Unconventional Life – Podcast, Blog, Live Events

Category: Wellness

  • Ep297: Making a Path from the Pain with Singer-Songwriter and Breakthrough Coach Adena Sampson

    Ep297: Making a Path from the Pain with Singer-Songwriter and Breakthrough Coach Adena Sampson

    Our wounds are an opening into the best and most beautiful part of us, the same couldn’t be truer for musician and entrepreneur Adena Sampson. Born with a fragile body and a broken home, Adena learned to value what was whole and let the light seep through the cracks.

    A house rarely feels like a home when you grow up in dysfunction. On top of this, Adena also had to deal with Chronic Lyme Disease which added physical pain to the emotional aching. But like many great talents, meeting pain also meant discovering your art, and for Adena, it was music.

    Seeing herself in the lost and the broken, she now offers her talents as a musician and her experience as a fellow survivor of trauma to help others find their way and make peace with the cause of their pain. Today, she uses her voice through her albums, books, and mentoring sessions to reach out to thousands of people, spreading a single message – “You are not alone.”

    “Because if I’m still standing,” Adena says, “I know that you can too. It is a choice.”

    With all the problems she’s heard from people who’ve asked her for help, Adena makes it a point that the reason for most of our problems today originates from the old traumas that we never sorted out. She makes it a point that traumas aren’t always big bundles of burdens, they could also be small insecurities and doubts that your mind unconsciously carries around. She says that dealing with the muck and grime of the past, doesn’t just demand effort but self-love as well.

    “A big part of my healing has not just been self-awareness, self-discovery, and self-mastery but truly self-love” Adena stresses, “[This meant] reclaiming my power, taking responsibility for what it is I’m creating in my life.”

    Adena knows that the road to getting better isn’t easy, that’s why she emphasizes the need for support and proper guidance to turn your trauma into tools that bring out the best in you.

    “It’s like the more you go through the muck, the more you face the obstacles., the more the obstacles become a path.”

    More from Adena:

  • Ep294: Seeing the Angel in the Marble with Michelangelo Mindset co-founder and Just Listen Author, Dr Mark Goulston

    Ep294: Seeing the Angel in the Marble with Michelangelo Mindset co-founder and Just Listen Author, Dr Mark Goulston

    It had almost been 30 hours since Dr Mark Goulston had last seen sleep.

    Before being a UCLA professor of psychiatry, an FBI and police hostage negotiation trainer, and a jury consultant on the OJ Simpson’s trial, Michelangelo Mindset co-founder and Just Listen author, Mark Goulston was a trainee himself under American Association of Suicidology founder, Dr Ed Shneidman.

    A turning point in Mark’s life was the patient, assigned to him by Shneidman, whom he called Nancy. She had made three suicide attempts in the past three months and had been hospitalized on several occasions. Upon her discharge, Mark would need to check on her as an outpatient.

    “Every time [Dr. Shneidman] did a consultation, it was always the same,” Mark narrated, “he would page or call me and say that there is this lovely young woman, ‘She’s in a lot of pain. You can help her, Mark. See her.”

    “I went to see her for about six months, and I didn’t think I was helping her, but that was the longest she’d gone without a hospitalization or a suicide attempt.”

    On top of this responsibility, Mark also covered for other doctors and checked on their patients once a month on Saturdays and Sundays. In one Monday session with Nancy, Mark was sleep-deprived and exhausted. He felt chills down his spine, and the room seemed colourless.

    “I’m a psychiatrist, not a psychologist so I did a neurologic exam on myself…,” he continued, “And I had this realization, [that may be] I’m not having a stroke or a seizure. I had this crazy idea that I was looking at the world through her eyes and feeling her feelings. So, because I was sleep-deprived, I blurted something out that normally I wouldn’t say.”

    “Nancy, I didn’t know it was so bad, and I can’t help you kill yourself,” he stated, “but if you do, I will still think well of you. I’ll miss you. And maybe I’ll understand why you had to, to get out of the pain.

    Remembering his training, Mark gasped, thinking he messed up because he had just given a suicidal patient permission. However, Mark was astonished to see that he and Nancy finally made eye contact.

    “Thank you for understanding I’m overdue,” Nancy said. “If you can really understand why I might have to kill myself to get out of my pain then maybe I won’t need to.

