Chapter 61: Temple Grandin on mixing minds making magic

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Welcome to Chapter 61!

I am delighted to bring you a conversation with the one and only Temple Grandin whose life has profoundly changed our notions about autism and neurodiversity and whose work has heightened awareness of the importance of animal welfare.

Born in 1947 in Boston, she was diagnosed with autism while still nonverbal at age 4. Told her daughter should be institutionalized, Temple’s mother dismissed doctors and worked tirelessly to help her daughter blossom.

A BA, MA, and PhD later, Temple is a lauded faculty member at the College of Agricultural Sciences at Colorado State University. She has authored over 60 scientific papers on animal behavior and is one of the first people with autism ever to raise awareness and document her own journey.

This has contributed to her notoriety on many fronts: she was brought to prominence in the world by Oliver Sacks M.D in his book, An Anthropologist on Mars, she has authored her own books on autism, Thinking in Pictures: My Life with Autism and The Autistic Brain: Helping Different Minds Succeed, her TED Talk “The World Needs All Kinds of Minds” has been viewed over 5 million times and the HBO movie,Temple Grandin, based on her life, and where she was played by Clare Danes, shed light on her incredible story as well as picked up over a dozen awards across the Emmy, SAG, and Golden Globes circuit.

As a respected spokesperson in the animal community, Temple is also celebrated for her redesign of slaughterhouses (yes, you read that right). She is outspoken in her belief that, “alleviating anxiety rather than extending life fully,” should be the priority for those raising animals. Her essay “Animals are Not Things” and her books Animals in Translation and Animals Make Us Human, have garnered her the highest regard, for her ability to empathize with animals is second to none.

In this Chapter, we discuss:

  • What is the state of autism in the world today?

  • How do we nurture diverse minds?

  • What is missing from our education system today?

  • What are the ethics of eating meat?

  • How can we value our elders more?

  • And of course, what are Temple Grandin’s 3 most formative books?

Ready to jump into my conversation with this beautiful and resilient soul?

Let’s go!

What You'll Learn:

  • What is autism and what does ‘the autism spectrum’ really mean?

  • What is missing from the education system today?

  • Why should kids do more hands-on learning?

  • What does it mean to be a visual thinker?

  • What could have avoided the Fukushima nuclear disaster?

  • What is animal welfare and why is it important?

  • What is the future of our species? (big one!)

  • How can we embrace getting older?

  • How do we find our purpose?

Notable quotes from Temple Grandin:

“If you want to know how my mind works, give me a key word and pretend I am Google for images.” - @DrTempleGrandin #3bookspodcast

"One of the worst things the schools have done is taken out hands-on classes." - @DrTempleGrandin #3bookspodcast

“Nature is cruel but we don’t have to be.” - @DrTempleGrandin #3bookspodcast

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Chapter 60: Shane Parrish masters Munger to map mental models and mold maverick minds 

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In Shane Parrish’s first group project during his MBA he watched as his professor got into some verbal fisticuffs with his partner on a project. They were debating the logic behind his group’s presentation. They disagreed about it! And, eventually, his partner got up and shouted, “I am wasting my time here!” before storming out of the room, out of the class, and out of the program in one fell Costanza-like swoop.

Shane fortunately caught up with the unnamed hero in this little caper while he was waiting for a taxi and said, “What happened back there? I thought we did the project right. Why did we get such a different answer than the professor?” His partner’s two-word answer ended up changing Shane’s life.

He said simply: “Charlie Munger”.

Shane Parrish’s Office Library

Shane Parrish’s Office Library

Who is Shane Parrish?

He’s a former spy who, to quote the NY Times, ‘helps Wall Street mavens think smarter.’ He’s become an unlikely guru to the world’s intellectual elite with strategies appealing to an overachieving audience across high finance, Silicon Valley and professional sports. He runs Farnam Street, colloquially known as FS.blog, which aims to ‘help you master the best of what other people have already figured out.’. FS.blog helps readers optimize decision-making through a giant worldwide community of thousands of people, a virtual think tank of professionals who can help “shorten the path to wisdom’ and self-education. FS is also: an award-winning newsletter (Brain Food), a podcast called The Knowledge Project (which I guested on not so long ago) and a series of incredible books called The Great Mental Models that Shane Parrish and his team personally publish. 

