels throughout North America, India and the Far East in search of Truth and Higher Wisdom, Guy voluntarily retired from his flourishing music career in order to simplify his life and to concentrate on deeper self-studies.

In addition to his writing and appearance schedule, Guy presents four inner-life classes each week at his non-profit, “Life of Learning Foundation” headquarters in Merlin, Oregon. These classes are ongoing and open to the public.
I encourage my listeners to visit his website, attend his workshops and begin to understand more about the gems of wisdom he has to offer.  You can learn more about his non-profit foundation, Life of Learning and his retreat center by clicking this link to his website.  I hope you enjoy this interview as much as I enjoyed producing it.

 

Podcast 55: Top Performer a Bold Approach to Sales and Service with Carr Hagerman

Carr Hagerman I had the wonderful pleasure of being introduced to Carr Hagerman through a good friend of mine by the name of Cathy Paper.  I completed a podcast last August with Cathy, and you can link to it by clicking here. I was intrigued by Carr’s approach to becoming a top performer in selling.  You see Carr’s background is that of a street performer for over 30 years. Carr Hagerman didn’t follow the path of the MBA into the corporate world; he came up from the streets – literally.   The character he created was unlike anything the festival patrons had ever seen before.   Gritty, funny, smart and totally irreverent, his character instantly engaged his audiences and captured their imaginations – and loyalty. His character is still a favorite among patrons. Carr found opportunities to bring his uncommon performance and business philosophy to a number of ventures, each one providing a fresh set of challenges that expanded his knowledge and honed his ability to apply what he’d learned.

In 1998 Carr was introduced to The FISH! Philosophy based on the film, FISH!, by Charthouse Learning. The philosophy incorporated much of what he’d been preaching for years.   Carr quickly became a master FISH! Philosopher and traveled to speak with companies and organizations all over the world about how to use FISH! to help them create more engaged workplaces. We all sell something for a living — whether it’s a brand, a vision, an education, a direction, or a service. We might even be selling a set of numbers to a board meeting, learning to a student, or cereal to an infant. This eye-opening parable is about harnessing natural energy — yours and that of those around you — in order to take your sales, and your satisfaction to the next level of success.  In Top Performer, you’ll meet Jim, a disciplined but uninspired sales manager. In London on vacation — his first in years — he meets a gentleman named Top Hat. In an engrossing conversation, Top Hat tells him about a legendary Dublin busker/street performer called the Rat Catcher, who engages his audience and effortlessly charms them into parting easily with their change. Top Hat then gives Jim an envelope to bring to the Rat Catcher as a form of introduction. Jim is incredulous, and even a bit suspicious. But after a trip back home, he’s willing to do anything to break out of his rut of good-to-average sales and dogged but unfulfilling perseverance. Jim travels to Dublin, where the Rat Catcher tells — and shows — him some surprising secrets of his work ethic and his selling style. Jim ultimately realizes that he needs to Claim the Pitch, Mine the Mess, Choose the Close, and, most importantly, Juice the Jam. When Jim returns home, he’s re-energized, having learned how to Build a Circle and Pass the Hat where it really counts — in his life, his relationships, and his workplace. Full of action-packed and sometimes hilarious descriptions of the real like adventures of street performer, this engaging metaphor will appeal to anyone in any position — and in any field, from banking to baking to busking. In the tradition of the bestselling Fish! series this is a deceptively simple story that contains profound advice — advice that will help make readers into Top Performer themselves.

Carr’s approach to sales and selling is quite unique, but the message is so important.  If you want to become a Top Performer in selling you have to engage your customer, ask questions and listen.    This is a wonderfully entertaining book and my interview with Carr helps to bring the concepts of a street performer to life and integrate them into your sales practice.  I encourage sales people and anyone working with in customer services to listen to this podcast and read Carr’s book. You can learn more about Carr Hagerman his workshops and seminars by clicking here to visit his website.