    Following this story, Mark shared with us a story from an even younger period in his life, when he had dropped out of medical school for the second time. In his conversation with the Dean of Students, William McNary, McNary said”

    “Mark, you didn’t mess up, because you’re passing everything. But you are messed up.” The dean continued, “if you get un-messed up, I think the school will be glad they gave you a second chance. Mark, even if you don’t become a doctor. Even if you don’t do anything, for the rest of your life, I’d be proud to know you, because you have a streak of goodness in you that we don’t grade in medical school. You don’t know how much the world needs that goodness.”

    In founding the Michelangelo Mindset, Mark shares that they got the name from a quote by the Italian sculptor where Michelangelo said, “I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free.”

    For Mark, that mindset meant looking into your future and clearly seeing happiness and fulfilment. This was the concept that has guided many defining moments of his life.

    In his career as a suicide specializing psychiatrist, Mark saw hope inside his suicidal patients that they couldn’t see or feel. He saw hope in Nancy just as the dean saw hope in him.

    “I was the David in the marble of my future that I couldn’t see but Dean McNary could see.”

    Mark shares with us that we can also be Michelangelo for the marble of the people we love.

    He teaches us the HUVA Method where we conduct an analysis of the conversations we’ve had recently. Mark says that once a day, we should look back at a conversation and ask ourselves if we made that person feel Heard, Understood, Valued and if we Added value to that conversation.

    To Mark, conversations are more than just tools of information, it can also save a life and contribute to the making of a kinder world.

     

    More from Mark:

  • Ep291: The Way of the Wanderer with Virtual Nomad Kach Medina of 2 Monkeys Travel

    Ep291: The Way of the Wanderer with Virtual Nomad Kach Medina of 2 Monkeys Travel


     

    It is often said that “success is a journey, not a destination.” This can’t be truer for the travel vlogger and nomadic influencer Kach Medina

    Her chronicle of over 140 different adventures started in the small country of the Philippines where the young Kach had already envisioned what she would do for the rest of her life; her knack for adventure made her the modern explorer that she is today.

    “I really wanted to become a diplomat so I could have a stronger passport, and I already knew when I was young that I wanted to travel the world. I envisioned this when I was seven, talking to my grandfather.”

    In 2013, Kach headed off backpacking to Southeast Asia. From there, she flew to different countries to explore more. In late 2014, having embraced a nomadic lifestyle, she began travel blogging on a full-time basis. Then after four years of adventure travelling followed by two years of sailing the Caribbean, she moved and bought a stone house villa in Herceg Novi, Montenegro, in 2019 to start a new expat life.

    Even during her time abroad, Kach never stopped looking for new horizons. She went from office jobs to teaching, jumping from one career to another. And even after several mishaps in life, love, and a car crash that left her immobile for months, she had one unwavering dream that kept her going: To travel the world.

    “When I finally found my mission, that’s when I decided that no matter what is happening externally, I just have to keep going.” She explains,” I just have to keep reminding myself that even though bad things come if I could just make my mission on a daily basis happen, I could surpass them.”

    Paving the way with every article she posts, Kach is now a devoted writer and wandering enthusiast who has made it her life’s mission to spread the joys of travelling. She makes it a point that the journey isn’t about the best spots or the most expensive food a country can offer; it’s about the act of finding yourself lost in new experiences.

    “My mission is to make one person happier every day. if I do that, I feel like I am still alive.”

     

    More of Kach:

  • Ep280: Reclaiming Your Peace Through Letters Imbued with the Beauty of Life with Calligrapher Paul Antonio

    Ep280: Reclaiming Your Peace Through Letters Imbued with the Beauty of Life with Calligrapher Paul Antonio

    The hustle and bustle of everyday life can lead us to take many things for granted. But by simply finding the connection between writing and life, professional artist and calligrapher, Paul Antonio had found a beauteous view of the world.

    Raised in Trinidad, Paul found a love for nature and the abundance of life around him. The bond he made with the natural wonder of his surroundings—and his curiosity—Paul found himself walking a swervey path into the realm of Calligraphy.

    “I could hear the music in the writing,” he says, “I knew that there was rhythm there, I just didn’t know how to connect it to the writing.”

    Paul left for London, England in 1998 and went on to study Letter form History at the Department of Typography and Graphic Communication, University of Reading (1998). After being awarded one of the ten Art & Crafts Scholarships from The Commonwealth Foundation, he went to Reigate School of Art and Design to study Calligraphy, Gilding and Heraldic Painting specialising in Historical Materials and Techniques. He got the only Distinction in his year (2000).