So how do you meet a spy? You fly to him. And so I did. Up to Ottawa, Canada and into the new Farnam Street Offices on Bank Street — all pre-pandemic. To say I’m intrigued by Shane is an understatement. He is a voracious reader with  insights and worldly wisdom on big questions like:

  • What does it mean to think better?

  • How should we think about our thinking?

  • What is intelligence and how should we measure it?

  • How do we build trust in relationships?

  • What does it mean to be a gentleman these days?

  • How do you raise boys into great men?

  • And, of course, what are Shane Parrish’s 3 most formative books?

Are you ready?

Let’s go.

What You'll Learn:

  • What does it mean to live a more meaningful life?

  • How should we create trust in the world today?

  • How do we create art with integrity?

  • How do we think about sponsorship?

  • How do you make adult friendships?

  • How do you live life without lawyers?

  • How do we develop trust without contracts?

Notable quotes from Shane Parrish:

“I think of intelligence as adaptability and ability to improve.” - @ShaneAParrish #3bookspodcast

“Whose bread I eat, his song I sing.”- @ShaneAParrish #3bookspodcast

Quoting Warren Buffet: “Do you live your life by an inner scorecard or an outer scorecard?” - @ShaneAParrish #3bookspodcast

Quoting Warren Buffet: “Would you rather be the world’s greatest lover, but have everyone think you’re the world’s worst? Or would you rather be the world’s worst but have everyone think you’re the greatest? - @ShaneAParrish #3bookspodcast

“If you are not paying for information, you are the product, you are what is being sold.” - @ShaneAParrish #3bookspodcast

“Be careful when you outsource your thinking and don’t convince yourself it is your thinking if you are paying for it.” - @ShaneAParrish #3bookspodcast

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Chapter 59: Jeff Speck is pushing the pleasures of pedestrian propinquity

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Where in the world are you right now?

Are you in cramped apartment in a busy downtown core? Are you in a countryside farm beside a tiny general store? Or are you in a basement hotel gym in Ulaanbaatar? 

And, more importantly, why in the world are you where you are? Are you chasing a career? Are you in school? Did you move for love? Does inertia have you wedged deeply into your neighborhood?

Well, where ever you are, I can promise you this: by the end of Chapter 59 you won’t look at where you live the same way ever again.

Why?

Because my next guest is a visionary city planner and urban designer and who will guide us through the power of place and principled planning.

Sidenote: Chapter 59 is our first rabbit hole chapter of 3 Books. You may recall Anne Bogel introduced us to Jeff Speck by picking his book Walkable City as one of her three most formative back in Chapter 57. She was in love with the book, I fell in love with the book, and we ended up inviting Jeff onto the show.

So who is Jeff Speck?

Well, he’s an internationally renowned city planner and urban designer, recognized for his research surrounding, and advocacy for, more walkable cities. He was Director of Design at the National Endowment for the Arts from 2003-2007, he was also Director of Town Planning at DPZ & Co (the founders of the  New Urbanist movement) for over 10 years and now heads up his own consulting practice, advising cities and mayors across the globe. He is a fellow at both the Congress for the New Urbanism and the American Institute of Certified Planners and has made conversations surrounding walkability mainstream via his two TED Talks viewed over 4 million times: The Walkable City and 4 Ways to Make a City More Walkable.  

And as if the above planning pedigree were not enough, he is the author of several books including the aforementioned Walkable City, the top selling city planning book for the past decade, (and #832 in our Top 1000!) as well as Suburban Nation, declared by the Wall Street Journal as ‘the urbanists bible’

In this chapter we deep dive into:

  • What is walkability and what is its true value?

  • What is the relationship between design and well-being?

  • What are the true costs of car ownership?

  • How can city planning combat loneliness?

  • How does poor planning perpetuate racism?

  • What makes a good mayor?

Jeff is a wonder brain. Humble, articulate, passionate, he’s a man on a mission. His mind has these cranks and gears that allow him to see the world with giant perspective and distill things down to simple ideas for us to absorb and reflect upon. 

Are you ready?

Let’s go!

What You'll Learn:

  • What is urban planning?

  • Where and how did urban planning go wrong in the twentieth century?

