Over the months of June and July, I will be sharing books that have really delighted me. Some of them have been written by past guests, while others are new books that have really inspired me to think more deeply about sustainability. My hope in sharing these books with you is that you’ll be inspired, as I was, and think differently about how you operate this summer. Through this summer book series, perhaps you’ll start asking important questions, like, “Well, what do I really want? What is enou...
Jun 26, 2024•20 min•Ep. 135
This summer and over the four episodes in June and July, I will be sharing books that have really delighted me. Some of them have been written by past guests, while others are new books that have inspired me to think more deeply about sustainability. My hope in sharing these books with you is that you will be inspired, as I was, and think differently about how you operate this summer. Through this summer book series, perhaps you’ll start asking important questions, like, “Well, what do I really ...
Jun 12, 2024•19 min•Ep. 134
How can the arts support our ability to thrive and flourish in life and work? As part of my continuing conversations about creativity and how it intersects with Sustainable Ambition, I’m talking with Dr. Tasha Golden about the role of art in our evolution and its power to help us express ourselves more fully. We also discuss the dangers of “robotic” behavioral norms to our physical and mental wellbeing and how reimagining identity as an evolving narrative rather than a fixed point can help us le...
May 29, 2024•48 min•Ep. 133
If asked, most of us would likely say that we want to live with a sense of meaning and purpose. But how many of us truly put that intention front and center in how we make choices for ourselves? In this episode, I’m continuing conversations that explore how creative practices can help us come to a deeper understanding of our ambitions and support us as we seek to live and work in meaningful ways. Podcast executive producer and audio artist, Emily Shaw, joins me to talk about her pursuit of meani...
May 15, 2024•44 min•Ep. 132
Can engaging in creative practices help us on our journey of Sustainable Ambition? Can we apply creative practices to live and work in more fulfilling and satisfying ways? To begin answering those questions, I am joined today by Doug Neill, founder of Verbal to Visual. Doug and I discussed the impact of visual thinking and how it can unlock creativity and improve comprehension. Doug believes that even if you don’t consider yourself creative you can discover doodling and sketchnoting as a powerfu...
May 01, 2024•56 min•Ep. 131
Do you have a hard time allowing your ambitions to shift and change? Do you feel uncomfortable when at times you don’t feel as committed to your ambitions? I want to challenge these dominant narratives about success and ambition. So today, I’m digging into why evolving ambitions are inevitable, and even desirable, and offer three alternative ways to reframe ambition so it is sustainable over the course of our lives. Thanks for Listening! If you liked this episode, please rate, review, and share ...
Apr 17, 2024•20 min•Ep. 130
Are you afraid to ask yourself what you really, really want? Today’s guest presents a compelling example of what it looks like to live boldly, with intention and imagination, from the inside out. Bonnie Wan joins me to discuss the journey of developing The Life Brief and expanding it from her own personal practice to something she now teaches others and brought to life in her new book, why you have to get messy to get clarity, and how to courageously create the life you want. Learn more about Bo...
Apr 03, 2024•44 min•Ep. 129
Having support structures in place is vital to sustaining our life and work ambitions particularly as we transition through different life stages. Entrepreneurs and people who are self-employed have an acute need for strong support structures because they tend to wear all the hats and stretch themselves too thin. Add in pregnancy and childbirth, and the need for strong support systems is even more intense for women entrepreneurs managing and running their businesses while also caring for new lif...
Mar 20, 2024•22 min•Ep. 128
We all have ambitions for both our personal and professional lives. The question is how do we pursue them sustainably and with resilience so we can get fulfillment and joy from both. In this new post-pandemic environment, we need new ideas, narratives, and models to consider and to test for ourselves. As part of a new periodic series, I’m speaking with people from a variety of disciplines about how they live and work. In today’s conversation with Ashley Donahey, we’ll touch on how personal and p...
Mar 06, 2024•52 min•Ep. 127
If you’re feeling exhausted, overwhelmed or burned out, you’re not alone. But rather than push or grind through it as so many of us try to do, today’s guest offers a different approach: a resilience plan. In this conversation, Dr. Marie-Hélène Pelletier and I talk about consciously building a resilience plan so that we can operate at our best and achieve our goals and ambitions without burning out. Learn more about Dr. Marie-Hélène Pelletier: Website Connect on LinkedIn The Resilience Plan: A St...
