Modern Love is a weekly New York Times column, created and edited by Daniel Jones since 2004. As it rose to popularity, it expanded into a podcast, a television show, and a book. In all its forms, Modern Love talks about relationships, feelings, betrayals, and revelations. Daniel Jones joins Google to talk about the anthology, “Modern Love, Revised and Updated: True Stories of Love, Loss, and Redemption,” a collection of the column’s most popular, provocative, and unforgettable essays, including...
Feb 21, 2025•53 min•Ep. 527
Award-winning author and historian Elizabeth L. Block joins Google to discuss her book, “Beyond Vanity: The History and Power of Hairdressing.” She explores the diverse history of women’s hair, from the cultural power of hair in 19th century America to the untold stories of business owners and trendsetters. Through her research, we see the places and spaces of hair that allow a new understanding of its immense cultural power. Elizabeth is an art historian and a Senior Editor in the Publications ...
Feb 18, 2025•30 min•Ep. 526
Mandy Len Catron is known for her wildly popular Modern Love essay in the New York Times, “To Fall in Love with Anyone, Do This." She popularized the 36 questions that are said to make people fall in love. Mandy’s essay inspired her book of the same name. In the book, “To Fall in Love with Anyone, Do This," Mandy deconstructs her own personal canon of love stories through a series of candid and vulnerable essays. She dives all the way back to 1944, when her grandparents first met in a coal minin...
Feb 14, 2025•57 min•Ep. 525
Doug Melville discusses his book, "Invisible Generals: Rediscovering Family Legacy, and a Quest to Honor America’s First Black Generals." The book takes us on a journey from post-Civil War America to modern-day Europe and Asia, introducing readers to prominent yet hidden heroes, inspired by Doug’s own story. In 2011, Doug was thrilled to be invited to an advanced screening of George Lucas’ “Red Tails,” a fresh take on America’s first Black aerial squadron, the Tuskegee Airmen. However, that exci...
Feb 11, 2025•52 min•Ep. 524
Award-winning wine expert Karen MacNeil discusses her book, “The Wine Bible: 3rd Edition,” which offers the ultimate education in wine with expanded content. Karen MacNeil is the only American to have won every major wine award given in the English language. TIME magazine has called her, “America’s Missionary of the Vine.” She is the author of the award-winning book, The Wine Bible, the only best selling wine book in the United States, and is the creator and editor of Wine Speed, the top digital...
Feb 07, 2025•58 min•Ep. 523
Chances are, you’ve tried – and maybe succeeded – at the Rubik’s Cube. Patented in 1975, the Rubik’s Cube then made its international debut in 1980 at the New York Toy Fair, and quickly became the best-selling toy in history. But you may not know that Erno Rubik also patented many other successful toys and designs, including the Magic Snake and Rubik’s Magic. His book “Cubed – The Puzzle of Us All” has been published in several countries around the world. Erno Rubik studied architecture and desi...
Feb 04, 2025•35 min•Ep. 522
Are you drowning in information overload? Do you disappear down a rabbit hole of social media just when you need to focus? Productivity expert Graham Allcott can help. Graham Allcott is the founder of Think Productive, author of 5 books, and the host of podcast "Beyond Busy." In this conversation, he talks about how to be a productivity ninja: how to work smarter, manage projects with confidence, and tame your inbox. Originally published in February 2019. Visit youtube.com/TalksAtGoogle to watch...
Jan 31, 2025•39 min•Ep. 521
When we let fear of other people's opinions take control, we play it safe and small because we're afraid of what will happen on the other side of critique. But what if the key to leading a high-performance life is to redirect our attention from the outside world to the world inside us? Dr. Michael Gervais discusses his book, The First Rule Of Mastery: Stop Worrying About What People Think Of You . He reveals the mental skills and practices we need to overcome the fear of other people's opinions ...
Jan 28, 2025•50 min•Ep. 520
We’ve all – hopefully – experienced what it’s like to fall into a sense of flow. It’s when everything happens easily. You have a natural sense of meaning and purpose without having to think or worry about it very much at all. But for some of us, that’s harder to come by. That’s where Arjuna Ardagh comes in. Arjuna is the founder of Awakening Coaching, where he’s coached leaders for over 35 years across the technology field, the movie industry, writers, and innovators in public policy. Arjuna map...
Jan 24, 2025•52 min•Ep. 519
Ravi Bapna and Anindya Ghose visit Google to discuss their book “Thrive: Maximizing Well-Being in the Age of AI” - the book explores how AI can positively impact many aspects of our daily lives, from health and wellness to work, education, and home life. Artificial intelligence is a powerful general-purpose technology that is reshaping the modern economy, but misperceptions about AI stand in the way of harnessing it for the betterment of humanity. In their book Thrive, Ravi Bapna and Anindya Gho...
