“Finding Treasures in the Trash”
Because in the muck lives the gold.
Hosted by executive coach and meditation teacher Cari Jacobs-Crovetto, this podcast explores how transformation happens—personally and collectively—when we’re willing to face what’s uncomfortable, messy, or ignored.
Created for high-achieving, soul-seeking humans, this show helps us look directly at the shadows—personal, relational, and global—that shape our lives. From disowned parts of ourselves and experiences we are ashamed to include to the cultural and emotional trials we’d rather ignore, Cari asks a radical question: What if the things we avoid from fear and shame are the treasures for awakening?
Through raw, intimate conversations and powerful storytelling, listeners are invited to face what’s been avoided, reclaim what’s been disowned, and discover how breakdowns—personal and collective—can become gateways to transformation. Grounded in Cari’s InnerTruthWork™, each episode offers real tools for emotional resilience, inner clarity, and conscious change—without bypassing or pretending.
At its core, this podcast is a return to what was true before we learned who we were allowed to be. Because the gold isn’t outside the mess. It’s inside it.
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When the Story You’re Living Is No Longer True with Aaron Tabacco, PhD
Season 1 · Episode 13
Thursday, September 17, 2026 • Duration 57:12
What happens when the truth you have been avoiding becomes the only way forward?
For Aaron Tabacco, PhD, that moment came in midlife, after years of trying to reconcile his identity, his faith, his marriage, and the family he loved deeply.
In this deeply human conversation, Cari and Aaron explore authenticity, self-acceptance, grief, family transformation, and the courage it takes to stop living inside a false story. Aaron shares how coming out as gay became not the destruction he feared, but the beginning of a profound healing journey for himself, his former wife, and their three sons.
Together they reflect on the need to be chosen, the hidden cost of abandoning ourselves, and what can happen when we begin to claim sovereignty over our own lives.
Aaron also shares how his family chose to rewrite the traditional story of divorce, creating their own rituals of release, commitment, and love.
Through the lens of executive coaching, emotional resilience, mental health, and personal growth, this episode asks what becomes possible when we stop turning away from the parts of ourselves that frighten us most.
Sometimes the path to safety begins with telling the truth.
And sometimes our deepest strength is waiting inside our greatest fear.
The Treasures in the Trash:
Being chosen can become a substitute for choosing ourselves – When our sense of worth depends on being seen, accepted, or selected by others, we can slowly disappear from our own lives.
The stories that keep us safe can eventually become the stories that keep us stuck – What once felt necessary for belonging may no longer reflect who we are or the life we are ready to live.
Telling the truth changes more than one life – Aaron discovered that hiding his suffering was not protecting his family because the pain he carried was already reaching the people he loved.
We are allowed to write a different ending – By refusing the traditional scripts around coming out and divorce, Aaron and his family created their own language for love, release, commitment, and belonging.
Our deepest fear may be holding our deepest strength – When we stop turning away from what frightens us and meet it with honesty, we may discover that the place we feared most is also where our freedom lives.
About Aaron:
Aaron Tabacco, PhD, has spent more than thirty years guiding people through growth and change, often in complex and high-stakes environments. He currently serves as the Director of Staff Experience at a major academic health sciences university. With a background spanning nursing, neuroscience, education, coaching, and mediation, his work centers on helping individuals and organizations navigate identity, connection, and transformation with greater clarity and care.
Known for his grounded presence and compassionate communication, Aaron works with students, clinicians, faculty, executives, and senior leaders across healthcare and other industries. His approach integrates relational depth, reflective practice, and a commitment to creating more humane, integrated ways of working and living. He works in San Francisco, California, and lives in Vancouver, Washington, where he continues a lifelong engagement with writing, music, and the landscapes of the Pacific Northwest alongside his husband and three adult sons.
Cari Jacobs-Crovetto is an executive and leadership coach and the founder of Brave Directions, where she works with senior leaders and C-suite executives to strengthen interpersonal and team relationships, navigate conflict skillfully, and deepen self-awareness, influence, and confidence.
Before becoming a coach, Cari spent three decades in marketing and product leadership roles across Fortune 100 companies, media networks, consulting firms, and venture-backed startups. In 2019, she was named one of Forbes’ Top 50 Chief Marketing Officers.
Cari brings together decades of operating experience with more than 45 years of Buddhist meditation study and practice, integrating deep inner work with practical leadership development.
She facilitates the renowned Interpersonal Dynamics (“Touchy Feely”) course at Stanford Graduate School of Business where she also coaches grad school students, leads meditation classes and leadership workshops, and hosts the podcast Finding Treasures in the Trash.
Her mantra: Fierce Heart — where compassion meets bold, badass leadership.
Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page.
Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!
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Mentioned in this episode:
This show was brought to you in part by the Magic Thread Media Network. To learn more visit: https://magicthreadmedia.com/
The Moment the Illusion Breaks: Vish Chatterji on Samvega and the Wisdom of Disillusionment
Season 1 · Episode 12
Thursday, August 20, 2026 • Duration 54:40
What if the moments when your life stops making sense aren't interruptions in your path - but the very things pointing you toward it?
There is a Sanskrit word for the experience of having the world you thought was solid suddenly crack open: samvega.
It can happen when something falls apart. But it can also happen when everything goes according to plan. You get the title. The money. The relationship. The thing you were certain would make you happy - and a quieter voice inside asks: Is this it?
