Episodes
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2024 Rewind: Winston Churchill, Prime Minister of Perseverance
Winston Churchill was known for many things – including always looking for ways to move onward after a trial or challenge. That’s the perspective we all should hope to have when life’s crucibles knock us for a loop. When setback and failure are all-too-common companions. When we’re wrestling with our own darkest hour.
This week, as part of what we’ve dubbed our series within the show – Stories from the Book Crucible Leadership – we revisit our deep-dive conversation about what a great role model of perseverance Churchill is for all of us hoping to turn our trials into triumphs. Though he faced personal and professional crucibles all his life, Churchill rose above and moved through them by doing some critical things right: leaning into pursuits like writing and painting to calm his soul; a happy marriage he worked hard at protecting; and -- maybe most importantly – adopting a magnanimous and forgiving nature when family, friends and political opponents disrespected or outright attacked him.
“Success,” he once said (and then modeled throughout his life), “is to go from one failure to another with no loss of enthusiasm.”
To explore Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com.
Enjoy the show? Leave a review on your favorite podcast app and be sure subscribe and tell your friends and family about us.
Have a question or comment? Drop us a line at [email protected]
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2024 Rewind: Jason T. Smith's Surprising Life of Significance
We're closing out the year with a look back on a few of our most powerful episodes of the last 12 months. This week, we revisit Jason T. Smith. who thought he'd missed out on his calling to be a medical missionary, until he realized he'd been gifted a new one.
Smith's vision for being a doctor helping heal those in underserved nations came crashing down when he didn't qualify to study medicine. So instead, he pursued physiotherapy, first as a backup plan, but then with a passion for not only restoring health, but for reimagining the field.
He became founder and CEO of Australia's largest physiotherapy network, the Back in Motion Health Group. He never wanted a business, he says, yet ended up as a franchisor, with more than 140 of them supported by a team of more than 700 employees.
But that isn't the final chapter of his life of significance. He sold the businesses for $100 million to focus full time on pursuits like his Iceberg Leadership Institute, where he's mentored more than 1,000 others just like him.
To explore Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com.
Enjoy the show? Leave a review on your favorite podcast app and be sure to subscribe so you don't miss an episode.
Have a question or comment? Drop us a line at [email protected]
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Missing episodes?
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Sir Warwick Fairfax: A Man of Noble Character
It’s certainly not uncommon to hear a son talk about his father with respect, admiration and love – the way Warwick talks about his father in this week's episode. But the noble character Sir Warwick Fairfax modeled to his son has had an impact that’s birthed the business that son founded, including this podcast you’re listening to right now.
In this last episode of the year in our series within the show, STORIES FROM THE BOOK CRUCIBLE LEADERSHIP, we discuss the many ways in which Warwick’s father did the right thing no matter how hard doing the right thing was, setting an example for his boy that lives on today in the work of Beyond the Crucible.
You’ll want to listen especially closely for the surprising moment Warwick and I realize a poem his father wrote in a book he was working on before he died in 1987 planted the seeds for Warwick’s life of significance as founder of Beyond the Crucible.
To explore Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com
Enjoy the show? Leave a review on your favorite podcast app and be sure to tell your friends and family about us.
Have a question or comment? Drop us a line at [email protected]
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Make Sure Your Passion Serves Your Purpose
How do you handle your passion with care? How do you help ensure when you're off-the-charts passionate about your vision, that you don't go off the rails in pursuit of it? How do you keep that race car that is your passion on the track?
In this week's episode, Warwick and I discuss his latest blog at beyondthecrucible.com titled Why Your Passion Must Serve Your Purpose. We explore seven key truths to help you stay out of the danger zone of your passion becoming so white-hot that it hurts you and your team.
Among the insights we discuss to help you avoid creating more crucibles are being vulnerable, asking for help and being sure to channel your passion appropriately.
In short, Warwick says, "Your passion needs to serve your purpose. If it doesn't, you need to get your passion under control until it does."
To explore Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com
Enjoy the show? Leave a review on your favorite podcast app and be sure to tell your friends and family about us.