Jan 21, 2025•1 hr 1 min•Ep. 518
Erin Weed is the founder of Girls Fight Back, a women’s safety education company. After teaching live self-defense seminars to over 1 million people worldwide, she sold Girls Fight Back in 2013. Since then, she has been working as a speaker, author, and communication strategist who helps people seek their purpose and speak their truth. Today, we’ll hear her Talk at TEDxBoulder about how to connect with one another by communicating authentically. On International Women's Day 2018, she joined Wome...
Jan 17, 2025•1 hr 10 min•Ep. 517
Dr. Peter Attia visits Google to discuss his book "Outlive: The Science and Art of Longevity.” The book is a guide to living better and longer, and reveals a new approach to preventing chronic disease and extending long-term health. For all its successes, mainstream medicine has failed to make much progress against the diseases of aging that kill most people: heart disease, cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, and type 2 diabetes. Too often, it intervenes with treatments that are too late to help, prolo...
Jan 14, 2025•1 hr 3 min•Ep. 516
As the author of "The Rise of Superman" and co-founder of the Flow Genome Project, Steven Kotler is one of the world's leading experts on ultimate human performance. In this Talk, he provides a tour of the current research focusing on "flow states”, or an optimal state of consciousness where we both feel our best and perform our best. Researchers now know that flow sits at the heart of almost every athletic championship, underpins most major scientific breakthroughs, and accounts for significant...
Jan 10, 2025•1 hr 12 min•Ep. 515
Masatoshi Ohno and Jérôme Guth visit Google to discuss how team sports fosters a sense of belonging, appreciation, and resilience. Masatoshi 'Mar' Ohno is a 3-time Japan Pro Surfing Association Grand Champion surfer who has made significant contributions to the Japanese surf industry. He holds the record for most consecutive wins in a single year, with 7 Golds in 2013. Mar has also been instrumental in promoting surfing in Japan, leading the national surf team to multiple victories and serving a...
Jan 07, 2025•1 hr 8 min•Ep. 514
Jump start your new year with a dynamic, action-oriented, inspirational conversation with Mike Steib, who is now CEO of XO Group, now known as The Knot Worldwide. During his time at Google, Mike created the “Career Manifesto” Google doc for his team. This doc quickly went viral, inspiring many Googlers and young professionals beyond Google’s walls. In this podcast, Mike brings the Career Manifesto to life through an engaging, insightful Talk geared toward early professionals who want to take con...
Jan 03, 2025•1 hr 2 min•Ep. 513
The cast & creatives from the Tony Award winning musical “The Outsiders” join us to perform a song and discuss the beloved story that defined a generation, reimagined as a groundbreaking new musical. In Tulsa, Oklahoma, 1967, Ponyboy Curtis, his best friend Johnny Cade, and their greaser family of ‘Outsiders’ battle with their affluent rivals, the Socs. “The Outsiders” navigates the complexities of self-discovery as the Greasers dream about who they want to become in a world that may never a...
Dec 31, 2024•49 min•Ep. 512
David DeSteno visits Google to discuss his book “Emotional Success: The Power of Gratitude, Compassion, and Pride.” Grit, the ability to persevere against all odds, is often recognized as the key to success. But how can grit be cultivated and sustained? In this book, David DeSteno reveals that the most powerful tools we can draw upon to achieve our toughest goals are not willpower or self-denial, but our prosocial emotions—gratitude, compassion, and pride. This undervalued toolkit evolved specif...
Dec 27, 2024•56 min•Ep. 511
Award winning author of 12 cookbooks Rose Levy Beranbaum visits Google to discuss her hugely influential cookbook “The Cake Bible, 35th Anniversary Edition.” This updated edition contains recipes for both classic and innovative cakes, plus complementary adornments of all types, instructions for making stunning decorations, and flavor variations for every craving and occasion. The original “Cake Bible” is a guiding light in the world’s baking literature, with Rose Levy Beranbaum’s deep knowledge ...
Dec 24, 2024•57 min•Ep. 510
Tony Hsieh visits Google to discuss his book "Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose." Back in 1999, Tony Hsieh sold LinkExchange, the company he co-founded, to Microsoft for $265 million. He then joined Zappos as an adviser and investor, and eventually became CEO. In 2009, Zappos was listed as one of Fortune magazine's top 25 companies to work for, and was acquired by Amazon later that year in a deal valued at over $1.2 billion on the day of closing. In his book, Tony sha...
Dec 20, 2024•57 min•Ep. 509
Dr. Tony Nader visits Google to discuss his book “Consciousness Is All There Is: How Understanding and Experiencing Consciousness Will Transform Your Life.” Dr. Nader offers a direct path to peace for ourselves and our world that anyone can obtain—simply by delving into our own Consciousness. He provides the methods, tools, and guidance for connecting with our authentic inner nature and understanding how Consciousness is the essence of all existence, including addressing such fundamental questio...
