An Existential Slap Across the Face: Dean Rickles, PhD, on the Essence of Life’s Meaning
Release Date: 07/01/2023
The Unforgettable Lorraine K. Lee on How to Become the CEO of Your Own Career
Living A Life In Full
Are you an ambitious industrious worker and a high achiever who always delivers, but you feel stuck or unseen, and you struggle to move up in your career? Or maybe it’s your peers who seem to get all the recognition and advance, while you're wondering why you’re being left behind. And that is where can lend a hand. Lorraine is an award-winning global keynote speaker and an instructor for Stanford University’s Continuing Studies Program and LinkedIn Learning, and she is the author of the bestselling new book, it’s also one of the Through her role as a founding...
info_outline
Dean Karnazes: A Life in (Full) Motion
Living A Life In Full
Dean Karnazes is a force of nature and an inspiration. He’s raced across the globe in support of various causes and modeled unparalleled perseverance and going beyond perceived limitations that serve to unlock an inner strength in others to also attain extraordinary results. He shares real-life examples that explore the topics of dealing with adversity, overcoming obstacles, setting and reaching lofty goals, the importance of teamwork - even in solo endeavors, and excelling in a competitive and complicated world. In this episode we discuss the essential ingredients necessary for...
info_outline
Racing for Her Life: The Amazing Story of Ironman World Champion and All-American Sara Fix
Living A Life In Full
Sara Fix is a powerhouse. A mother of three, a small business owner, and a woman who’s navigated life’s highs and lows—all while completing 28 Ironman races across the globe, but her biggest challenge is being diagnosed with stage 4 neuroendocrine cancer, yet, she refuses to let her diagnosis define her. She continues to train, compete, and inspire others with her resilience and positive mindset. Sara's story is one of perseverance and advocacy. She emphasizes the importance of being one's own health advocate and encourages others to listen to their bodies and seek help when needed. Her...
info_outline
Daniel Kraft, MD, on Predicting the Future of Technology and Healthcare - and Helping to Create It
Living A Life In Full
Prescription medications are fairly controversial these days – cost, insurance coverage, efficacy, and too often, medications are dosed incorrectly, cause toxic side effects or just don't work. But what if we could change how we prescribe drugs, what if there was a 3D printer that could design pills that adapt to an individual’s needs, and maybe print-on-demand the medications tailored to the patient? Or what if there was a real-world device that worked like the diagnostic Tricorder we imagined watching Star Trek? How about AI-infused antiviral discoveries and laboratory-level diagnostic...
info_outline
Jodi Wellman on How to Live More Fully and Intentionally
Living A Life In Full
How many Mondays do you have left? Statistically, we all get about 4,000 Mondays in our lifetime, so if you're halfway through your life, you might have roughly 2,000 Mondays to go. The good news is that you are in charge of how you spend those days, the question is will you be toiling away at a job that you hate, or will you be creating a career that you love? Will you choose to scroll mindlessly for hours a day, or will you pursue hobbies and travel that light you up? Will you be dreading the inevitable end, or will you be living your life in full in a way that allows you to meet the Grim...
info_outline
Drs. Randy Brazie and Geoffrey VanderPal on the New Science of Decision Making
Living A Life In Full
I suspect that there are times you may feel overwhelmed by the sheer number and complexity of nonstop decisions you need to make. To further complicate matters, you may believe that some decisions require rational (brain) decision making, while others call for you to "go with your gut." But what if you could integrate the two - your brain and your gut - in a way to help you become the calm and steadfast person, and leader, you would like to be. What if you could combine both rational logical thoughts with your more instinctual feelings? With their combined expertise in both business and...
info_outline
Scott Young on Mastering How to Get Better at Anything
Living A Life In Full
Life depends on learning. We spend decades in school acquiring an education. We take pride in mastering a craft, or a sport, or a game. The things we do in our careers or even just for fun are enjoyed to a large extent because we feel we are capable of getting better at them. We yearn for mastery. But learning can be elusive. We may spend hours studying and still not do well on an exam. Improvement can be fickle - if it comes at all. Sometimes we improve effortlessly, and other times it can be a slog. Many of us can spend years hitting a tennis ball, playing chess, or working at...
info_outline
John Marks’ Journey from Provocateur to Peacemaker
Living A Life In Full
It seems that almost everywhere in the world, there is conflict, distrust, and unrest – Gaza, Ukraine, Syria, and even here in the US. Oftentimes, any kind of diplomacy, cooperation, agreement, detente or finding a common ground seems impossible. But what if there was a different way? What if there was an organization that holds as its mission, “to transform the way the world deals with conflict, away from adversarial approaches and toward cooperative solutions?” What if those tactics included dialogue training, joint development projects, public art projects, sports leagues, and social...
info_outline
Ben Guttmann on the Power of Simplicity
Living A Life In Full
We are not as smart as we think we are. We're busy and distracted in a world that is incentivized to continually make us more of both. The only things that work, the only messages that cut through the noise, are sharp, clear, and direct. We’ve all been advised to “not judge a book by its cover,” to “not count your chickens before they hatch,” and that “Rome wasn’t built in a day.” Maybe for you, what comes to mind is something political, like Patrick Henry’s revolutionary “Give me liberty, or give me death!” or more recently, Barack Obama’s “Yes We Can.” Now...
info_outline
Daniel Goleman, PhD, on Emotional Intelligence and Optimal Performance on
Living A Life In Full
You have likely seen moments of peak performance—perhaps an athlete plays a perfect game or a business that has a quarter with once-in-a-lifetime profits. Perhaps you have experienced something similar – playing a musical piece perfectly, making a faultless shot, or perhaps acing a final. But these moments are often elusive, and for every amazing day, we may have a hundred ordinary or even unsatisfying days. Now, imagine your best day at work - you exceed the goals set for you, your interactions with coworkers are productive and bristle-free, the new system you implemented has...
info_outlineDeath might seem to render pointless all of our attempts to create a meaningful life. But Professor Dean Rickles argues that only constraints―and death is the ultimate constraint―make our actions meaningful. In order for us to live full lives, Dean believes it is the finiteness and shortness of life that brings meaning. In this episode we explore how this insight is the key to making the most of the time that we do have.
Dr. Dean Rickles is a Professor of History and Philosophy of Modern Physics at The University of Sydney. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Leeds with a thesis on conceptual issues in quantum gravity. He is also the Co-Director of the Sydney Centre for Time, an Advisor for The Lifeboat Foundation, and Co-leads a Templeton Foundation-funded interdisciplinary project on the flow of time. His primary research focus is the history and philosophy of modern physics, particularly quantum gravity and spacetime physics.
Dean’s authored dozens of peer-reviewed articles along with a number of books. He is also a member of the New York Academy of Sciences and the Foundational Questions Institute.
The primary focus of our conversation was on his latest book, Life Is Short. I personally really enjoyed it, and midway through I set it aside to send Dean a request to be on the podcast as I knew I needed to connect and discuss it.
Life is Short explores how death limits our options and forces us to make choices that forge a life and give the world meaning. Therein Dean writes that people often live in a state of indecision, in a misguided attempt to keep their options open.
“By reminding us how extraordinary it is that we have any time to live at all, Life Is Short challenges us to rethink what gives life meaning and how to make the most of it."
Dean has said that he, himself feels that that life is too short, so I asked him about some of the ways he lives his, albeit too short life, in full. While this is a deep, deep conversation that covers many disciplines, our specific discussion on Life is Short I think will be of interest to anyone wanting to live their life in full.