One Encounter, One Opportunity. Make service meaningful. Be Your customer's hero.

Service Life Can Be A Source of Shame…So Befriend It | Ep. 76

In this episode you’ll learn about how common it can be to experience shame in the service experience and techniques that determine whether it will be a great ally or a terrible enemy.

Tap into the the wisdom, humanity and academic rigor of Andy Lee, founder of the legendary mindfulness program at Aetna Health. Now on a mission to help organizations weave mindfulness into its culture, we discuss the challenges and profound possibility of these practices to transform the workplace.

Mindful service allows you to take place in social change advancing it bit by bit through service that seeks to create the world you’d want to live in.

Reclaim your understanding of love as something that is always a factor in serving in a mindful, empowered way – and the way towards racial healing.

Everything you’ve been trying to do more effectively along your mindful service journey – listening, openness, compassion, healing, avoiding righteousness, catching reactivity – is a skill that can be applied to participating in the racially just world you want to live in.

About the service skills you most need but aren’t taught. Ones I’ve gathered from years of learning and travel and my upcoming course that will distill them into practices and principles that any service-oriented person can use.

Part two of two of my epic discussion with service design visionary Joel Bailey who is who is working with large companies, institutions and public services and proving that you can bring humanity and consciousness back to service in a way that is sustainable and scalable. This is someone that understands the essence and power of service – as well as how much we’ve lost contact with it as a culture.

The first half of a sweeping two-part discussion about the radical ways designer Joel Bailey is shifting large-scale service providers from an outdated industrial age model of service-as-product into an organizational that is truly connected to the people they service – a mission made especially urgent by the COVID crisis.

Hear about how the Coronavirus opened up surprising opportunities for Tico & Susan to successfully serve their community how they’ve always wanted to through their Kombucha and fermented food company, Radiate.

I speak with Albert Bitton about his project that provides healthy meals to overworked medical professionals across about a dozen of New York’s crowded hospitals. Our conversation was a deeply inspiring look at how one service industry can provide something so important to another.

In this new podcast series I’m getting field reports from amazing minds in the world(s) of service about lockdown living and the challenges and opportunities it offers service-minded people. I talk to cocktail bar industry leader Dushan Zaric about self-awareness, growth and transformation, and the power and strength found in setting a positive example.

See how easy it is to dismiss or condemn people’s tendency to be preoccupied with their own “nonsense” – especially as you become more aware and present throughout your mindful service journey. But the way forward is compassion and understanding – no matter how preoccupied people are, how much that is disrupting what you need from them, and no matter how rude they are being in the process.

Break the conditioning you may have that the service role is lowly and unimportant and see the power you have to make a positive impact.

Realize how moments of crisis like are something you’ve been training your whole life for – through every opportunity you’ve taken to pay attention, be compassionate, understand things better, and choose to de-escalate rather than react.

I discuss how times like this are powerful opportunities to explore what really matters in our lives. And to understand the essence of how it is we wish to serve in this life. It doesn’t matter what it is you’re doing, it matters how you’re doing it and the person you’re practicing as while doing it.

What’s the most important factor determining the success and satisfaction you get from serving? You. This episode details meditation and mindfulness techniques you can use to start your day, prime yourself for service, and refresh yourself during the chaos of the work day.

Strategies for managing situations where you are confronted with people that are not making it easy to be served. And mindsets for managing the most important person in that equation: you.

True service comes from the inside out. Within you is a still, wise, and infinitely broad awareness that can anchor you in the most chaotic of situations. Learn to access this “Buddha self” and remain tethered to it regardless of what the rest of your mind is doing.

Learn gratitude practices to start your day and also apply to challenging situations. They will transform how you experience life.

Service (and all activities in life) is not so much about what you’re doing, but the intention behind it. And that intention can be positive without feeling artificial, strained or anything but authentic. Learn an internal practice that you can apply to the simplest activities that will totally transform your quality of life and relationships.

Happy 2020! The podcast is starting off the year with a very special interview on the transformative power of mindful communication. Truly listening, understanding, and speaking to what’s really needed can make the humblest of interactions feel truly alive. And my discussion with Oren Jay Sofer, the subject’s most definitive voice, was bursting with such aliveness at every moment. So many insights. So much value.

Witness the power of compassion as a skill, not some kind of pious state that only the saintly are gifted with – learn the awareness practices that make you better at negotiation, handling challenging people and finding satisfaction in any work you do that involves other people.