Vish Chatterji knows these moments well.
As a young man, Vish had a clear picture of success: America, achievement, the powerful executive in the suit. And he got there. But along the way came moments that punctured the story he had been living - moments of disappointment, disillusionment and unexpected redirection.
In this conversation, Cari and Vish explore what happens when we stop treating those moments as problems to solve and begin asking what they might be here to show us.
They talk about how easily achievement can become a way of outrunning deeper questions; why high performers are particularly good at overriding the signals that something needs our attention; and why there may not be one dramatic awakening that changes everything. Instead, Vish suggests, a life may be shaped by a series of samvega moments - each one nudging us a little closer to who we are becoming.
They also explore an important paradox: listening to the deeper voice doesn't necessarily mean abandoning the life you've built. Sometimes we needed every chapter. The invitation is to learn how to witness ourselves while we are living it - to participate fully without becoming so consumed by the race that we can no longer hear ourselves.
And sometimes, the treasure that emerges from the trash isn't something new at all. It is a part of ourselves that has quietly been there all along, waiting for us to recognize its value.
Because the question may not be simply, How do I get out of this?
The Gift of an Interrupted Life with Jordan Kersten
Season 1 · Episode 11
Thursday, July 23, 2026 • Duration 46:20
“Everything that we think we can hold onto is going to go. And isn't that freeing?” — Jordan Kersten
Jordan Kersten has learned to greet life's interruptions differently than most of us.
Again and again, her body has asked her to stop. A knee that no longer held her. A concussion that slowed her mind. An illness without answers. Another injury that made independence impossible.
None of them were experiences she would have chosen.
Yet each one became a doorway into a deeper way of being alive.
As Jordan shares her story, it becomes clear that this conversation isn't really about injury. It's about what happens after the life we expected gives way to the life that's actually unfolding. The body changes. Certainty disappears. Something familiar is lost. And in the space that's left behind, another way of seeing begins to emerge.
Cari and Jordan wander through questions of mindfulness, vulnerability, safety, expression, and what it means to find your voice when the ground beneath you keeps changing. Together they explore how compassion grows through lived experience, why receiving can be harder than giving, and how even the most painful interruptions can deepen our connection to ourselves and to one another.
There is a quiet wisdom running through this conversation.
Not everything that breaks us is asking to be fixed.
Sometimes it's asking us to become more awake.
The Treasures in the Trash
The reliable becomes unreliable. That isn't failure—it's part of being human. Our deepest growth often begins the moment certainty falls away.
Compassion is rarely learned through ideas. It is learned through lived experience. Our own struggles soften us toward the struggles of others.
Finding your voice begins with feeling safe. Authentic expression isn't something we force; it's something that naturally emerges when we no longer have to protect ourselves.
When the Life You Planned Falls Away with James Rosser
Season 1 · Episode 10
Thursday, June 18, 2026 • Duration 52:42
"As long as you're still harming yourself, how much kindness can you put out there? How much compassion can you put out there?" — James Rosser
What happens when the life you built no longer feels like your life?
For James Rosser, the question arrived through an unimaginable moment.
In his late twenties, during the height of the AIDS epidemic, James was mistakenly diagnosed with a terminal illness and told he likely had eight months to live. Then, after repeated testing, he learned the diagnosis was wrong.
But something had already shifted.
What began as a confrontation with mortality became something more surprising: a confrontation with exhaustion. Exhaustion from carrying a life that looked successful from the outside but no longer felt true on the inside. Exhaustion from perfection. Performance. Hiding. Becoming someone instead of being someone.
In this deeply personal conversation, Cari and James explore the unexpected ways suffering can become a doorway—not because pain is inherently noble, but because turning toward suffering instead of reacting against it can reveal who we are and what matters most.
Together they unpack the difference between mindfulness and meditation, the hidden aggression inside self-improvement, the origins of the inner critic, and why compassion is not softness—it is courage.
James shares how Buddhist practice, self-compassion, and years of learning to stay with difficult experience transformed his relationship with himself and ultimately changed the direction of his life—from finance to therapy, teaching, healing, and service.
This episode is an invitation to pause long enough to ask:
What if your pain isn’t asking you to become someone else?
What if it’s asking you to become more fully yourself?
The Treasures in the Trash:
Suffering can become a doorway — Sometimes the moments we would never choose reveal the values and truths that quietly shape the rest of our lives.
From “Sole” Voice to “Soul” Voice with Sylvia LePoidevin
Season 1 · Episode 9
Thursday, May 21, 2026 • Duration 44:09
“I think it was that intense sense of not belonging and being alone that actually created this beautiful spark of self-reflection.” — Sylvia LePoidevin
Some people inherit a clear sense of who they are. Others have to build it themselves.
In this conversation, Sylvia LePoidevin shares what it was like growing up between worlds. Raised in remote parts of Africa while never fully belonging there or in the United States, she learned early what it meant to live without a clear mirror reflecting identity back to her. What began as loneliness slowly became something else. Curiosity. Intention. Self-authorship.
As a child, she would climb onto the roof alone and write about the kind of person she wanted to become. Calm. Wise. Grounded. Someone who could not be easily shaken. Years later, after becoming a successful startup executive known for helping companies go from zero to one, she began asking a deeper question: Did she become herself naturally, or did she consciously create herself in response to isolation?