  • What is necessary to create human-scale livable spaces?

  • Why are many cities failing its citizens?

  • How much is car dependency hurting us?

  • Why is strangeness important?

  • What is the importance of the concept of live, work, play in planning?

  • Why is it illegal to build mixed use walkable communities to this day in the US?

  • How has the pandemic affected how we build and think about our cities?

  • And, of course, what are Jeff Speck’s three most formative books?

Notable quotes from Jeff Speck:

“Great writing is really great thinking.” - Jeff Speck #3bookspodcast

Quoting Jane Jacobs: “Almost nobody travels willingly from sameness to sameness and repetition to repetition even if the physical effort required is trivial.” - Jeff Speck #3bookspodcast

“The bigger the city the more strangeness you can have.” - Jeff Speck #3bookspodcast

“It’s remarkable how cities give you crowds and interaction but they’re also the place to go for anonymity.” - Jeff Speck #3bookspodcast

“We have designed out of our communities the useful walk.” - Jeff Speck #3bookspodcast

“For every dollar that you spend on gasoline, society is paying another nine dollars to get you around.” - Jeff Speck #3bookspodcast

“If you switch from driving to taking transit you will lose 6 pounds” - Jeff Speck #3bookspodcast

“The denser your city is the more patents per capita it is going to generate.” - Jeff Speck #3bookspodcast

Quoting Jane Jacobs: “Lowly, unpurposeful and random as they may appear, sidewalk contacts are the small change from which a city’s wealth of public life may grow.” - Jeff Speck #3bookspodcast

“It is a very different thing to bump into someone while walking then it is to bump into someone while driving.” - Jeff Speck #3bookspodcast

“We do everything better when we don’t limit ourselves to our specialty.” - Jeff Speck #3bookspodcast

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Chapter 58: Author David Mitchell on designing dizzily dazzling dreams

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“Never touch your idols: the gilding will stick to your fingers” Gustave Flaubert

I heard David Mitchell mention this quote while I was deep in the rabbit hole preparing to speak to him. It gave me pause. Was there any way he could possibly live up to the pedestal in the clouds I’d long placed him on?

My love affair with David Mitchell began years ago when I became completely transfixed by Cloud Atlas. I then began devouring his other books like a starving man — Ghost Written, number9dream, Black Swan Green, The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet, The Bone Clocks, and his brand new masterpiece Utopia Avenue

Every book broke new genre territory while consistently offering vividly realistic characters, leaping plotlines, and hints towards a larger scale multiverse tying everything together. It’s no wonder five of his books have been long- or short-listed for the Booker Prize.

And it’s not just me or the Booker committee, either. The Boston Globe calls David Mitchell, “one of the most electric writers alive”, Esquire calls him, “a genre leaping, mind bending, world-traveling, puzzle-making, literary magician”, and the New York Times Book Review declared him “a genius who writes as though at the helm of a perpetual dream machine.” TIME even declared him one of the world’s “100 Most Influential People”.

I was indeed worried, but after spending two and a half hours talking to David (in what I think may be the longest feature-length interview with him anywhere and his first podcast interview in years) I am pleased to say no specks of gold came off in my fingers. If anything, his grace, humility, and wit only elevated the pedestal higher into the cosmos.

Ladies and gentleman, boys and girls, prepare to go deep into one of the world’s deepest minds in the world. Get ready for a ramble across Middle Earth, Russia, Ireland, and Japan as we discuss things like:  

  • How can art be an anti-snobbery force?

  • How books can stop minds from scratching themselves raw?

  • How writers build trust with their readers?

  • How we can we harvest imagination?

  • What is it like raising a child who is non-verbal?

  • What is the power and meaning of the metaphysical?

  • How should writing be judged?

  • Which fantasy author trumps Tolkien and why?

These are just some of the topics we touch on with loving father, master craftsman, mentor to many, and endlessly erudite bibliophile David Mitchell.

Let’s go!

What You'll Learn:

  • Why shouldn’t genre matter in writing?

  • Why doesn’t snobbery belong in the world of books?

  • How do books change after they’re read?

  • How does the metaphor of a TV box set apply to books?

  • How do writers build trust with their readers?

  • How do we harvest imagination?

  • What’s the relationship between health care policy and good writing?