Equal opportunity and quality of life are such bigger issues in the restaurant industry than you think they are. I speak with hospitality leader and social servant John Debary about his organization RWCF and his mission to help restaurants nationwide shift into caring organizations with the capacity to improve the lives of their workers.

Needs don’t need to be cured like they’re some kind of disease or exploited in some sort of relationship of exchange. Learn to navigate them as a powerful vehicle for you to truly connect to the people you serve.

Break conditioning you have around “being obligated” to do anything and watch your life improve. Own your decisions and experience more empowerment, gratitude, and opportunity.

Self-worth is not a function of how much you think you deserve. Shed this old conditioning, hack feelings of non-acceptance and take your service game to the next level. Final part in a series to help you develop strength, grit and self-sufficiency by reconciling with the tough realities of service life.

It’s the podcast’s 50th episode anniversary so I am discussing principles to take your service mindset to the next level – and it involves a starting from an open, unbiased perspective. The Zen principle of “The Beginner’s Mind” involves a sort of “wise innocence” that allows maximum readiness, learning and growth from any given moment without abandoning all the knowledge and skill you’ve developed over the years.

Understand what power truly is and how service is the perfect place to cultivate it. However, really tapping into its transformative power requires more humility than we are usually willing.

Make a habit of the “internal yes” in order to learn how to thrive in situations we can’t control, predict or get the results we want. After all, self-discovery happens when we don’t get our own way.

Never feel deficient when someone reacts negatively to something you said or did by implementing a simple understanding of personal responsibility. Be caring and considerate from a free and empowered, not one where you feel shackled and obligated.

The customer is always right…and so are you (if you’re present, attentive, and truly serving). But you’re never right if you have something to prove. Learn how to let go of the beliefs that are holding you back from truly connecting to the people you serve.

My reflections on my fascinating discussion with Kelsey Mathes in the most recent interview episode “Ego-Driven Fear, Self-Transformation, Empowered Work…and Other Barroom Chat – Interview w/ Kelsey Mathes.”

Big doses of wisdom and inspiration from Kelsey’s journey from hospitality professional to meditation teacher and transformational coach. Learn to live with care and purpose…without the drama.

The untold power of gratitude – how to make every moment an opportunity for something that feeds you with inspiration, growth, self-understanding and tools for being even more of service.

Have a non-attached relationship to your expectations of the people your serve, while avoiding indifference and maintaining your preferences, priorities and principles.

A short episode reflecting on my fascinating discussion with Wu De – key points applied to the challenges and opportunities of service life.

The Zen Way of Tea: reconnect with your natural intuitive wisdom, master yourself while remaining fluid, free and accepting – and learn how to truly serve.

Learn to create your own opportunities and relationships that serve your growth and success better than anything someone you’re hoping to “network with” can offer you. Be your own source of self-worth and break dependency on others for validation.

Cultivate the warrior-like resilience that service demands. This means coming to terms with some hard truths of life as a human being. And learning the tools to hack what seems like a grim reality.

Bartender turned life coach discusses the importance of not defining your worth by self-sacrifice and grind – find a path that truly inspires you.

How I learned that service isn’t just for work. Everything in life can be defined on those terms. And must be questioned: Is it a worthy input of energy? Am I doing it skillfully such that I am really serving the best parts of myself and others?

Catherine Sherlock is going against the grain to deepen the power of mindfulness training on the organizational level.

Ask me about how to be confident and you will get more than you bargained for.

Discussion that looks at mindfulness, emotional intelligence, monotasking, caregiving and hospitality principles that work in any setting.

Yoga & meditation are not just meant to be an isolated, but a practice you bring into everything – including, especially, any kind of work. I discuss an ancient practice that allows you to meet any challenge with enthusiasm, inspiration and wisdom.

Conversation with Rebecca Shafir, speech pathologist, mindful communication and business coach and author of Zen of Listening (a very important book for me). We discuss communication techniques, pitfalls and mindful living.

Host of the Innerbloom AND Positive Head Podcast Alexa Houser discusses her story, EFT healing practice and mission to help the world transcend its issues…by processing hers along with them.

We look at an emotional mastery system that allows you to work with your most “unwanted” emotions to master yourself, live mindfully and be an absolute service Jedi.

Rachael Kable’s mission is educate the world on simple, practical and methodical ways of incorporating mindfulness into every aspect of your life. She tells her story and discusses how mindfulness helps harness the potential of emotional sensitivity. 

Industry-leader Dushan Zaric discusses the responsibility we have to serve with care and presence; powerful insights forged from a life of passion, deep self-exploration and hardship.

Category Archives for Podcast