Feb 21, 2024•51 min•Ep. 126
As we leave January behind, many of us are still in the process of figuring out what we want out of this year. And it’s not uncommon to long for a clear path forward as we do. That desire for clarity can put us on a path of aiming for what we should be doing or pursuing. But if our ambitions are going to be sustainable, we have to make them our own. Living with the ambiguity as we define our own ambitions can be a challenge. Today, I want to offer some ways of navigating the uncertainty with a b...
Feb 07, 2024•36 min•Ep. 125
The world of work is changing. And it’s not just about what industries are growing or shrinking. Attitudes, behaviors, beliefs, and motivations around work are all shifting. Connie Steele joins me today to discuss the fluid future of work and what it will take to succeed at leading ourselves and others in 2024 and beyond. Learn more about Connie Steele Website Strategic Momentum Podcast Connect with Connie on LinkedIn Instagram: @conniewangsteele Building the Business of You Thanks for Listening...
Jan 24, 2024•44 min•Ep. 124
Welcome to 2024! As we look to a new year, I’m offering some ideas and reflections to set the tone as you craft the year ahead. I talk about what the James Webb Space Telescope can teach us about shifting our own paradigms and give you several prompts to help you dial in your Sustainable Ambitions for 2024. Thanks for Listening! If you liked this episode, please rate, review, and share the episode. Thank you so much! Get show notes for this episode at https://sustainableambition.com/podcast Send...
Jan 10, 2024•14 min•Ep. 123
As we end 2023, I’d like to offer a few prompts and reflections to help you stay grounded as you navigate this challenging time and head into 2024. I truly believe that self-reflection is an important and powerful tool to help us learn about ourselves and craft a more positive and empowering narrative, with learning we can take forward into the future. My hope is that these ideas and prompts will help you end your year with a little more peace. Thanks for Listening! Give the gift of Sustainable ...
Dec 27, 2023•18 min•Ep. 122
In today’s special episode, my dear friend Sonya Thomas turns the tables and interviews me. We explore how the concept of Sustainable Ambition has evolved for me through the conversations I’ve had with my guests on the show and my research. We discuss the importance of defining success on personal terms, aligning ambitions with personal motivations, and the necessity of taking breaks. Sonya shares some of her own journey and experience with ambition and navigating career pivots, and I share upda...
Dec 13, 2023•54 min•Ep. 121
What does it mean to find home? How do we develop a sense of belonging, whether to a place, a community, or even to our work? Today, I’ll dive into these questions and more with returning guest, Amy Bonsall. We discuss making hard decisions feel lighter, why “squishy ground” is where the magic happens, and how building belonging helps us to flourish and create the life we want. Learn more about Amy Bonsall: Collective Instagram: @co.ll.ec.ti.ve Connect with Amy on LinkedIn Thanks for Listening! ...
Nov 29, 2023•38 min•Ep. 120
How do we sustain a successful career over time? When we define ambition and success on our own terms, based on what’s important to us internally vs. an external yardstick, we can end up with a life and career that are fulfilling and sustainable. My guest today has embodied this approach in his long and successful corporate career and now in a new endeavor after retiring from his corporate role. In this episode, Doug Milliken shares his career journey and how he shaped his roles to align with wh...
Nov 15, 2023•52 min•Ep. 119
Crafting a fulfilling life and career is the work of a lifetime. My guest today is Karyn Flynn. Karyn has built a varied resume, stepped back from her career to focus on her family, and pivoted in and out of multiple fields and roles. Her trajectory hasn’t been straight, but considering her purpose and values and continually leveraging her skills has allowed her to create a more fulfilling, sustainable career and life. She shares how building confidence through your skills and not your title can...
Nov 01, 2023•45 min•Ep. 118
In this episode, I’m joined by author and journalist Rainesford Stauffer. We discuss her new book, All the Gold Stars: Reimagining Ambition and the Ways We Strive, what happens when ambition defines us, the conversations we should be having about ambition, and getting curious about ambition with a more expansive, holistic view. Learn more about Guest Website Instagram: @rainesford_stauffer All the Gold Stars An Ordinary Age Thanks for Listening! If you liked this episode, please rate, review, an...
Oct 18, 2023•49 min•Ep. 117
Overwhelm can happen to anyone, even me. We can set goals and priorities, and they can be the right ambitions, but managing a packed schedule takes intention and thought if we want to avoid burnout. Today, I’m sharing some strategies that helped me make conscious decisions about how I was spending my time in pursuit of my goals during an active few months. Thanks for Listening! If you liked this episode, please rate, review, and share the episode. Thank you so much! Get show notes for this episo...
