On the 124th episode of the What is a Good Life? podcast, I’m delighted to welcome our guest, Glenn Behenna. Glenn is a Senior Lecturer at Carmarthen Business School and a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy at the University of Wales Trinity Saint David. He has held a varied range of roles throughout his career, including steelworker, police officer, consultant, and facilitator, alongside more than 20 years of experience lecturing and managing university programmes at both MBA and BA levels. Glenn’s path has been driven by a deep interest in people and how we communicate. He has also been invited to speak at the House of Lords on topics related to education.

In this conversation, Glenn shares his insights on the power of making a meaningful difference in the lives of others. We delve into the value of listening, paying attention, and fostering relationships within learning environments. Our discussion highlights how curiosity can drive personal growth and deepen our understanding of both ourselves and others.

We also reflect on the need to create space for our feelings and intuition, as well as the necessity of preserving our humanity in an increasingly automated world.

Contact me at mark@whatisagood.life if you'd like to explore your own lines of self-inquiry through 1-on-1 coaching, take part in my 5-week What is a Good Life? group courses, discuss experiences I create to stimulate greater trust, communication, and connection, amongst your leadership teams, or you simply want to get in touch.

- For the What is a Good Life? podcast's YouTube page: https://www.youtube.com/@whatisagoodlife/videos
- My newsletter: https://www.whatisagood.life/
- My LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-mccartney-14b0161b4/
- Exploring one-on-one coaching: https://www.whatisagood.life/p/one-on-one-coaching
- What is a Good Life? Course: https://www.whatisagood.life/p/the-what-is-a-good-life-course

00:00 Making a difference to people’s lives

05:00 Helping people build confidence

09:10 Encouraging people to know they are enough

12:30 Being vulnerable and available to people

15:30 The power of listening to open up others

18:40 Attention and relationship in learning

23:00 The unpredictable unfolding path of life

26:30 Curiosity & becoming at ease with ourselves

35:15 Leaving space for intuition & feeling

40:22 Reflections on AI in education

43:00 We are dehumanising ourselves

49:13 Students wary of AI marking their work

53:53 Conversation summary

56:26 What is a good life for Glenn?

On the 123rd episode of the What is a Good Life? podcast, I’m delighted to welcome our guest, Jessica Böhme. Jessica is a professor and academic director of technology management at FHM Berlin, and she is the founder of the Institute for Practical ekoPhilosophy (IPeP). She writes a weekly newsletter "wild:philosophy," where she explores how to live life in a collapsing world. Her expertise lies in utilising philosophy as a meta-technology for individual, social, and ecological transformations.

In this episode, we delve into the profound question of how to live this life—particularly in the context of sustainability and personal responsibility. We discuss the concept of 'messy disturbance' in navigating life's complexities, the paralysis that can come from heightened awareness, and reflect on the experiments Jessica undertook to align her actions with her values—including her remarkable "one dress" experiment, in which she wore the same dress every day for over a year.

This conversation celebrates curiosity, the wisdom gained through lived experience, paying attention to life’s feedback and how philosophy can be practiced in everyday life, offering a grounding force amidst uncertainty.

Ultimately, this episode points to a richness of life that can be experienced when we allow ourselves to be seen.

For more of Jessica's work, check out the following:
Website: https://www.jessicaboehme.com/
IPeP: https://www.institute-pep.com/
Newsletter: https://jessicaboehme.substack.com/
Books: https://www.jessicaboehme.com/books/

Contact me at mark@whatisagood.life if you'd like to explore your own lines of self-inquiry through 1-on-1 coaching, take part in my 5-week What is a Good Life? group courses, discuss experiences I create to stimulate greater trust, communication, and connection, amongst your leadership teams, or you simply want to get in touch.

- For the What is a Good Life? podcast's YouTube page: https://www.youtube.com/@whatisagoodlife/videos
- My newsletter: https://www.whatisagood.life/
- My LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-mccartney-14b0161b4/
- Exploring one-on-one coaching: https://www.whatisagood.life/p/one-on-one-coaching
- What is a Good Life? Course: https://www.whatisagood.life/p/the-what-is-a-good-life-course

00:00 How do I live this life? What principles?

04:10 Living in the messy disturbance of life

07:10 We are more resilient than we think

11:00 Engaging with the difficulty of our choices

13:30 The importance of living our theories

18:05 Wearing the same dress for a year

23:00 People don’t notice as much as you think

26:30 The connection with items through familiarity

30:00 The relationship between scarcity and care

32:05 The friction between long term and a world in flux

37:05 Standing by and living in our choices

42:35 Integrating more than rejecting ways of life

46:17 Seeing Philosophy as a daily practice

49:00 Life’s feedback and responding to it

51:30 Summary and what is a good life for Jessica?

On the 122nd episode of the What is a Good Life? podcast, I’m delighted to welcome our guest, Felicity Reed. Felicity is a Psychotherapist and expert in leadership, who, alongside a private practice and consultancy, has worked as a clinical lead across the NHS, local authorities and the voluntary sector, working at the sharpest edges of trauma and health inequalities, supporting people facing life’s toughest circumstances to turn their pain into power.

She first came into therapy because of her own difficulties and ADHD, and uses this lived experience of messiness to bring humour, joy and humanity to the trickiest places of the human soul. She is the founder of Mic Drops: tiny pops of tools, techniques and training that highlight health inequalities, and demonstrate tiny but powerful actions each of us can take to improve social justice. She also shares tiny and powerful daily tips on Instagram to de-mystify therapy and make mental wellbeing easier.

In this wonderful conversation, we explore the themes of connection, soul, vulnerability, and embracing and sharing our messiness. We explore what type of relating is possible on the other side of this openness.

Ultimately, this episode points to a richness of life that can be experienced when we allow ourselves to be seen.

For more of Felicity's work, check out the following:
Felicity's website: https://www.felicityreed.co.uk/

Felicity's Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/felicitypsychotherapy/

Contact me at mark@whatisagood.life if you'd like to explore your own lines of self-inquiry through 1-on-1 coaching, take part in my 5-week What is a Good Life? group courses, discuss experiences I create to stimulate greater trust, communication, and connection, amongst your leadership teams, or you simply want to get in touch.

- For the What is a Good Life? podcast's YouTube page: https://www.youtube.com/@whatisagoodlife/videos
- My newsletter: https://www.whatisagood.life/
- My LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-mccartney-14b0161b4/
- Exploring one-on-one coaching: https://www.whatisagood.life/p/one-on-one-coaching
- What is a Good Life? Course: https://www.whatisagood.life/p/the-what-is-a-good-life-course

00:00 How do I be true to myself?

03:30 How we can lose ourselves

07:00 The shame we feel when not ourselves

10:00 When our stories and reality don’t align

15:00 The response to withholding our truth

21:00 Soothing ourselves

24:30 When two humans meet in presence

29:30 We simply need each other

34:15 The gift of our sharing our humanity

38:20 Moving from opinions to soulful connection

43:25 Words that we feel

47:00 Love and creating space for our being

52:00 Summary and what is a good life for Felicity?