In this podcast episode, Jordan Criss returns to discuss life and fulfillment. We cover topics such as imposter syndrome, healthy habits, procrastination, and focusing on what matters most to you, regardless of the outcome. Life is about playing a long game. What are your thoughts or experiences related to these ideas?

Coach Karlee is a movement coach who teaches her athletes to move their bodies as nature designed: strong, secure, pain-free, and forward. Utilizing slow-motion video assessment, she can assess, address, and correct pattern errors that are causing pain and/or hindering performance goals. With a background in soccer, endurance running, and strength and conditioning, Karlee takes an intense passion for competition and athletics into her coaching style to help build mentally and physically capable athletes, regardless of age, gender, sport, or background. She prioritizes foundations for durability through awareness and integration of pain-free movement practices to maximize performance and longevity. Are you ready to unlock your INNER ATHLETE?

Gina Iaffaldano is a legal operations professional, writer, and everyday athlete who recently relocated back to the Chicagoland area. She is working on her first book, Little Gifts, which covers much of her experience overcoming Guillain-Barré syndrome. This rare autoimmune syndrome caused her to be neurologically paralyzed. Gina has been in remission for two years and is training for her second Spartan competition post-recovery.

In this episode, we are joined by Ed Latimore. Ed is a former professional heavyweight boxer, a competitive chess player, and a bestselling author. His writing focuses on self-development, realizing your potential, and sobriety—all of which he approaches from personal experience, overcoming poverty and addiction. We have a special guest on today's episode, Ed Latimore. Ed's an ex-professional heavyweight boxer and a competitive chess player. He's also a best-selling author who writes about personal development, achieving your goals, and sobriety. Ed speaks from experience, having overcome poverty and addiction.

Alec returns to the podcast! This time to share his journey and lessons from ultra running. We had this conversation just days before he would attempt the Stagecoach 100.

Alec is a business owner, entrepreneur, ultra-runner, mountaineer, and travel fanatic. He believes in the power and resilience of the human spirit and one who perpetually seeks to optimize life in all of its pillars.

Professionally, Alec is currently the Managing Partner of BDV Capital Group. This boutique capital advisory firm works with select investment groups, primarily focused on real estate private equity. In recent years, Alec has come from an entrepreneurial family and a real-estate-focused family business.

He is a former Division One athlete for the University of Oregon and now an ultra-marathoner and an avid mountaineer — currently climbing the highest point in all 50 states in America while simultaneously pushing his running endurance limits consistently further, recently completing his furthest race yet, the Ultra Race of Champions 100km (62 miles) through the Blue Ridge Mountains in Virginia.

Aden Yaregal is an LA-based first-gen Ethiopian American working towards cultivating an executive-level career in television development to unite communities through representation and diverse storytelling. Aden is co-producing the Greater Film Festival and working as a development coordinator and script reader with the Enclave Entertainment Group. Previously, Aden began her career in telecoms sales and media before shifting full-time into entertainment.

My guest today is Sal Abbinanti. Sal Abbinanti was educated at the University of Southern California and the Art Institute of Chicago. Sal began his indie comics career in 2005 with the launch of Mercury Comics and the publication of Atomika-God is Red, and now, The Hostage. By day, he is the art rep for Alex Ross and Bill Sienkiewicz and lives on the North Side of Chicago.

Liminality is the quality of ambiguity or disorientation in the middle stage of a rite of passage when participants no longer hold their pre-ritual status but have not yet begun the transition to the status they will hold when the rite is complete. We can apply this concept of liminality to our daily routines.

My guest today is Bret Gornick. Brett is the co-founder of Live Better. Live Better’s mission is to design wellness experiences to connect people to pursue purpose. He empowers people to care for their mental and physical health to give back to our planet.

In his previous life, Brett was a data analyst at Walgreens. Since then, he has advised CEOs, Fortune 500 companies, professional athletes, entrepreneurs, and creatives alike on prioritizing self-care and applying energy to find purpose in their work.

Today, my guest on the podcast is returning guest and longtime friend Jordan Criss. In this episode, we do this one remotely for the first time. All other conversations I've had with Jordan on the podcast have all been in person, but now I have adjusted to living in LA, just over three weeks at the time of this recording. We spend much of this time discussing what we do in our lives and how they've changed.

My guest on the podcast today is Nick Buegel. In this conversation, we try to unpack how Nick has adjusted during this pandemic. Like many of you, this has been a time of extreme change. And change that many of us don't want to happen or have to accept is happening. All of our routines have changed and shifted and adjusted. And in many ways, we must learn to lean into that change and take it for what it is.

This is Adam's second time on the podcast. And we left our first conversation, which I'll link in the show notes, with many cliffhangers and much more to unpack. We took a few weeks and reconnected. In this conversation, we spend much of our time discussing achievement and reorienting the goalpost of our life, how we get swept up by short-term thinking, and what we're doing as a selfish pursuit when trying to lead a more fulfilling life. In reality, you should try to develop yourself to be the best version of yourself because you can be a better person for those you care about. And then by proxy for the world. And we talk about voting near the end of this conversation.

Krista Stryker founded 12 Minute Athlete, a leading expert on high-intensity interval training (HIIT) and bodyweight fitness. She is also the author of the new book The 12-Minute Athlete. In today's conversation, we don't spend too much time around the working-out aspect of Krista's life. Instead, we talk about how we deal with the uncertainty in your life. It's front and center. And we talk about how we deal with uncertainty. How can we learn to focus on things that we can control?

Darin Davidson is an orthopedic surgeon. Darin founded Darin Davidson MD Consulting, which seeks to improve everyone’s health and wellness by integrating holistic principles within the traditional medical model. We can obtain the greatest well-being by combining the best available knowledge and evidence from all fields that contribute to human performance and wellness, such as medicine, psychology, sleep, nutrition, and exercise.

Today on the podcast. I am joined by two of my returning guests and closest friends. Jordan Criss and Alex Ivy. And the reason I have them on the podcast today was pretty special to me. Jordan and Alex, at the time of this recording, are now living in LA. And this conversation took place roughly three weeks ago. As they were packing up to leave, we covered that. But the whole point was that I'm assuming many of you just had a wait. What, why would you leave right now? And that's the entire point. Because in the pandemic, the idea of moving sounds insane. But. The idea of moving at any point in your life, making a big drastic change. Be it a job. Be it a relationship or moving to a new place. Why now? That is always the question.

And the answer to that should be, why not?

Today, on the podcast, we are joined by Lindsey Sherwin. Lindsey is a professional actress and youth and family therapist. She employs therapeutic drama, expressive arts, and counseling techniques to work with adolescents, families, artists, and creative entrepreneurs to resolve problems, make new choices, and expand their creativity throughout their lives.

Erich shares some ideas that he's been working through. The weight of the world's problems and chaos has almost felt insurmountable in the last few weeks. At its worst, how can one person make a real difference in the chaos?

Dierdre is fascinating in what she provides to people her outlook on the world. Being able to push back on norms of how people assume you should be. And also the power of writing because she believes that what you tell yourself informs what you can do. When you say, Oh, I'm supposed to be this, or I should be that, that's another person's value. And she says, write your own story. Or that's what she would say after talking to her. And so with that, everyone.

It's Kevin's job to inspire businesses, organizations, individuals from CEOs, and school children to embrace their spirit of play creativity and maximize their human potential for more meaningful business and personal growth.

Here's a quote on his website where he sums up what he's all about.

“The master in the art of living makes little distinction between his work and his play.” James Michener.

I love this quote because it encapsulates who Kevin is. In this conversation, you'll hear the intensity Kevin brings to the conversation.