Podcast 54: Pursuit of Light – An Extraordinary Journey with Sandy Brewer

Sandy BrewerI was recently introduced to Sandy Brewer through a friend in Los Angeles.  She mentioned that I needed to contact Sandy to do a podcast for she felt that her book and story about her life were nothing less than amazing.  I contacted Sandy and we spoke for awhile about her book and upbringing and I was convinced that I needed to let more people know about this amazing woman.  I received her book “Pursuit of Light” and was in awe by the strength and courage she must have had to manifest as a child growing up to cope with an amazingly horrific childhood.

In my this podcast with Sandy we discuss the trauma, triumph and the spiritual awakening necessary to live with such dysfunctional parents.  The abuse Brewer endured as a child was so horrific a reader may be forgiven for wondering why she didn’t go insane or commit suicide. Remarkably, Brewer not only overcame the handicaps of her own past but has also gone on to become an extremely effective therapist and inspirational speaker. Now, she has published a gripping and cathartic memoir that shares the profound lessons of her personal story.

Pursuit of Light has a double focus: It narrates the tragic story of Brewer’s childhood and also expounds the mature philosophical and spiritual perspective she has developed, which has allowed her to get beyond seeing herself as a victim. A reader quickly discovers the enormous gulf between what happened to her and what she has chosen to make of her life. The flashbacks into the nightmare world of her youth, in which mental, physical, and sexual abuse were the norm, are italicized and narrated in present tense, setting them off from the rest of the text and helping to lend them a startling immediacy no reader will soon forget.

As Brewer writes, “Choice impacts every area of our lives. Being a victim is a choice. Living life in the constant melodrama of a tedious soap opera…is a choice. Happiness is a choice.”

Sandy Brewer developed seminal techniques that allowed her to conquer the crippling legacy of her past. Enlightened and empowered by her journey of self-discovery, she is now committed to helping others make the same transition out of the darkness and into the light. This empowering narrative is a centerpiece of that work. Pursuit of Light provides an inspiring roadmap for how to follow the path Sandy Brewer has herself followed “through suffering to the stars.”

I thoroughly enjoyed my interview with Sandy and I highly recommend her book “Pursuit of Light-An Extraordinary Journey” I caution the readers, this book is not for the faint of heart for it depicts a a tragic upbringing, but the lessons learned and articulated in the book are so important to one’s spiritual growth.  Please visit Sandy’s website for more information about her coaching, and workshops.

Podcast 53: The Sedona Method with Hale Dwoskin

Hale Dwoskin I first become acquainted with Hale Dwoskin, and the Sedona Method when I attended a Prophets Conference in Los Angeles several months ago. I was quite intrigued by Hale’s simple but quite effective method of helping people transform their lives through the exercises he has developed.

Frankly, it’s very simple. We are all either our own worst enemy or our own best friend. We are constantly sabotaging our health, happiness and success unintentionally due to our unresolved thinking, beliefs and attitudes. Yet even when we know a thought, belief or attitude is not serving us, most of us find it very difficult to change it or let it go. According to Hale, the reason for this problem is: our emotions color, create and lock these limitations in place, making the limitations supposedly “real.” It is our emotions that either put us into action or prevent us from acting. The Sedona Method will show you how to master your emotions, thereby mastering how you think and act.

During my interview with Hale we get to explore the Sedona Method, and he even provides exercises during the interview that you can try out. I am quite impressed with Hale and the system he has created for positive personal transformation. His book “The Sedona Method: Your Key to Lasting Happiness, Success, Peace and Emotional Well-Being” is a great read if you are looking to identify some of those beliefs and patterns that are holding you back. He then provides exercises to help you transform those limiting thoughts.

I also would recommend that you visit his website for more information about his workshops, seminars, CD’s and audio programs. Please sit back, relax and enjoy my interview with Hale Dwoskin and learn more about the “Sedona Method”.

Podcast 52: Leadership from the Inside Out with Kevin Cashman

Kevin Cashman I had the pleasure of becoming acquainted with Kevin Cashman through my good friend and author Larry Wilson. I purchased Kevin’s book some years ago, and it always resonated with my philosophy with relationship to leadership. In my interview with Kevin, we get to explore the whole-person approach to leadership.