What unfolds is a conversation about identity, conditioning, belonging, reinvention, and the quiet self underneath every role we play. Together, Cari and Sylvia explore what happens when there is no script handed to you, and how loneliness can sometimes become the very thing that teaches you how to come home to yourself.
And maybe the deeper truth is this: when no one tells you who you are, you get the rare chance to listen for yourself.
The Treasures in the Trash:
Not belonging can become a form of freedom - When there is no clear script, mirror, or community telling you who to be, there is also space to consciously shape yourself from the inside out.
Loneliness can deepen self-awareness - The moments that feel most isolating can also become the moments where reflection, imagination, and inner clarity begin to form.
The identity you create may still be deeply real - Even the parts of ourselves we consciously shape often come from something honest and essential underneath. Self-creation and authenticity are not always opposites.
The Masks We Wear To Survive with Wai Poc
Season 1 · Episode 8
Thursday, April 23, 2026 • Duration 39:12
There are parts of us that learn to survive before they ever get the chance to live.
In this conversation, Wai Poc invites us into the quiet, complex terrain of identity—where visibility and invisibility coexist, where inherited fear shapes connection, and where the longing to belong meets the courage to be fully seen. From growing up as one of the only Asian students in his school, to navigating life as an “invisibly gay” man, his story is not linear—it’s layered, tender, and deeply human.
What unfolds is not just a story about identity, but about the masks we wear to feel safe… and the moment we realize we can no longer live inside them. Through friendship, self-love, and a willingness to stay curious about others, Wai Poc shows us that connection is not something we find—it’s something we allow.
And maybe the invitation here is simple, but not easy:
to take off the mask… and trust that who we are is enough to be met.
The Treasures in the Trash:
Survival isn’t the same as living - What helped you navigate early environments, whether inherited fear, silence, or self-protection, can quietly limit your ability to fully connect, express, and thrive. At some point, survival patterns need to be reexamined so life can actually be lived.
The mask that protects you can also confine you - We learn to shape ourselves in ways that feel safe or acceptable, but over time that version of ourselves can become the very thing that keeps us from being fully known and expressed.
Self-love expands your capacity to connect - As you begin to accept the parts of yourself you once hid or rejected, your ability to understand, relate to, and genuinely connect with others deepens.
Needing people is part of being human - The belief that we should be completely independent can keep us isolated, when in reality connection, support, and understanding are essential to a full and meaningful life.
There is more space for you than you think - The idea that you need to shrink to belong is often internalized, and while not everyone will understand you, there is far more room for your full self than you’ve been led to believe.
When Your Superpowers Become Your Baggage with Scott Duffy
Season 1 · Episode 7
Thursday, March 19, 2026 • Duration 01:20:00
There are moments in life when everything you built collapses. A car accident rewires your future. A company sale that looks like a dream turns into a financial freefall. A market crash. A divorce. A season where the identity you wore like armor falls apart.
In this conversation, Scott Duffy does not offer the highlight reel. He tells of the collapse. The pawn shop. The last $200. The parking lot tears. The phone call that helped him stand back up. And underneath his story is a truth that feels both confronting and liberating.
In this episode of Treasures in the Trash, Cari sits down with entrepreneur and investor Scott Duffy to explore a reality that every leader—and every human being—eventually faces: what happens when the very strengths that once made us successful stop working.
Scott’s career has included remarkable highs—building companies, selling a business to Richard Branson’s Virgin Group, and working at the forefront of entrepreneurship. It has also included difficult setbacks, including financial collapse and divorce. Those experiences became the backdrop for a deeper conversation about resilience, reinvention, and what it really takes to begin again.
During the conversation, Scott offers a striking observation about the current moment in the age of artificial intelligence: the very skills that once defined our expertise may quickly become outdated. As he puts it, “Your superpowers before ChatGPT may now be your baggage.”
But the deeper insight in this conversation isn’t really about technology.
It’s about what happens when life disrupts us—when the identities we’ve built begin to loosen and the strategies that once worked no longer carry us forward.
Those moments can feel like collapse. But they can also become powerful turning points.
Finding Treasures in the Trash is about taking the muck of life—the uncertainty, the failures, the parts of ourselves we’d rather hide—and discovering that it can become the very gold that opens the next chapter of our lives. Or of our planet.
The Treasures in the Trash:
Radical Acceptance Is How Radical Self Love Begins with Mandy Ingber
Season 1 · Episode 6
Thursday, February 19, 2026 • Duration 50:38
Content Note: This episode includes a brief first-person account of physical and sexual assault. Listener discretion is advised.
This episode is about Radical Acceptance and Radical — and I mean radical — Self Love. Acceptance of uncharacteristic looks. Acceptance of our race. Acceptance of real physical pain. Acceptance of aging. But ultimately, it is about accepting the shadow all the way through — every part and every way it can show up, from childhood through the crone. Radical Acceptance without flinching. Mandy Ingber has lived her entire life finding treasures in the trash. She has lived this work like no one I have met yet. “When you push away the shadow, you get rid of your own power.” So she has done the opposite. Nothing gets cut out, nothing gets pushed down or away — everything is there to be experienced in this life. To have transformation, you have to have the difficulty — it doesn’t feel good, and that’s why we don’t want to be in it. But that’s the doorway. Like the yoga she’s taught to celebs like Jennifer Aniston and Kate Hudson, we dig deep to make it through the pose to find the true gold in the challenges of life.