Oct 04, 2023•33 min•Ep. 116
How can we craft our goals in ways that actually support our well-being? How can we reduce frustration and, in turn, increase fulfillment as we pursue our goals? Today, I’m thrilled to be joined by Valerie Tiberius. Valerie’s work explores the ways in which philosophy and psychology contribute to the study of well-being and virtue. Her most recent book, What Do You Want Out of Life? A Philosophical Guide to Figuring Out What Matters has been especially relevant to the way I think about Sustainab...
Sep 20, 2023•42 min•Ep. 115
Today, I’m in conversation with Ayelet Fishbach, an award-winning psychologist and prolific researcher on the science of motivation. We discuss how motivation connects to both ambition and how to manage our goals. You’ll hear how we can make choices about where we want to pull ourselves and how to create the circumstances that best support our efforts. We also delve into the idea that it’s okay to be ambitious and try to do a lot in our lives, while also needing to hold our goals and ambitions l...
Sep 06, 2023•46 min•Ep. 114
What lies at the intersection of ambition and expectation? On today’s episode, I’m welcoming back Wade Brill to discuss just that. We start first by getting clear—what are definitions of ambitions, ambitious, and expectations? And how do we manage when expectations are present? Expectations are tricky to manage and can cause a lot of suffering. Wade shares practical advice for noticing when expectations are present and how we can have more compassion for ourselves as we navigate these intersecti...
Aug 23, 2023•54 min•Ep. 113
How do we help the next generation define success on their own terms? My guest, Irena Smith, offers wisdom and advice from her years of experience working with college applicants and her own life experience in her memoir, The Golden Ticket: A Life in College Admissions Essays. Her book explores the college application process from the perspective of a parent, college counselor, and admissions officer. She challenges the societal expectations of success, especially for young people, and encourage...
Aug 09, 2023•55 min•Ep. 112
What can we learn about Sustainable Ambition from amazing women who are changing the world? Today I’m talking with Lauren Schiller and Hadley Dynak about their new book, It's a Good Day to Change the World: Inspiration and Advice for a Feminist Future. The women in the book are taking on the seemingly intractable problems of our world and creating change one step at a time and there is so much we can learn from these stories and from the women who brought us the book. Learn more about Lauren Sch...
Jul 27, 2023•39 min•Ep. 111
It’s easy to get caught in the loop of looking to external markers of success and constantly striving toward ever-moving goalposts of what it means to be successful. Today, I’m in conversation with the CEO of Hello!Lucky, Sabrina Moyle. Sabrina shares her journey through founding the company with her sister, redefining success on her own terms, and the inner work she’s done to support creating a sustainable, creative, joyful life for herself and her family. We discuss finding our purpose in our ...
Jul 12, 2023•45 min•Ep. 110
What is performance and what does it mean to perform? For many, performance implies being inauthentic. But what if we defined performance as being wholly present, uninhibited by our fears, and unrestrained in expressing our instincts? In today’s episode, I’m reflecting on my conversations with D’Arcy Webb and Charles Gilbert and on what it really means to perform, how it intersects with our goals and doing our best work, and how it impacts the way we show up for others. Thanks for Listening! If ...
Jul 05, 2023•11 min•Ep. 109
How do we sustain our ambition and creativity over time? Over a lifetime, even? I had the pleasure of sitting down with Charles (Charlie) Gilbert, a lifelong creative, a writer, a composer, a director, and a teacher. In this episode, Charlie talks about sustainable creative habits, how retirement has opened up new possibilities for his work, and his big ambitions for this chapter of his life. He also shares his perspective on defining success, particularly in an industry where rejection can be t...
Jun 28, 2023•42 min•Ep. 108
Today, I’m in conversation with D’Arcy Webb. D’Arcy is an award-winning speech and vocal coach with decades of experience and decades of sustained ambition. In this episode, D’Arcy talked about what it’s like to be ambitious at this stage of her life and how she’s able to sustain her drive. She also talked about the power of using your voice, no matter your age, and how stepping into that kind of power can change your life. Learn more about D’Arcy Webb: Website Connect on LinkedIn Instagram: @da...
Jun 14, 2023•44 min•Ep. 107
What is sustainable? What is ambition? What happens when you put these two seemingly incongruous words together? Some people think they are mutually exclusive, but I disagree. In this episode, I dive into what I mean by each of these terms with a hope that you can better understand that these two words can live together, making you a believer in Sustainable Ambition, too. Thanks for Listening! If you liked this episode, please rate, review, and share the episode. Thank you so much. Get show note...
May 31, 2023•38 min•Ep. 106