  • Who are The Russians and how does one properly wade into them?

  • Why are we all storytellers?

  • What are some myths surrounding autism?

  • How do you become a better writer?

  • And, of course, what are David Mitchell’s three most formative books?

notable quotes from David mitchell:

“A day doesn’t feel well spent without the writing in it.” – David Mitchell #3bookspodcast

“The internet never forgets.” – David Mitchell #3bookspodcast

“Art should be an anti-snobbery force.” – David Mitchell #3bookspodcast

“Genre is analogous to a paintbox” - David Mitchell #3bookspodcast

“It should raise no eyebrows if the writer wishes to treat genre as an organ of the novel” - David Mitchell #3bookspodcast

“Trust the advice of your local independent bricks and mortar booksellers of the kind that actually pay tax and have a role in the community.” – David Mitchell #3bookspodcast

“All books want to be used, if I was a book, I would want to be used.” - David Mitchell #3bookspodcast

“The same way a cellist can play more than one string at the same time with one stroke of the bow, I try to make scenes do more than one thing and lines do more than one thing.” - David Mitchell #3bookspodcast

On writers and ageing: “I’ve got a metaphorical compost heap in my head.” - David Mitchell #3bookspodcast

On Emily Dickinson: “She did not travel and yet you can still find infinity and eternity in her poems.”- David Mitchell #3bookspodcast

On studying different languages: “It is the access to the treasure chest of wisdom and wit that is there in the etymology of words.” - David Mitchell #3bookspodcast

“Booksellers are front line workers of the mind.” – David Mitchell #3bookspodcast

“If there isn’t justice for everybody then there is no justice for anybody.”– David Mitchell #3bookspodcast

“Going wrong can be your ally; all you have to do is work out why you’ve gone wrong and that is a necessary step to going right, so don’t be discouraged.”– David Mitchell #3bookspodcast

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Chapter 57: Anne Bogel believes books build bridges and boost bibliophile belonging

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Want to hang out in New York?

Yes, let’s go back to pre-pandemic when sidewalks were full, strangers shook hands, and everybody popped in and out of stores like it was nothing. Sound like a faraway dream world? Yeah, it does to me, too. Yet somehow only a few months ago I flew down to New York and hung out in Union Square and The Strand bookstore with literary phenom Anne Bogel.

Anne runs Modern Mrs Darcy, one of the world’s largest book blogs, as well as What Should I Read Next? and One Great Book, two of the world’s largest books podcast. Is that all? No, of course that’s not all! Do you know Anne?

She’s like the Tasmanian Devil. She’s also a bestselling author and has three books to her name including Don’t Overthink It, I’d Rather Be Reading, and Reading People. Oh, and did I mention she’s the mother of four children!?!?

In Chapter 57, Anne shares why she’s hesitant to look at people’s bookshelves when she’s just met them, what your ‘reading life’ is and how to grow and nurture it, what makes a city liveable, how Anne would organize a bookstore, and, of course, Anne’s three most formative books.

I am so excited to share this conversation with you. I dare you to listen to Anne and not feel immediately excited to grow your reading life…

Let’s go!

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What You'll Learn:

  • What is your reading life?

  • How do you grow your reading life?

  • What do your bookshelves say about you?

  • How do you lean into reading new narrative structures?

  • What books should you read to your kids to introduce them to death?

  • What would Anne Bogel’s bookstore look like?

  • How do you measure success?

notable quotes from anne bogel:

“Every reader goes through this rite of passage that transitions from having books chosen for us to choosing books for ourselves.” – Anne Bogel #3bookspodcast

“If my real life reminds me of something I read in a book, I am reading well and I am probably living well too.” – Anne Bogel #3bookspodcast

“Shakespeare said ‘the eyes are windows to the soul,’ but we readers know one’s bookshelves reveal just as much.” – Anne Bogel #3bookspodcast

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Chapter 56: Kate the Therapist on navigating knotty natures to nurture our needs

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I miss walking into stores.

I miss walking into stores the way stores were stores before the pandemic.

I miss the act of mindlessly browsing. I miss getting to know a shopkeeper. I miss idly chatting with strangers. I admit it! I miss the way it used to be.

A couple of years ago, as I was walking around Toronto, a store caught my eye.