Key Takeaways:
Pouring yourself into what’s labeled a “negative.” Because of Mandy’s looks, she was cast early as a villain—asked to embody exaggerated shadow parts by playing those roles.
Being cast as your shadow. Moving toward the scary parts of yourself in a conscious, safe way. For Mandy, this meant facing deep fear connected to her father by eventually becoming that fear herself when cast as a villain.
Our relationship to appearance. Being “cast” by the world based on how we look can be debilitating—or it can become a portal into radical acceptance, especially when our appearance is intertwined with race.
Nose jobs and fixing the outside. Changing our exterior doesn’t resolve the complexity of what we feel inside or how we accept ourselves. The old self doesn’t disappear—it waits in the shadow to be transformed into treasure.
Our looks as a proxy for conditioning we don’t talk about nearly enough.
Insecurity as a doorway. How feeling insecure can open us to experiencing life more fully and honestly as human beings—without fear.
From Denial to Self-Devotion with Trudy Goodman
Season 1 · Episode 5
Tuesday, February 3, 2026 • Duration 43:49
What if the parts of you you’ve learned to doubt are actually the ones trying to guide you home?
In this conversation, Cari sits with Trudy Goodman to explore the quiet but profound cost of not trusting ourselves—and the long, compassionate path of returning to that trust. Not as a concept, but as a lived, embodied relationship with intuition, vulnerability, and truth.
Trudy shares how a lifelong pattern of overriding her intuition led to painful consequences, including moments of deep denial in relationships. What emerges is not regret, but a reframing: those experiences became the very doorway into rebuilding trust from the ground up. Not through force, but through small, consistent acts of listening.
The conversation gently unravels the tension between spiritual teachings that ask us to “drop the self” and the very real, human work of tending to it. Rather than rejecting the self, Trudy invites a different approach—one rooted in compassion, awareness, and the willingness to stay present with what’s difficult without turning away.
There is no bypassing here. No perfection to reach.
Only a deepening devotion to what is true—again and again.
And the realization that even the parts we’ve pushed away are not problems to solve… but places asking to be loved.
The Treasures in the Trash:
When Intuition Gets Overridden – Trudy shares how ignoring her inner knowing led to painful consequences and long-standing patterns of self-doubt.
Rebuilding Trust From the Inside – A practice of listening to even the smallest impulses becomes a way to retrain intuition and restore self-trust.
The Myth of Dropping the Self – Spiritual teachings are reframed to include, rather than reject, the human self and its lived experience.
Compassion for the “Unwanted Parts” – What we often label as shadow is revealed as parts of ourselves asking for attention, care, and love.
Self-Devotion as a Practice – The path forward becomes one of steady, compassionate commitment to knowing and trusting oneself over time.
Leaning into the Pain with Lisa Danylchuk
Season 1 · Episode 4
Tuesday, February 3, 2026 • Duration 44:11
What if the ways you’ve learned to cope… are also the ways you’ve learned to stay away from yourself?
Cari sits down with Lisa Danylchuk to explore what it actually means to lean into pain—not forcefully, not all at once, but with enough support to stay present to what’s real. Together, they unpack the many forms avoidance can take—overworking, overgiving, numbing, performing—and how easy it is to normalize those patterns, especially in high-functioning lives.
Lisa brings both personal experience and clinical depth, sharing how grief became a doorway rather than something to bypass. Not because it was easy, but because there was enough safety to stay with it. That distinction becomes central: this work isn’t about pushing harder—it’s about knowing how to approach gently, and when.
What emerges is a more compassionate understanding of trauma, shadow, and healing. Not as something reserved for extreme experiences, but as something woven into everyday life—into relationships, leadership, identity, and the quiet ways we disconnect from ourselves.
The invitation isn’t to dive in recklessly.
It’s to begin, wherever you are, with honesty… and support.
The Treasures in the Trash:
The Many Faces of Avoidance – How avoidance shows up in everyday behaviors like overworking, caregiving, and numbing habits.
Grief as a Gateway – Lisa’s experience of losing her brother becomes a turning point that led her to lean into, rather than bypass, pain.
Safety Before Depth – Healing depends on having enough internal and external support to approach difficult emotions without overwhelm.
Trauma Doesn’t Discriminate – Hard experiences shape people across all environments, including high-achieving and professional spaces.
Gentle Is Powerful – Sustainable transformation comes not from force, but from slowly and compassionately meeting what’s been avoided.
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Samvega is the moment the old story stops working. It is the disillusionment that comes when something punctures the world we thought was predictable and secure. It can feel like everything has gone to trash - and that may be precisely where something true becomes visible.
We are remarkably good at outrunning what we don't want to know. Another promotion. Another goal. More money. A new purchase. Staying busy can keep us from confronting the uncomfortable question underneath all the striving: Is the life I'm building actually the life I want to be living?
There may not be one big awakening. Vish describes life as a series of samvega moments - small and large encounters with disappointment, discomfort and disillusionment that gradually redirect us. The question is whether we notice them or simply return to the status quo.
Listening doesn't always mean leaving. Not every moment of disillusionment is an instruction to quit the job, end the relationship or reinvent your life. Sometimes we need the chapter we are living. Spiritual practice gives us the capacity to step outside the momentum long enough to witness ourselves inside it.
The treasure may have been with you all along. Long before Vish became a coach or studied Vedic astrology, meditation, yoga and his Indian spiritual heritage were quietly accompanying his more conventional ambitions. Eventually, what had seemed like separate parts of his life began to reveal themselves as one path.