Leaders from around the country are singing praises for Leadership from the Inside Out, because the book is a practical leadership guide that offers real tools for leadership transformation.  “Leadership from the Inside Out”,  is different from other leadership or business management books, because it’s more than a book!   It takes readers on a reflective, interactive journey – a practical explorer’s guide focusing on mastery of life, rather than on mere mastery of circumstances or of managing people – to help readers advance from single-dimensional focus on results to multi-dimensional high performance. Expect to be transformed.

REDEFINING LEADERSHIP: The book advances a view of leadership that originates in the character of the person and radiates outward to enrich others. It goes beyond competency and skill-building to character and personal development. Penetrating the externally defined manifestations of leadership, it goes to the essence of leadership itself: authentic self-expression that creates value. It will literally turn your views of leadership inside-out.

INTERDISCIPLINARY: The book’s whole-person approach integrates seven interrelated pathways to leadership: Personal Mastery, Purpose Mastery, Change Mastery, Interpersonal Mastery, Being Mastery, Balance Mastery and Action Mastery. Through insightful stories, real-life examples and practical exercises, Leadership from the Inside Out helps you connect personal growth to leadership effectiveness.

I thoroughly enjoyed my interview with Kevin, and I learned what it takes to become a leader during these turbulent and consistently changing times. If you are in a position of leadership, I highly recommend Kevin’s original release or I would also consider the revised edition that will be released in September 2008 by Berrett-Koehler. You can visit Amazon now and pre-order the revised edition to be released soon.

Please visit Kevin’s website for more information about his consulting organization by clicking here. You can also look inside the new book by clicking here which will direct you to Amazon.

Enjoy this engaging and insightful interview with a master in the art of leadership.

Podcast 51: How to Find Out What (The) God of Your Understanding Wants From You with Rabbi Brian Mayer

Rabbi Brian Mayer Rabbi Brian Mayer’s approach to spirituality is definitely unique. He has founded a website entitled, “Religion-Outside the Box“, where a community of spiritual seekers are gathering on the Internet to read and listen to Rabbi Brian’s philosophy.

Rabbi Brian says that ROTB empowers adults to find and be with (the) God (of their understanding.) ROTB espouses a common ground between the religious right and those who think of themselves as “spiritual but not religious.”

In my podcast with Brian we speak about his book entitled, “How to Find Out What (The) God (Of Your Understanding) Wants From You. Brian makes the statement that we live in four different worlds. The physical, the emotional, the intellectual and the spiritual. He states that the first three are easy to identify, but the fourth is where we get stuck and for good reason. Brian states that the spiritual-religious world…like truth, beauty and love…are hard to categorize.  Spirituality is where we define what and who God is to us, and frequently this is difficult for us to define and get our head around.

In my interview with Rabbi Brian we have an opportunity to explore Religion Outside the Box as well as why his Internet congregation is growing so rapidly. I know you will find this interview to be spiritually enlightening and Brian’s approach will open your mind to new possibilities about your spiritual-religious practice. I thoroughly enjoyed our interview, and recommend Brian’s book.
If you would like to learn more about his Internet spiritual talks, book and seminars please visit his website by clicking here.

Podcast 50: "Sell Little Red Hen! Sell" with Jeff Hansler

Jeff Hansler I first met Jeff through a very good friend who is a dynamite public speaker by the name of Lorna Riley. Jeff was a participant on our Compassionate Communications pilot program, and was excited about the opportunity.

During our dialogue with one another I was intrigued by his work as a speaker and published author, so I decided to do this podcast. Jeff owns a company called, “The Oxford Company” , which is a sales consulting organization located in Huntington Beach, Ca.

In this podcast we focus on Jeff’s book entitled, “Sell Little Red Hen! Sell.” Jeff masterfully adapts the children’s story of, “The Little Red Hen”, to teach the principles of successful selling. Topics in the book include:  multi-layered listening, understanding personality types, selling to values and influence and persuasion. It is a must-read for salespeople everywhere!

Jeff is a master at helping companies develop sales systems He does this by analyzing existing processes and improving on the efficiency and effectiveness of their sales delivery system.

I highly recommend to anyone in sales to listen to the podcast and read Jeff’s book. You can learn more about his consulting services and book by clicking here. Enjoy the podcast!!!!

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