There was a big sign outside that read Hard Feelings, and in the window there were a number of books I liked—books by Brené Brown, Susan Cain, Allie Brosch, etc — and several I knew nothing about.

I noticed all the books were on the topic of mental health.

I walked inside and met up with a woman named Kate Scowen.

Kate is from Montreal, and she spent her formative years reading books that explored all kinds of feelings. She ended up getting three (!) degrees in Social Policy and Planning, Social Work, and English, but she always wanted to do more!

Why?

Because she wanted to create one of the first stores targeted specifically around mental health.

Yes, a store targeted to mental health. Curated books, candles, eye masks, wheels of emotion. And with accessible, incredible low cost therapy in the back!

Over the next few years I developed a great relationship with Kate. I believe her idea is revolutionary and indeed it is being used as a prototype around the world already.

Today we sit at the back of the shop and discuss topics like:

  • What is therapy?

  • How do you find a therapist?

  • How do we navigate the system?

  • What are ‘hard feelings’?

  • How do we be more honest with our children?

  • How do we create a chosen family?

  • What are the core six emotions?

  • And, of course, what are Kate Scowen’s three most formative books?

Listen in to this episode of 3 Books to hear from the incredible Kate Scowen.

Let’s go!

What You'll Learn:

  • What is therapy?

  • How do you find a therapist?

  • How do we navigate the system?

  • What are ‘hard feelings’?

  • How do we be honest with our children?

  • How do we create our chosen family?

  • What are the core six emotions?

  • How do we practice self-care?

  • And much, much more…

notable quotes from kate scowen:

“We are a community of counselors, providing low-cost service to people who have limited capacity to pay.” – Kate Scowen #3bookspodcast

“We are not alone in our desire to be alone.” – Kate Scowen #3bookspodcast

“You can’t fill the void with Amazon.” – Kate Scowen #3bookspodcast

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Chapter 55: Brad Montague on fighting fear by forging fantastical futures

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I kind of believe that way down deep in our stomachs there’s this tranquil little pond of peacefulness that is where we want to live. It’s that part of us that knows for sure that these days are short, life is precious, everything is fleeting, and like these little relationships we have - with a podcast, with our mothers, with our sisters, with our lovers - these relationships are life.

Sure, they’re harder to measure and harder to count and harder to remember during the daily overwhelm ... but if you can tap into that pond… if you can tap into that deeper, knowing, wiser self… then it’s a better way to live.

I know for me for the past few years Brad Montague has been a bit of a guide back down to that pond inside myself. Do you know Brad? He is a wonderful human being. He created the viral Kid President videos which have been seen over 700 million times. He started a charity to get socks to homeless people, he founded the Montague Workshop, he goes on listening tours to classrooms around America asking kids want they want from grown-ups in their life, and his epic social presence is a daily source of inspiration for hundreds of thousands of people. (Check out his beautiful Instagram offering here.)

Most recently, he put his incredible wisdom down on paper into a bestselling book called Becoming Better Grown-ups: Rediscovering What Matters and Remembering How to Fly.

We’re catching up to him today from his home in Henderson, Tennessee, and discussing some pretty heavy (but important!) topics surrounding death, the pandemic, and how faith and art can co-exist.

Although these are not your typical feel-good topics, Brad’s perspective will no doubt leave you feeling refreshed and positive.

As always, when I talk to Brad, or read his books, or see his art, I am awed by how he can create chaos from the cosmos.

Getting the chance to chat with him about his three formative books was a true gift.

Let’s go!

What You'll Learn:

  • How do we talk to our kids about death?

  • How do we navigate the pandemic with children?

  • How do faith and art mix?

  • How do artists live a spiritual life?

  • What does the phrase ‘there is nothing so secular that cannot be sacred’ mean?

  • How do we create timeless art?

  • And, of course, what are Brad Montague’s 3 most formative books?

notable quotes from brad montague:

“The ordinary is extraordinary.” – Brad Montague #3bookspodcast

“Living your life creatively, instead of fearfully, is what it’s all about.” – Brad Montague #3bookspodcast

“I want to dedicate my life to things that are good and true and beautiful.” – Brad Montague #3bookspodcast

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Chapter 54: K881901 aka Emily Kim Ae Sun Hunter on twins tied together and tossed to tomorrow

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In the late 1980s outside of Seoul, South Korea, a woman got pregnant with twins. She was 18 years old, she’d had a one night stand, and she was not able, for reasons we do not know, to keep the babies, so she gave them up for adoption.