Pain can contain a question. Vish closes the conversation with a different way of meeting difficult moments: rather than asking only how to make the hurt stop, step back and ask, What is the bigger picture? What is the context of this hurt? What is its purpose? What am I being asked to learn?
About the Guest
Vish Chatterji is an executive coach, Vedic astrology teacher, author, and former business executive whose work bridges ancient wisdom and modern life.
Before moving into coaching and teaching, Vish built a career across engineering, corporate leadership, technology and entrepreneurship. Throughout those years, however, another thread ran alongside his professional life: a longstanding practice of yoga and meditation and an evolving relationship with the wisdom traditions of his Indian heritage.
Today, through his coaching practice, Head & Heart Insights, Vish brings together practical leadership experience with teachings from yoga, meditation, Ayurveda, Vedic philosophy and Jyotish, or Vedic astrology. His work invites leaders and seekers to listen more deeply to their own inner wisdom and to understand the larger patterns unfolding in their lives.
He is the author of The Business Casual Yogi and Astrology Decoded, host of the podcast Bending the Light, and a Faculty Coach and Educator with the Berkeley Executive Coaching Institute at UC Berkeley.
Cari Jacobs-Crovetto is an executive and leadership coach and the founder of Brave Directions, where she works with senior leaders and C-suite executives to strengthen interpersonal and team relationships, navigate conflict skillfully, and deepen self-awareness, influence, and confidence.
Before becoming a coach, Cari spent three decades in marketing and product leadership roles across Fortune 100 companies, media networks, consulting firms, and venture-backed startups. In 2019, she was named one of Forbes’ Top 50 Chief Marketing Officers.
Cari brings together decades of operating experience with more than 45 years of Buddhist meditation study and practice, integrating deep inner work with practical leadership development.
She facilitates the renowned Interpersonal Dynamics (“Touchy Feely”) course at Stanford Graduate School of Business where she also coaches grad school students, leads meditation classes and leadership workshops, and hosts the podcast Finding Treasures in the Trash.
Her mantra: Fierce Heart — where compassion meets bold, badass leadership.
Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page.
Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!
Subscribe to the podcast
If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can follow the podcast on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast app.
Leave us an Apple Podcasts review
Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you are enjoying the show, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts.
Mentioned in this episode:
This show was brought to you in part by the Magic Thread Media Network. To learn more visit: https://magicthreadmedia.com/
Healing isn't always returning to who we were. Sometimes it's becoming someone we couldn't have become any other way.
Sometimes the body interrupts us before the soul can. The moments that stop us often become the moments that awaken us.
Every episode of Finding Treasures in the Trash explores the places we'd rather avoid—the losses, disappointments, fears, and moments that seem to break us—and asks a different question:
What if the treasure is already hidden inside the trash?
About the Guest:
Jordan Kersten is a passionate and grounded health coach, voice teacher, and yoga teacher dedicated to helping people reconnect with their innate creativity, resilience, and capacity for healing. She works with individuals from all walks of life, with particular experience supporting those recovering from injury and navigating complex health conditions.
Inspired by the mindfulness traditions of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) and Plum Village, Jordan brings a deeply compassionate and curious approach to her work. She is endlessly fascinated by the connection between the body, mind, and creative spirit, and believes that even life's greatest challenges can become opportunities for growth, self-discovery, and transformation.
When she's not teaching or coaching, Jordan can often be found backpacking, watching sunsets, or singing.
Interested in exploring work with Jordan, get $135 off her 6 week Summer Jumpstart, and $245 off her Summer Season Reset (3 months)! Email her at jordankersten@gmail.com for more info.
About Cari:
Cari Jacobs-Crovetto is an executive and leadership coach and the founder of Brave Directions, where she works with senior leaders and C-suite executives to strengthen interpersonal and team relationships, navigate conflict skillfully, and deepen self-awareness, influence, and confidence.
Before becoming a coach, Cari spent three decades in marketing and product leadership roles across Fortune 100 companies, media networks, consulting firms, and venture-backed startups. In 2019, she was named one of Forbes’ Top 50 Chief Marketing Officers.
Cari brings together decades of operating experience with more than 45 years of Buddhist meditation study and practice, integrating deep inner work with practical leadership development.
She facilitates the renowned Interpersonal Dynamics (“Touchy Feely”) course at Stanford Graduate School of Business where she also coaches grad school students, leads meditation classes and leadership workshops, and hosts the podcast Finding Treasures in the Trash.
Her mantra: Fierce Heart — where compassion meets bold, badass leadership.
Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page.
Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!
Subscribe to the podcast
If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can follow the podcast on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast app.
Leave us an Apple Podcasts review
Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you are enjoying the show, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts.
Mentioned in this episode:
This show was brought to you in part by the Magic Thread Media Network. To learn more visit: https://magicthreadmedia.com/
Reactivity and response are not the same thing — The space between what we feel and how we respond may be where freedom begins.
Self-improvement can hide self-rejection — The drive to become better can sometimes be fueled by the painful belief that we are not enough as we are.
Compassion changes everything — When we stop treating suffering as failure and begin meeting it with care, healing becomes possible.
The inner critic often began as protection — What feels harsh today may once have been trying to keep us safe.
Looking for the good is a practice — Our minds naturally scan for danger, but kindness and awareness help us remember what else is here.