Have a question or comment? Drop us a line at [email protected]
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Building a Resilience Strategy: Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier
Relationships, including with those we call fellow travelers, are critical, we learn in this week's episode, to crafting the resilience we need to move beyond our crucibles.
Our guest this week, Dr. Marie-Helene Pelletier, is a pioneer in the field of strategic resilience. Her studies and experience have taught her that thriving through setback and failure is not a trait we manifest innately, but a skill we must build. How do we do it?
As you'll discover in her conversation with Warwick, Dr. Pelletier says the change professionals and leaders need to make is to approach their resilience the same way they approach a successful business using a strategic plan. That's what creates helpful, sustainable, and reliable long-term resilience.
The key components to that plan, she says, include relationships, knowing what energizes you and what drains you, and leaning into your values as you consider your next action step on your journey back from trials and challenges.
To learn more about Dr. Pelletier, visit www.drmarie-helene.com
To explore Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com -
FDR: He Didn't Let Polio Derail His Calling
This week, in the latest episode of our series within the show Stories from the Book Crucible Leadership, we look at the courage, good humor and determination– both personal and political – that made Franklin Delano Roosevelt one of history’s most celebrated figures.
None of what he accomplished in the White House, we discuss here, would have been possible if Roosevelt didn’t have two critical things necessary to move beyond a crucible: a mindset shift that he wouldn’t let his polio prevent him from living an active life; and fellow travelers who helped him keep going so that he could indeed, move from private trial to public triumph.
“A smooth sea never made a skilled sailor,” Roosevelt once said --- and his life is a ringing testament to that truth we’d all be wise to remember.
To explore Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com
Enjoy the show? Leave a review on your favorite podcast app and be sure to tell your friends and family about us.
Have a question or comment? Drop us a line at [email protected] -
Seek to Win A Friend, Not an Argument
Do you find yourself, when engaging in discussions about hot-button subjects, spending more time trying to win an argument than trying to build or maintain a relationship? If so, then this episode is for you.
This week, we discuss his latest blog at beyondthecrucible.com, in which he offers seven tips for not turning a discussion of issues into an us vs. them war of words. Among the insights he offers: don’t judge the motives of people we disagree with, respect those who differ from your perspective, share the backstory behind your worldview and seek to find common ground.
“Having positive engagement with those we disagree with is possible,” Warwick says. `“Isn’t this more of what the world needs?
To explore Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com
Enjoy the show? Leave a review on your favorite podcast app and be sure to tell your friends and family about us.
Have a question or comment? Drop us a line at [email protected] -
5 Years, 5 Big Learnings
Inspiring, uplifting and so much fun. That Warwick’s summary of the milestone we celebrate on this week’s episode: the five-year anniversary – to the day, on the date this show drops – of the Beyond the Crucible podcast.
Our look back focuses on five key learnings from these past five years that have come from interviews and discussions on the show. Those insights – your worst day is your worst day, your crucible can be a gift, you can't get beyond your crucible without forgiveness, it's never too late to pursue a fresh life of significance, and knowledge is power – have become critical parts of our knowledge base for helping you move from trials to triumphs.
And you’ll also want to pay special attention at the end, when Warwick and Gary pick one episode each from among the 234 that have come before this one that we believe captures the essence of what Beyond the Crucible is all about.
To watch the Heather Kampf episode discussed in the show, click here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dgbGo6Z1Xms&list=PLLohc3aLoBACZkgOBuRE1LtBBMSqc0OOO
To listen, click here: https://podcasts.apple.com/nz/podcast/harnessing-resilience-iii-heather-kampf-82/id1484108280?i=1000534538329
To watch the two Lisa Blair episodes discussed in the show, click on these two links:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=413wO70tLuk&list=PLLohc3aLoBACZkgOBuRE1LtBBMSqc0OOO
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MC25FPb4lSA&list=PLLohc3aLoBACZkgOBuRE1LtBBMSqc0OOO
To listen, click here:
https://podcasts.apple.com/nz/podcast/lisa-blair-part-1-reframing-failure-47/id1484108280?i=1000501701291
https://podcasts.apple.com/nz/podcast/lisa-blair-part-2-how-do-i-survive-tonight-48/id1484108280?i=1000502437093
To explore other Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com
Enjoy the show? Leave a review on your favorite podcast app or You Tube and be sure to tell your friends and family about us.