Two baby girls were born and they were given the names K881901 and K881901. Because most people who adopt babies want one baby the twins were immediately split up and put into foster homes.

For the first five months of their lives they did not know each other existed.

Eventually a couple from New Hampshire, USA wanted children with siblings and adopted both babies. K881901 and K881902 were reunited and flown over to the United States to grow up under the watchful gaze of their Italian American father and French Canadian mother in a US state that is 98% white.

K881901 was renamed Emily Kim Ae Sun Hunter and what were are about to hear is a story I got to hear live a few months ago when I gave a speech for Manulife at their first ever Global Employee Summit. Manulife is a global financial services company of over 35,000 people with a number of divisions such as John Hancock Financial.

Unfortunately I had to follow Emily onstage! She dropped the mic with her personal story, the one I’ve just started sharing with you here, which received a giant standing ovation from the audience. She talked about finding yourself, navigating your race, being a person of color where you’re always the minority, and about how we discover our identities in a world of grey.

We recorded this conversation at the Manulife Head Office in Toronto between our afternoon speech to the Western hemisphere employees and before our late-night speech to the Eastern hemisphere employees. I want to say a huge thank you to Manulife CEO Roy Gori, Director of Global Communications Brooke Tucker-Reid, and of course Emily Kim Ae Sun Hunter for helping make this conversation happen.

Let’s go!

What You'll Learn:

  • How do you react to racism?

  • How do you find yourself when you’re far from where you’re from?

  • How do you grow your career as a woman of color? (And how do you think of the spectrum between ‘submissive’ and ‘confident’?)

  • How can you find the meeting point of all your worlds?

notable quotes from emily kim ae sun hunter:

“You can’t take off your own face. It’s so obvious—you can’t hide from it.” – Emily Hunter #3bookspodcast

“We would pinch the bridge of our noses with a clothes pin to try to form a bridge because we knew we never had one.” – Emily Hunter #3bookspodcast

“90% of the time when someone says something rude to me, it’s just because they are afraid.” – Emily Hunter #3bookspodcast

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Chapter 53: Vivek Shraya is trashing traditional trans tropes

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I was browsing through a book store a few years ago when I stumbled on a small purple book called I’m Afraid of Men written by Vivek Shraya.

Hadn’t heard of the book! Hadn’t heard of Vivek Shraya! But the provocative title grabbed me so I flipped it over. What was on the back? A simple big solo statement: “And men are afraid of me.”

I opened and kept reading the jacket. Here’s what it said: “A trans artist explores how masculinity was imposed on her as a boy and continues to haunt her as a girl, and how we might reimagine gender for the twenty-first century. Vivek Shraya has good reason to be afraid. Throughout her life she has endured acts of cruelty and aggression for being too feminine as a boy and for not being feminine enough as a girl. In order to survive her childhood she had to learn how to convincingly perform masculinity. As an adult she makes daily compromises to steel herself against everything from verbal attacks to heartbreak. Now, with raw honesty, Shraya delivers an important record of the cumulative damage caused by misogyny, homophobia, and transphobia, releasing trauma from a body that has always refused to assimilate.”

Needless to say, I was intrigued. I picked up this small book and it transfixed me. It showed me a view and a lens and a perspective that I had no familiarity with and was opening my mind to a culture and people living with so much oppression. I ended up buying more of Vivek’s books, including her wonderful children's book A Boy & The Bindi. And when her traveling live memoiry stageshow How To Fail As A Pop Star visited Toronto my wife Leslie and I bought tickets and joined the giant standing ovation.

Vivek Shraya is an artist whose body of work crosses the boundaries of music, literature, visual art, theatre, and film. That bestselling book I’m Afraid of Men was her­ald­ed by Vanity Fair as “cultural rocket fuel,” and her album with Queer Songbook Orchestra, Part‑Time Woman, was nominated for the Polaris Music Prize. She is one half of the music duo Too Attached and the founder of the publishing imprint VS. Books. A six-time (!) Lambda Literary Award finalist, Vivek was a Pride Toronto Grand Marshal, was featured on The Globe and Mail’s Best Dressed list, and has received honours from The Writers’ Trust of Canada and The Publishing Triangle. And, as if that’s not enough, she’s also Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Calgary!

