225: Being Curious About the Power of Language

Megan Miller is the founder of Aprovechar Language Solutions, LLC, whose mission is to empower anyone needing a bilingual voice. She offers a personalized, habit-based approach to teaching Spanish and English language and culture to adults worldwide.

Megan has over 20 years of experience in Spanish and has been obsessed with learning and teaching all of her life: from living abroad in Madrid, Spain; traveling worldwide, and being a training consultant and language coach.

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Jeff Ikler
224: Leading for Impact

Michelle Chen was the SMART Nav lead for the DART mission. She is a software systems engineer at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory, which built the spacecraft, and is managing the mission for NASA’s Planetary Defense Coordination Office.

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Jeff Ikler
223: Leading from Grief to Life

We’re all leaders — of our own lives and or the roles we play where we work. How do we effectively lead ourselves or those with whom we work through the grief associated with a life change? Helping us to answer that is Melissa Douaire. Melissa has more than 15 years of experience supporting those who are grieving. She is recognized for her gifts and expertise as a compassionate listener, faithful optimist, and knowledgeable confidante. Melissa earned her Masters in Divinity from Chicago Theological Seminary. She is an ordained UCC minister and a certified grief counselor.

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Jeff Ikler
222: Want to Simplify Your Money Management?

Carl Richards is a Certified Financial Planner™ and creator of the Sketch Guy column that appeared weekly in The New York Times (2010-2021). There, he used simple illustrations to introduce calming financial advice and counsel. He is also the author of The One-Page Financial Plan and The Behavior Gap resources — a book, website, and podcast that provide simple ideas to help us “Stop Doing Dumb Things with Money.” Carl’s goal is to demystify financial planning by focusing as much — or more — on the humans it serves as it does on the numbers.

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Jeff Ikler
220: Helping the Dead Live Again

My guest in this episode is Richard Goldstein. Since joining the New York Times in 1980, Richard worked as an editor and an obituary writer, focusing on figures from the military and sports world.

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Jeff Ikler
219: The Leader as Storyteller

Debbie Danielpour writes screenplays, libretti, fiction, and nonfiction and has been a professor of fiction or screenwriting for over thirty years. On the film side of her work, she’s written seven feature screenplays, a limited television series, and tv or feature scripts as a writer-for-hire. Her biopic, MIRIAM was just selected as a finalist in one of the preeminent screenwriting competitions, and her feature film WE’RE ALL HERE will be shot next summer.

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Jeff Ikler
218: Being Curious About being in Someone Else's Shoes

My guest in this episode is Dr. Christine Mason. Chris is the Executive Director, Center for Educational Improvement; Assistant Clinical Professor, Department of Psychiatry Yale University School of Medicine, Program for Recovery and Community Health; Chief Advisor, Childhood-Trauma Learning Collaborative; New England Mental Health Technology Transfer Center. Dr. Mason has co-authored several books, notably Visioning Onward and Compassionate School Practices.

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Jeff Ikler
217: Being Curious About Curiosity

My guests in this episode are Melissa Hughes Ph.D., a neuroscience researcher, educator, keynote speaker, and author of Happier Hour with Einstein — Another Round, and Michael Appelgren PsyD, a licensed psychologist, private practice owner, and executive functioning and parent management coach. Together we explore the roots of curiosity, some of the obstacles that stand in the way of actualizing it, and the benefits of increasing and leveraging it.

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Jeff Ikler
216: The Quest to Rediscover Humanity At Its Very Best

My guest in this episode is Dennis Pitocco. Dennis is Chief Reimaginator of 360° Nation, an organization and approach to life that includes the award-winning BIZCATALYST 360°; Real Voices 360°, and GoodWorks 360°. Everything Dennis and his team do is “for good” versus for-profit and founded upon their quest to rediscover humanity at its very best.

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Jeff Ikler
213: Bridging Our Great Divide by Listening to Understand

My guest in this episode is Mary Thomas-Vallens. Mary, a 40-year classroom teacher in the Irvine California Unified School District, currently serves as a moderator and in various other capacities for the Braver Angel organization, which works to depolarize “reds” and “blues,” “conservatives” and “liberals” and help them become better listeners.

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Jeff Ikler
211: Understanding a Very Delicate System: the Supply Chain

Why are some of those shelves empty in your go-to stores? What’s one of the real causes of inflation? St. Claire L. Gerald is the VP of Supply Chain for RTG Solutions Group, a consulting firm that helps business leaders improve their organization’s efficiencies. Mr. Gerald is a Certified Supply Chain Professional (CSCP). He is also an instructor working with individuals seeking to gain their supply chain certification.

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Jeff Ikler
209: "Speak Earth" — Having Meaningful Conversations About the Environment

Tania Marien is an independent environmental education professional and the Director of Talaterra, a network of independent environmental education (EE) professionals who contribute to lifelong learning and environmental health in communities.

OK, that’s Tania’s official bio. After talking with her for a couple of hours and studying what she does and how she works, I prefer to describe her as a “citizen for our age”: she’s a connector, an organizer, a contributor, a doer, a giver, and infinitely smart about how to approach the highly complex topics of the environment and climate change.

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Jeff Ikler
208: And A River Runs Through It

Today’s guest is Steve Ehrlich. Steve is an avid fly fisher who is now applying his experience and interests in adult learning, psychology, and literature toward a new chapter — bringing the transformative lessons and stories from the fly fishing environment to support personal and professional growth.

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Jeff Ikler
207: Engaging with History to Help Make Sense of Today

My guest in this episode is Donna D. Curtin Ph.D, a historian serving as the Executive Director of the Pilgrim Hall Museum in Plymouth, MA. Pilgrim Hall is “the oldest continuously operating public museum in the country and America’s museum of Pilgrim possessions. I wanted to talk to Dr. Curtin because as a former high school history teacher and developer of social studies classroom materials for more than 35 years, I’m very concerned about the restrictions being placed on what some history teachers can teach. Having met Donna on a tour of the Pilgrim Hall Museum, I felt she would bring the professional historian’s view of the role and value of history for young and old alike.

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Jeff Ikler
206: Discovering the Pathways to Discovering Purpose

My guest in this episode is Bradley Wright PhD, a professor of sociology at the University of Connecticut and host of the “School of Purpose” podcast. When I began to investigate curiosity, Bradley’s focus on purpose was one of the first ideas that intrigued me because I don’t ever remember saying to myself, “That’s why I’m here! That’s what I meant to do in life!” Instead, it was more like, “Well, maybe I could teach.” Curious as I am, I wanted to explore the relationship between my passion for curiosity and the appeal of discovering life's purpose. So, too, it turns out, did Bradley.

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Jeff Ikler