Have a question or comment? Drop us a line at [email protected]
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Emotionally Paralyzed By Her Dad's Paralysis
Charis Santillie was plagued by undealt-with emotions after her father was paralyzed in a hot-air balloon crash when she was just 19 years old. The accident’s aftermath left her a workaholic, allowing her to live the illusion of safety and control.
It was only after meeting a coach who asked her why she was suffering from emotional paralysis that Santillie emerged from her self-imposed shackles to help others emerge from theirs. As a certified Fearless Living coach, she now specializes in guiding successful entrepreneurial men to become the Chief Emotional Officers™ of their lives as they face personal and professional transitions.
The insights she offers her clients, she says, have helped her continue her own healing journey.
To explore Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com
Enjoy the show? Leave a review on your favorite podcast app and be sure to tell your friends and family about us.
Have a question or comment? Drop us a line at [email protected]
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Horatio Nelson: Naval Hero, Leadership Icon
Confident. Calm. Decisive. A man of sound judgement. That’s Lord Horatio Nelson, one of the most celebrated military leaders in British history. He was a hero of Warwick’s growing up, who’s become an example of someone with the personal character and interpersonal skills that can benefit all of us as we navigate our journey to lives of significance.
This week, in the eighth installment of our series within the show -- STORIES FROM THE BOOK CRUCIBLE LEADERSHIP -- we discuss what made Nelson a brilliant and beloved leader and the lessons we all can learn from him about motivating and mobilizing teams to achieve a critical goal.
We also unpack the details of the two defining battles in Nelson’s naval career: The Battle of the Nile and the Battle of Trafalgar. The first one made Nelson a national hero. The second made him an icon for the ages.
“Living your values, living your beliefs, is absolutely key to living a life of significance,” Warwick says. "And that’s what Nelson did.”
To explore Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com
Enjoy the show? Leave a review on your favorite podcast app and be sure to tell your friends and family about us.
Have a question or comment? Drop us a line at [email protected] -
How to Avoid a Professional Identity Crisis
Remembering you’re more than your worst day and less than your best day is just one of the nuggets of wisdom we discuss this week in our examination of Warwick’s latest blog at beyondthecrucible.com about the truths that will help you avoid a professional identity crisis.
Among the points from his blog Warwick and I discuss are the need to do some serious self-examination and self-reflection; asking others for help if you feel like your identity is wrapped up in what you do, and making sure you’re tackling the soul work that will help you keep your identity in an emotionally healthy balance.
Along the way, we also discuss the inspiration for the blog, which came from two recent podcast guests … and Warwick’s own struggles with his professional identity and how he’s moved beyond them.
To explore Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com
Enjoy the show? Leave a review on your favorite podcast app and be sure to tell your friends and family about us.
Have a question or comment? Drop us a line at [email protected] -
Leaning Into Her Own Homelessness to Help Other Women Escape Theirs: Leanna Fairfax
Leanna Fairfax, a distant relative of Warwick's, talks about her rough early years – homeless at 15 and off-and-off again through the years after that, in an abusive relationship, plagued by the gnawing feeling that she would always live her life on the margins. But that’s just the start of Leanna Fairfax’s journey.
Leanna traced her ancestry to John Fairfax, Warwick's great-great grandfather, the founder of the family media empire Warwick lost in a failed takeover bid that led to his life's greatest crucible. She tracked Warwick down on LinkedIn – discovering that the details of his crucible and John Fairfax's life of perseverance helped her make sense of how she was able to persevere through her setbacks and trials.
What has her perseverance looked like? Going to college after dropping out of high school, earning top marks while getting her bachelor’s and master’s degrees, and now pursuing her PhD studying women going through the same crucibles she did.