And now, right in the throes of her book launch for her fiction debut (!) The Subtweet, I had the pleasure of chatting with Vivek from Calgary about a slew of topics I think you’ll enjoy such as how parents can avoid snuffing out their children’s gender creativity and how we might think about using pronouns.

Vivek is able to navigate many complex topics—topics that most people are not even willing to discuss—with a comfort and clarity that shows a deep level of thinking and which is the partial product of the hardships she’s endured and navigated throughout her life. I find her and her work incredibly brave, vulnerable, and important.

I loved talking to her and hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did.

And now … let’s go!

What You'll Learn:

  • How do you conduct a virtual book tour?

  • How can parents avoid snuffing out the gender creativity in their children?

  • How did colonization induce transphobia?

  • What are the pros and cons of using labels?

  • How might we think about using pronouns?

  • What are some issues with the most common trans narratives?

  • How do we learn to see cultural lenses that we have lived with our whole lives?

  • What is an artist’s real job?

  • And, of course, what are the incredible Vivek Shraya’s 3 most formative books?

notable quotes from vivek shraya:

“There is this whole idea that you can’t love someone else until you love yourself, but for me, it’s actually the opposite that’s been true. It is by loving other brown people, loving other queer people, that I’ve learned to love myself.” – Vivek Shraya #3bookspodcast

“The biggest thing is giving your child the space to be who they are.” – Vivek Shraya #3bookspodcast

“As a culture, we should all be more open and flexible to the possibility of change.” – Vivek Shraya #3bookspodcast

CONNECT WITH Vivek:

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Chapter 52: Wagner Moura on lessons in living and loving from Latino leaders

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Wagner Moura 3 Books Neil Pasricha.jpg

We need leadership right now.

Professional sports? Paused. Olympics? Postponed. Movie theaters? Closed.

And yet we need stories to process, make sense, and inspire us more than ever before.

Community leaders, politicians, and family members are filling the void. Don’t you love the viral stories of doctors playing piano after a long shift or prime ministers doing press conferences declaring the Tooth Fairy an essential service?

We need leadership right now.

And today I want to offer you a great one.

Sérgio de Mello was a United Nations diplomat for 34 years earning awards and praise for his astounding global humanitarian efforts. He had a unique leadership style which cut through bureaucracy, clearly saw the humans behind the flags, and understood that we live in a global village and the most important way to get through tough times is by connecting our hearts.

His empathetic and hopeful story is being brought to the screen in a brand new film called Sergio by Wagner Moura, an incredibly talented actor perhaps best known for playing Pablo Escobar in Narcos.

Leslie and I absolutely loved Sergio and I was thrilled to sit down with Wagner Moura, passionate father, passionate activist, and passionate artist, to discuss many, many themes including: 

  • How do we learn to stand up for what we believe in?

  • How do we parent during quarantine?

  • How do we commit to things beyond our control?

  • How do we create art in times of crisis?

  • What do you say to your children when a president publicly denounces you?

  • How do we seek out the humble leaders without titles in our own lives?

  • And, of course, what are Wagner Moura’s three most formative books? 

I found Wagner Moura to be an incredibly beautiful soul and I think you will be inspired by the wonderful soulful offering he gives us all on 3 Books.

Listen to Chapter 52 below.

Let’s go!

What You'll Learn:

  • How do we learn to stand up for what we believe in?

  • How do we parent during quarantine?

  • How do we commit to things beyond our control?

  • How do we create art in times of crisis?

  • What do you say to your children when a president publicly denounces you?

  • How do we seek out the humble leaders without titles in our own lives?

  • And, of course, what are Wagner Moura’s three most formative books? 

notable quotes from wagner moura:

“We now can see who the real leaders are.” – Wagner Moura #3bookspodcast

“All characters I’ve played have Hamlet’s shadow over them.” – Wagner Moura #3bookspodcast

“Education in the arts is a process of not educating your brain but your soul.” – Wagner Moura #3bookspodcast

word of the chapter: 

Resources Mentioned:

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