Rock to Recovery - Wes Geer
Chatter that Matters
Wes Geer chased rock and roll the way some people chase salvation, all in, full volume, no brakes. Wes Geer went from a kid with a guitar and a dream to co-founding Head P.E., tearing through the chaos of the '90s rock scene, then playing with Korn, and living the kind of life that looks electrifying from the outside and destructive from within. Fame, excess, addiction, collapse, Wes lived every mile of that road. But this episode is not just about the rise and the wreckage. It is about what happens when someone survives the fire and comes back carrying a torch, or in this case, a guitar....
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Follow Your Passion - Elysia Racanelli and Jonathan Roy
Chatter that Matters
My advice to anyone is this. If you can, follow your passion. Follow it to where it brings you intellectual and emotional rewards, a sense of purpose and place, and in this volatile world, always have a Plan B. This is why I am so excited to introduce my two guests this week. Elysia Racanelli is a family doctor by day and avant-garde singer by night, whose haunting voice and commanding stage presence will stop you in your tracks. Jonathan Roy is the son of Patrick Roy, one of the greatest goaltenders of all time. Jonathan worked hard to follow in his father's 'skates', but when the NHL was...
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Is Sports Fixed? Declan Hill
Chatter that Matters
Have you ever considered that the sports you are watching are fixed? This episode ois appointment listening for Sports fans, sports gamblers and concerned parents, and an eye-opening story for anyone interested in how pervasive organized crime has woven into our society. My guest this week is Declan Hill, Oxford-educated and author of The Fix. Declan is world-renowned as an investigative journalist who has infiltrated organized crime fixing rings to understand how the world of sports fixing actually works and why the extensive marketing efforts to encourage more people to gamble on sports...
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Mansions to the left of Me, Tents to My Right.
Chatter that Matters
On occasion, I break format, step out of interview mode, and speak directly to you about what I believe matters to you, to me, and to our country. In this episode, I talk about Canada’s K economy and the growing, dangerous divide between those who have and those who have very little. I look at the human cost, the impact on our psychology and our society, and five things we can do to rebuild our economy. To grow our way forward, versus borrowing on the backs of future generations just to cover today's bills. I hope you can find ten minutes over the next few days to listen, and to share your...
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Do it Yourself, But Do It. The k3 Sisters Band
Chatter that Matters
This week's podcast is for all who are dealing with the reality that their future will not look like the past. There will be no neatly paved road. No ladder with perfectly placed rungs. Instead, there will be relentless headwinds, industries reshaped by technology and marketplaces rendered by global forces. Jobs will collapse, and new ones will emerge. Which is why I invited The k3 Sisters Band to join me this week. Three sisters who chose to make their destiny a matter of choice, rather than leave it to chance. Homeschooled. Fourth-generation musicians. As children, on a flight home from...
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From Darkness Came Light - Carol Lee
Chatter that Matters
Vancouver’s Chinatown was never built to be trendy. It was built because people had nowhere else to belong. Shut out of opportunity. Pushed to the margins. Told where they could and could not live. So they built anyway. Store by store. Family by family. A place that began to pulse and then became magnetic to all who lived in and visited Vancouver. And then slowly, the pulse weakened. Rising costs. Aging buildings. Poverty. Then the pandemic. The streets emptied. Businesses struggled to survive. Anti-Asian racism surged. Fear replaced foot traffic. Absence replaced community. ...
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Save the Rage for the Stage - Bif Naked
Chatter that Matters
Some artists find a sound or a look. Others find the truth. Bif Naked found both. In this moving episode of Chatter that Matters, I sit down with the iconic Juno Award-winning artist and activist Bif Naked to unpack “I am who I am.” Born in New Delhi. Adopted. Raised across oceans, finding love in words and music. At 21, Bif met her birth mother, a moment that brought her story full circle. But identity is not formed only in comfort. At 36, Bif was diagnosed with breast cancer. Two years later, she suffered a stroke. Those chapters did not silence her. They fed her poetry and clarified...
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What happened to the Truth? - Gordon Pennycook
Chatter that Matters
What happened to the truth? I find myself fixated on a troubling realization. It feels remarkably easy to win over an audience with a slogan, a promise without substance, or blatant mistruths, even when those are wildly disconnected from the audience's reality. And even more surprisingly, they are not only readily accepted but also often repeated and shared. I wanted to understand why. Not from a political or media lens, but from a human one. What is it about human nature that makes us so vulnerable? That question led me to two conversations on Chatter That Matters. What ties them...
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Robyne Hanley-Dafoe - From Broken to Becoming
Chatter that Matters
Robyne was a high school dropout who believed she wasn’t worth saving. Then her car plunged through the ice, trapping her 20 feet underwater and changing everything. This is the story of how choosing hope became a strategy for survival and healing. I sit down with Dr. Robyne Hanley-Dafoe, bestselling author and one of the most trusted voices on resilience. As a teenager, Robyne battled addiction, dropped out of school, and was hospitalized in an adult psychiatric ward. At 16, a near-fatal accident gave her a second chance she refused to waste. This is not a glossy comeback story....
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Jane Roos - Why am I still here?
Chatter that Matters
What happens when the dream you are chasing, ends in a split second? Only to find a new one awaits. At 19, Jane Roos was chasing Olympic dreams, fast, fearless, and focused. Then, in a single moment, everything changed. A devastating car accident took her best friend’s life and ended the future she had trained for. What followed was pain, survivor’s guilt, and a question that quietly redefined her life: Why am I still here? From a hospital bed, with no roadmap and no safety net, Jane founded the Canadian Athletes Now Fund, an idea that would grow into one of the most important sources of...
info_outlineSome people dream. Others help weave those dreams. This episode is about two women who refuse to separate the two.
It begins with Karla Briones. Raised in an entrepreneurial family in Chihuahua, Mexico, her first business was a schoolyard candy empire at six years old. Then the drug cartels arrived. Threats followed. Friends disappeared. At eighteen, her family dismantled their entire life and drove nearly four thousand kilometres to Canada with no safety net, no jobs, no guarantees.
What followed was survival. Credentials did not transfer. Her parents fell into depression. Karla became a provider before she had finished becoming a student. Three jobs. A new language. University. Failure. Grit. Then entrepreneurship again. Pet stores. Restaurants. Retail. Some worked. Some collapsed. All of them taught her the same lesson: everyone can use and benefit from a helping hand.
That lesson eventually became Immigrant Entrepreneur Canada to help weave the dreams of others.
One of the many who benefited is Lina Asmah, the Hot Pepper Lady. From Ghana to Canada, Lina carried fire in both food and spirit. She works full-time. She farms. She grows over 160 varieties of peppers. Her turning point came at a last-minute event she almost skipped. Karla spoke. Lina applied. She entered Immigrant Entrepreneur Canada and found something rare, a system that did not talk about immigrants as numbers, but as builders. She found mentors. She found clarity. She found momentum. She found her dream.
Lina also named something most people feel but rarely say out loud: we listen to accents before we listen to ideas. Inside that community, she found her voice again.
Immigration Entrepreneur Canada and Karla Briones are helping newcomers weave their dreams.
To find out more about Immigration Entrepreneur Canada: https://www.immigrantentrepreneurcanada.ca