Your heart already knows something — Sometimes the most important question isn’t “What should I do?” but “What does my heart need to hear?”
James Rosser has been meditating since 1987, beginning his journey with Spirit Rock co-founder James Baraz. Today, he serves as a Dharma teacher and Board Member at InsightLA, and co-leads retreats at the Big Bear Retreat Center. His extensive training includes graduations from InsightLA’s Facilitator and Dedicated to the Dharma programs, Spirit Rock's Dedicated Practitioner Program, and the inaugural class of the Kornfield-Brach Mindfulness Meditation Teacher Certification Program (MMTCP).
James integrates deep spiritual practice with clinical expertise. He is a Mentor at Kristin Neff’s Self-Compassion Institute, a Trained Teacher for the Center for Mindful Self-Compassion, and an intensively trained Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) clinician. Currently, he works as an LCSW at UCLA’s Resnick Neuropsychiatric Hospital, designing and growing intensive outpatient programs. He holds a Master’s in Social Welfare from UCLA and a Bachelor’s in Finance from the University of Tennessee.
Cari Jacobs-Crovetto is an executive and leadership coach and the founder of Brave Directions, where she works with senior leaders and C-suite executives to strengthen interpersonal and team relationships, navigate conflict skillfully, and deepen self-awareness, influence, and confidence.
Before becoming a coach, Cari spent three decades in marketing and product leadership roles across Fortune 100 companies, media networks, consulting firms, and venture-backed startups. In 2019, she was named one of Forbes’ Top 50 Chief Marketing Officers.
Cari brings together decades of operating experience with more than 45 years of Buddhist meditation study and practice, integrating deep inner work with practical leadership development.
She facilitates the renowned Interpersonal Dynamics (“Touchy Feely”) course at Stanford Graduate School of Business where she also coaches grad school students, leads meditation classes and leadership workshops, and hosts the podcast Finding Treasures in the Trash.
Her mantra: Fierce Heart — where compassion meets bold, badass leadership.
Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page.
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Mentioned in this episode:
This show was brought to you in part by the Magic Thread Media Network. To learn more visit: https://magicthreadmedia.com/
Starting over reveals what is stable - Every return to zero strips away what is temporary and brings us back to the part of ourselves that remains unchanged beneath achievement, location, or circumstance.
You are more capable of rebuilding than you think - The more connected you become to the deeper self beneath external identity, the less frightening change, reinvention, and uncertainty begin to feel.
About our Guest:
Sylvia LePoidevin has built marketing from zero four times. As the first marketing hire at FloQast ($1.6B) and Kandji ($850M+), she's helped build companies now worth over $2 billion combined. She turned down two CMO roles at $5B+ companies to make her fourth early-stage bet as CMO at Juno, where they've gone from zero to millions in under six months. Raised in remota Africa before moving to the US alone at 17, she writes "The Zero to One Marketer" on LinkedIn and Substack.
Cari Jacobs-Crovetto is an executive and leadership coach and the founder of Brave Directions, where she works with senior leaders and C-suite executives to strengthen interpersonal and team relationships, navigate conflict skillfully, and deepen self-awareness, influence, and confidence.
Before becoming a coach, Cari spent three decades in marketing and product leadership roles across Fortune 100 companies, media networks, consulting firms, and venture-backed startups. In 2019, she was named one of Forbes’ Top 50 Chief Marketing Officers.
Cari brings together decades of operating experience with more than 45 years of Buddhist meditation study and practice, integrating deep inner work with practical leadership development.
She facilitates the renowned Interpersonal Dynamics (“Touchy Feely”) course at Stanford Graduate School of Business where she also coaches grad school students, leads meditation classes and leadership workshops, and hosts the podcast Finding Treasures in the Trash.
Her mantra: Fierce Heart — where compassion meets bold, badass leadership.
Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page.
Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!
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Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you are enjoying the show, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts.
Mentioned in this episode:
This show was brought to you in part by the Magic Thread Media Network. To learn more visit: https://magicthreadmedia.com/
About the Guest:
Wai Poc is an Executive Coach in the high-tech, biotech, and finance sectors, including for VPs at companies like Google, Facebook, Genentech, Gilead as well as for C-levels in pre and post IPO Series A to D companies where he is based in Silicon Valley. His expertise includes strategic influence, leadership development, and organizational dynamics. Many moons ago, Wai studied cultural anthropology at Stanford University before moving onto a MBA and into business. He is part of the teaching and coaching team on EQ at Stanford's Graduate School of Business. A sabbatical field expedition to Madagascar led Wai to meet Patricia Wright, with whom he is now writing a book on power and politics in the workplace. Their goal is to decode the primate roots of human competition and collaboration with Unleashed: A Field Guide to Power and Politics at Work.
About Cari:
Cari Jacobs-Crovetto is an executive and leadership coach and the founder of Brave Directions, where she works with senior leaders and C-suite executives to strengthen interpersonal and team relationships, navigate conflict skillfully, and deepen self-awareness, influence, and confidence.
Before becoming a coach, Cari spent three decades in marketing and product leadership roles across Fortune 100 companies, media networks, consulting firms, and venture-backed startups. In 2019, she was named one of Forbes’ Top 50 Chief Marketing Officers.
Cari brings together decades of operating experience with more than 45 years of Buddhist meditation study and practice, integrating deep inner work with practical leadership development.