    Having always been interested in the history and the development of writing as a whole, Paul went on to study Arabic Calligraphy, English Palaeography and Archaeological Illustration at Birkbeck University (2001).

    This fondness for writing pushed him to pursue arts. During the days of his apprenticeship, he learned how letters were imbued with the very beauty of life which he so desperately admired and has since been drawn towards calligraphy and Heraldic arts.

    In 2003 Paul went to Egypt as the Assistant Archaeological Illustrator for the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, to copy hieroglyphs. This role assisted him in illustrating some of the hieroglyph collections at the Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, London. It also allowed him to run a year-long course on ‘An Egyptian Writing System’ for Birkbeck University and some intermittent courses for undergraduates at UCL, the British Museum and the general public.

     “I knew that I was not here to do the writing, I was only here as an instrument. I was here for the writing to happen through me.”

    Paul stresses that like any artist, or writer, the art of Calligraphy also requires emotion. He says that as he writes his pieces, he leaves himself open to his emotions and true to his inner feelings. Though there is a level of focus that must be kept to ensure a steady hand, Paul encourages one to also be free when writing.

    “The writing is more than just pretty shapes on a page. This isn’t about you, giving yourself permission to be at peace. This is about you reclaiming the peace that is already yours.”

    After a 2 year collaboration with the reputable paper brand Rhodia, Paul’s Social Media label PAScribe released the PAScribe Rhodia pads. Three pads on white paper with his unique grid, and black and grey paper with very fine lines to help calligraphers practise with light or metallic ink on dark, in the hopes of getting people to correspond more with each other.

    Even now as Paul pursues other crafts such as heraldry, meditation, and teaching, he still hasn’t lost the dedication and love that he has for calligraphy, passing on his passion to his students and living by the principles he has learned through his years of practising arts.

     

    More from Paul:

  • Ep277: How to Stay Original with The Man Behind 100 Voices, Impressionist Charlie Hopkinson

    Ep277: How to Stay Original with The Man Behind 100 Voices, Impressionist Charlie Hopkinson

    The field of entertainment demands fresh ideas to keep the people watching, and with the massive presence of the internet, it’s impressive how far content creation can go. But how can someone make their content feel “original”? Professional Impressionist and voiceover artist, Charlie Hopkinson, says it’s about “authenticity” and staying true to your own ideas.

    Starting out as a math teacher and gradually shifting into his current career, he points out the misconception that people are born creative or talented. Rather he says that it’s more about the effort you put out and the passion that you have, which makes something feel “authentic”.

    It was the cumulative results of years of practice, planning, and experience that led to his success.

    And I’m talking about 100 impressions or so…

    Impressions of Morgan Freeman, David Attenborough, Rick and Morty (Rick and Morty show), Game of Thrones (Jon Snow, Tyrion Lannister, Ser Davos Seaworth…), Breaking Bad (Walter White, Jesse Pinkman), Lord of the Rings (Gandalf, Boromir, Legolas…), Peaky Blinders (Tommy Shelby, Arthur Shelby, Alfie Solomons…) Cartoons and more!

    This dude can literally do a whole movie voicing by himself!

    “I think it’s quite strange though because the life I’m currently living is very much a mixed-mash of all these different fields that I’ve been involved with over the years.”

    Through his comedy career, as well as his growing YouTube community, he understood that people know when something feels authentic. He stresses that creators are chasing the idea of pleasing the audience and it ends up turning people off.

    “It’s really easy to get caught in the trap of trying to chase what the audience wants you to think the audience wants,” he stresses. “And it definitely takes you down the wrong road… as a comedy creator, I would say, If It’s not making you laugh. Don’t make it.”

    Being in the comedy industry for more than four years, Charlie clarifies that he has also been in creative slumps. His advice for anyone who feels as though they’ve become stale or just wants to improve is to put yourself in a “live environment”.

    “…The instant ‘oh, people are really enjoying that! I’m really enjoying that feeling, that connection with other people, that was like a big thing for me, finding my creative fulfilment and finding enjoyment.”

    He states, highlighting how it unlocks your creativity through performance pressure and connecting with your audience.

    Whose impressions you think are the best?

     

    More from Charlie:

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