Dec 17, 2024•35 min•Ep. 508
Alton Brown visits Google to discuss his book “Good Eats 3: The Later Years”. The book offers foodies more than 200 recipes accompanied by hundreds of photographs, drawings, and stills from his hit Food Network show “Good Eats”, as well as lots of science-of-food facts, cooking tips, food trivia, and behind-the-scenes glimpses. In chapters devoted to everything from pomegranates to pretzels, mincemeat to molasses, Alton delivers delicious recipes along with fascinating background in a book that’...
Dec 13, 2024•1 hr 1 min•Ep. 507
Joanna “JoJo” Levesque visits Google to discuss her book “Over the Influence: A Memoir.” Signed to a major recording deal at just 12 years old, JoJo catapulted to the top of the pop-and-R&B-infused charts in the mid 2000s. JoJo was an undeniable superstar and pop culture fixture, appearing in major studio films, on Top 40 radio, magazine covers, and national TV. Then, out of the blue, everything came to a halt and JoJo seemingly stepped out of the spotlight, leaving many fans to wonder: What...
Dec 10, 2024•1 hr 2 min•Ep. 506
James Franco visits Google to discuss writing, directing, producing and starring in his film "The Disaster Artist.” The movie is based on Greg Sestero’s best-selling tell-all book about the making of Tommy Wiseau's cult-classic disasterpiece The Room, often referred to as “The Greatest Bad Movie Ever Made”. In the film, Tommy Wiseau and Greg Sestero become friends after meeting each other in an acting class in San Francisco. Hoping to achieve Hollywood stardom, Sestero moves to Los Angeles and s...
Dec 06, 2024•39 min•Ep. 505
Award-winning author Maggie Jackson joins us to discuss her latest book “Uncertain: The Wisdom and Wonder of Being Unsure.” In an era of terrifying unpredictability, the swift, sure answer often seems right. We race to address precarity and complexity with neat algorithms, crisp bullet points, or hurried tweets. Who has time to dally in the wilderness of being unsure? How could we find the clarity and vision so urgently needed today by not-knowing? This book is about the unsung triumph of doing ...
Dec 03, 2024•34 min•Ep. 504
In "Sleep Smarter", Shawn Stevenson shares easy tips and tricks to discover the best sleep and best health of your life. When it comes to health, there is often one criminally overlooked element: sleep. Good sleep helps you lose weight, stave off disease, stay productive, and improve virtually every function of your mind and body. That’s what Shawn Stevenson learned when a degenerative bone disease crushed his dream of becoming a professional athlete. Like many of us, he gave up on his health an...
Nov 29, 2024•58 min•Ep. 503
Social health expert Kasley Killam visits Google to discuss her book “The Art and Science of Connection.” Weaving together cutting-edge science, mindset shifts, and practical wisdom, Kasley offers a methodology for how to be socially healthy. Her book is an antidote to the loneliness epidemic and an inspiring manifesto for seeing wellbeing as not only physical and mental, but also social. Exercise. Eat a balanced diet. Go to therapy. Most wellness advice is focused on achieving and maintaining g...
Nov 26, 2024•55 min•Ep. 502
Sir Barry Cunliffe has been Professor of European Archaeology at the University of Oxford for 35 years and is a Fellow of the British Academy. In this talk, he discusses his book "The Scythians: Nomad Warriors of the Steppe.” Brilliant horsemen and great fighters, the Scythians were nomadic horsemen who ranged wide across the grasslands of the Asian steppe from the Altai mountains in the east to the Great Hungarian Plain in the first millennium BCE. Their steppe homeland bordered on a number of ...
Nov 22, 2024•55 min•Ep. 501
Simon Sinek, optimist, author, and founder of The Optimism Company, visits Google to discuss how adopting an optimistic mindset can help you rediscover your purpose and thrive even when it seems like everything around you is changing. Simon Sinek is an unshakable optimist, who believes in a bright future and our ability to build it together. He has devoted his professional life to help advance a vision of the world that does not yet exist; a world in which the vast majority of people wake up eve...
Nov 19, 2024•59 min•Ep. 500
Muhammad Yunus, a winner of the Nobel Peace Prize and bestselling author of "Banker to the Poor," visits to Google to talk about his book "A World of Three Zeroes." Muhammad Yunus is one of today's most vigorous social critics. Now he declares it's time to admit that the capitalist engine is broken, and that in its current form it inevitably leads to rampant inequality, massive unemployment, and environmental destruction. He advocates for a new economic system that unleashes altruism as a creati...
Nov 15, 2024•1 hr 3 min•Ep. 499
Tamron Hall and Lish Steiling join us to discuss their book “A Confident Cook,” where they share empowerment and excitement with those who are just beginning to cook. This book is packed with scrumptious recipes as well as cocktails and mocktails. Throughout, Lish and Tamron chat, teach, learn, and inspire you to keep it going in the kitchen. Tamron Hall is an Emmy Award-winning television host and executive producer of the syndicated talk show, "Tamron Hall," a best-selling author, and a self-t...
Nov 12, 2024•1 hr 1 min•Ep. 498