She facilitates the renowned Interpersonal Dynamics (“Touchy Feely”) course at Stanford Graduate School of Business where she also coaches grad school students, leads meditation classes and leadership workshops, and hosts the podcast Finding Treasures in the Trash.
Her mantra: Fierce Heart — where compassion meets bold, badass leadership.
Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page.
Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!
Subscribe to the podcast
If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can follow the podcast on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast app.
Leave us an Apple Podcasts review
Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you are enjoying the show, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts.
Mentioned in this episode:
This show was brought to you in part by the Magic Thread Media Network. To learn more visit: https://magicthreadmedia.com/
Beginner’s mind opens possibility - When we become experts, our thinking can quietly harden. Scott and Cari explore the power of returning to beginner’s mind—what the Zen tradition calls shoshin. Experts see limits; beginners see options. In times of disruption, curiosity becomes a strategic advantage.
Your superpower can become your baggage - The skills that once made us exceptional can eventually trap us in outdated patterns. In the age of AI—and in life more broadly—growth requires the willingness to release certainty and evolve beyond what once defined us.
Resourcefulness matters more than resources - Scott draws a powerful distinction: success rarely comes from having the most resources. It comes from how creatively and courageously we meet reality. Resourcefulness, not abundance, is what moves people forward.
When the wave comes, you move through it - Disruption is inevitable. Whether it’s AI, a market shift, or a personal collapse, the question isn’t whether the wave arrives—it’s how we respond. We can run, freeze, or learn to move through it.
The people around you shape what feels possible - Our environments matter. Scott reflects on the idea that we often become the average of the people closest to us. The relationships we choose can either expand our sense of possibility or quietly shrink it.
Transformation begins after the fall - Some of Scott’s most powerful insights come from the hardest chapters of his life. His recovery framework—accountability, forgiveness, learning, and gratitude—reveals how moments that feel like collapse can become the foundation for growth.
If you’re ready to start reclaiming the parts of yourself you’ve pushed aside, head to https://bravedirections.myflodesk.com/5daystotruth to sign up for ”Five Days to Truth”—a free guided meditation series to help you begin that process with clarity and care. It’s a powerful companion to this work, and Cari’s gift to you.
About the Guest:
Scott Duffy is an entrepreneur and AI business strategist. He is the Founder of AI Mavericks and several other AI-focused businesses. Prior to AI ventures, he founded a company acquired by Richard Branson’s Virgin Group, held leadership roles at FOX Sports, NBC Internet, & CBS Sportsline, and started his career working for Tony Robbins. He is the author of four influential books, including "Shoshin," "The Ultimate Prompting Guide," "Breakthrough," & "Launch"; has been recognized as a “Top 10 Speaker” by Entrepreneur; has appeared on CNBC; has spoken at the NY Stock Exchange; and was Co-Host of a popular podcast for Microsoft.
Cari Jacobs-Crovetto is an executive and leadership coach and the founder of Brave Directions, where she works with senior leaders and C-suite executives to strengthen interpersonal and team relationships, navigate conflict skillfully, and deepen self-awareness, influence, and confidence.
Before becoming a coach, Cari spent three decades in marketing and product leadership roles across Fortune 100 companies, media networks, consulting firms, and venture-backed startups. In 2019, she was named one of Forbes’ Top 50 Chief Marketing Officers.
Cari brings together decades of operating experience with more than 45 years of Buddhist meditation study and practice, integrating deep inner work with practical leadership development.
She facilitates the renowned Interpersonal Dynamics (“Touchy Feely”) course at Stanford Graduate School of Business where she also coaches grad school students, leads meditation classes and leadership workshops, and hosts the podcast Finding Treasures in the Trash.
Her mantra: Fierce Heart — where compassion meets bold, badass leadership.
Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page.
Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!
Subscribe to the podcast
If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can follow the podcast on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast app.
Leave us an Apple Podcasts review
Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you are enjoying the show, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts.
Mentioned in this episode:
This show was brought to you in part by the Magic Thread Media Network. To learn more visit: https://magicthreadmedia.com/
Going through physical pain to find freedom. We find joy, resilience and more when we can lean into the entirety of our experience.
Jiminy Cricket and wishing upon a star as consciousness and focused attention
If you’re ready to start reclaiming the parts of yourself you’ve pushed aside, head to https://bravedirections.myflodesk.com/5daystotruth to sign up for ”Five Days to Truth”—a free guided meditation series to help you begin that process with clarity and care. It’s a powerful companion to this work, and Cari’s gift to you.
About the Guest:
Mandy Ingber is a Los Angeles based New York Times best selling author, wellness expert, and astrologer who has spent more than 30 years guiding clients to understand their life’s purpose through their birth charts and embodiment practices. She is the creator of the YOGALOSOPHY method and the author of Yogalosophy: 28 Days to the Ultimate Mind Body Makeover and Yogalosophy for Inner Strength: 12 Weeks to Heal Your Heart and Embrace Joy. Her work has earned awards from Los Angeles Magazine and LA Weekly, and she has been featured in major publications including Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, People, and The Oprah Magazine, with television appearances on Good Morning America and the TODAY show. Her private client list has included Jennifer Aniston, Kate Beckinsale, Helen Hunt, and Brooke Shields.
In addition to her wellness work, Mandy is deeply committed to supporting people through life’s transitions. She is a certified Death Doula who guides individuals and families through advance medical directives, living trusts, and final wishes, and she serves as a minister for both end of life celebrations and weddings. She is also a sought after speaker and spokesperson for wellness brands, serves on the advisory committee for the Cancer Prevention Clinic at Providence Saint John’s Health Center, and brings a unique creative background from her earlier career on Broadway, television, and film.
Cari Jacobs-Crovetto is an executive and leadership coach and the founder of Brave Directions, where she works with senior leaders and C-suite executives to strengthen interpersonal and team relationships, navigate conflict skillfully, and deepen self-awareness, influence, and confidence.
Before becoming a coach, Cari spent three decades in marketing and product leadership roles across Fortune 100 companies, media networks, consulting firms, and venture-backed startups. In 2019, she was named one of Forbes’ Top 50 Chief Marketing Officers.
Cari brings together decades of operating experience with more than 45 years of Buddhist meditation study and practice, integrating deep inner work with practical leadership development.
She facilitates the renowned Interpersonal Dynamics (“Touchy Feely”) course at Stanford Graduate School of Business where she also coaches grad school students, leads meditation classes and leadership workshops, and hosts the podcast Finding Treasures in the Trash.
Her mantra: Fierce Heart — where compassion meets bold, badass leadership.
Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page.
Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!
Subscribe to the podcast
If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can follow the podcast on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast app.
Leave us an Apple Podcasts review
Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you are enjoying the show, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts.
Mentioned in this episode:
This show was brought to you in part by the Magic Thread Media Network. To learn more visit: https://magicthreadmedia.com/
About the Guest:
Trudy Goodman is a psychotherapist and internationally recognized meditation teacher who has been teaching mindfulness for decades. She is the founding teacher of InsightLA, a leading meditation community in Los Angeles, and was among the earliest teachers of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction, working alongside Jon Kabat-Zinn. Trudy holds a graduate degree in psychotherapy from Harvard and has dedicated her life to helping people cultivate awareness, compassion, and emotional healing through meditation. Known for her warmth, accessibility, and depth of wisdom, she has guided thousands of students in integrating mindfulness into everyday life.
Cari Jacobs-Crovetto is an executive and leadership coach and the founder of Brave Directions, where she works with senior leaders and C-suite executives to strengthen interpersonal and team relationships, navigate conflict skillfully, and deepen self-awareness, influence, and confidence.
Before becoming a coach, Cari spent three decades in marketing and product leadership roles across Fortune 100 companies, media networks, consulting firms, and venture-backed startups. In 2019, she was named one of Forbes’ Top 50 Chief Marketing Officers.
Cari brings together decades of operating experience with more than 45 years of Buddhist meditation study and practice, integrating deep inner work with practical leadership development.
She facilitates the renowned Interpersonal Dynamics (“Touchy Feely”) course at Stanford Graduate School of Business where she also coaches grad school students, leads meditation classes and leadership workshops, and hosts the podcast Finding Treasures in the Trash.
Her mantra: Fierce Heart — where compassion meets bold, badass leadership.
Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page.
Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!
Subscribe to the podcast
If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can follow the podcast on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast app.
Leave us an Apple Podcasts review
Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you are enjoying the show, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts.
Mentioned in this episode:
This show was brought to you in part by the Magic Thread Media Network. To learn more visit: https://magicthreadmedia.com/
About the Guest:
Lisa Danylchuk, LMFT, E-RYT is an author, licensed psychotherapist, and yoga teacher trainer specializing in bringing yoga into trauma treatment. A graduate of UCLA and Harvard University, Lisa is the founder of the Center for Yoga and Trauma Recovery in Oakland, CA, and creator the Yoga for Trauma (Y4T) Online Training Program. She has authored three books: Yoga for Trauma Recovery: Theory, Philosophy, and Practice (2019), Embodied Healing: Using Yoga to Recover from Trauma and Extreme Stress (2015), and How You Can Heal: A Strength Based Guide to Trauma Recovery (2017), and is a contributing editor for Best Practices for Yoga for Veterans, published by the Yoga Service Council. She also serves on the Board of Directors and the UN Task Force for the International Society for the Study of Trauma and Dissociation, and was recently elected to serve as Secretary for the organization. A leader in the movement to incorporate yoga into trauma treatment, she has trained yoga and mental health professionals around the world, and presents her work internationally.
Cari Jacobs-Crovetto is an executive and leadership coach and the founder of Brave Directions, where she works with senior leaders and C-suite executives to strengthen interpersonal and team relationships, navigate conflict skillfully, and deepen self-awareness, influence, and confidence.
Before becoming a coach, Cari spent three decades in marketing and product leadership roles across Fortune 100 companies, media networks, consulting firms, and venture-backed startups. In 2019, she was named one of Forbes’ Top 50 Chief Marketing Officers.
Cari brings together decades of operating experience with more than 45 years of Buddhist meditation study and practice, integrating deep inner work with practical leadership development.
She facilitates the renowned Interpersonal Dynamics (“Touchy Feely”) course at Stanford Graduate School of Business where she also coaches grad school students, leads meditation classes and leadership workshops, and hosts the podcast Finding Treasures in the Trash.
Her mantra: Fierce Heart — where compassion meets bold, badass leadership.
Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page.
Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!
Subscribe to the podcast
If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can follow the podcast on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast app.
Leave us an Apple Podcasts review
Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you are enjoying the show, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts.
Mentioned in this episode:
This show was brought to you in part by the Magic Thread Media Network. To learn more visit: https://magicthreadmedia.com/