Her focus is on researching homeless women living in temporary accommodations, which will not only help improve their lives but has also helped her learn things she didn’t know or feel when she herself was homeless.
To explore Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com.
Enjoy the show? Leave a review on your favorite podcast app and be sure to tell your friends and family about us.
Have a question or comment? Drop us a line at [email protected]
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His Dreams of Being a Doctor Dashed, He Found a New Calling Running a Physiotherapy Business: Jason T. Smith
Jason T Smith thought he'd missed out on his calling to be a medical missionary, until he realized he'd been gifted a new one. Smith's vision for being a doctor helping heal those in underserved nations came crashing down when he didn't qualify to study medicine. So instead, he pursued physiotherapy, first as a backup plan, but then with a passion for not only restoring health, but for reimagining the field.
He became founder and CEO of Australia's largest physiotherapy network, the Back in Motion Health Group. He never wanted a business, he says, yet ended up as a franchisor, with more than 140 of them supported by a team of more than 700 employees.
But that isn't the final chapter of his life of significance. He sold the businesses for $100 million to focus full time on pursuits like his Iceberg Leadership Institute, where he's mentored more than 1000, others just like him.
To explore Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com.
Enjoy the show? Leave a review on your favorite podcast app and be sure to tell your friends and family about us.
Have a question or comment? Drop us a line at [email protected] -
From a Tin Shed to the United Nations: Stephanie Woollard
Not a handout but a hand up. That’s what our guest this week, Stephanie Woollard, just described about how she responded when did when, during a visit to Nepal, she encountered seven women living in a tiny tin shed. They were suffering from physical handicaps and from being marginalized by their society because of those challenges. And her efforts empowered them to change their own lives and to help others do the same.
Through the charity she founded, which she named 7 Women, Woollard has bettered the lives of thousands of women in Nepal. While equipping them with the power overcome their crucibles, she leaned into her strength and discovered the faith to help her overcome her own setbacks and challenges along the way – which included debilitating burnout.
“I’ve always had the desire to make a difference,” she tells Warwick. And she’s done that – as the title of her book says – from a tin shed to the United Nations.
To explore Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com.
Enjoy the show? Leave a review on your favorite podcast app and be sure to tell your friends and family about us.
Have a question or comment? Drop us a line at [email protected]
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Stories from the Book Crucible Leadership: Abraham Lincoln on the Character to Build a Team of Rivals
The best people possible. That’s who Abraham Lincoln drafted for his Cabinet during the most precipitous time in U.S. history. And most of them weren’t the biggest fans of the country’s 16th president.
This week, in the latest episode of our series within the show, STORIES FROM THE BOOK CRUCIBLE LEADERSHIP, we examine how Lincoln managed to achieve such momentous results by assembling a team of rivals.
Key to his success, Warwick explains, was Lincoln’s character and the humility that flowed from it, allowing him to surround himself with men who had what it took to help him win the civil war and end slavery … even if they didn’t much care for their boss when they started working for him.
In the end though, because of his lack of ego and his ability to forgive slights both big and small, Lincoln’s team came to view him, as one of them said, “as the best and wisest man he had ever known.”
To explore Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com.
Enjoy the show? Leave a review on your favorite podcast app and be sure to tell your friends and family about us.
Have a question or comment? Drop us a line at [email protected]
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Kind, compassionate words are life-giving to us when spoken by others after we’ve been through a crucible. And they’re also life-giving to us when we speak them to others .. a truth the main characters in the movie TOY STORY learn when their initial rivalry turns into an unlikely friendship.
This week, in the 9th and final episode of our summer series CLASSIC FILMS, CLASSIC CRUCIBLE LESSONS, we discuss the dangers of comparing our life of significance to someone else’s … and unpack why great fellow travelers don’t have to necessarily be those with whom we have a lot in common.
In the end, we discover, building each other and ourselves up rather than tearing each other and ourselves down is what allows us to say, to quote TOY STORY’S title song, "You've Got a Friend in Me."
To explore Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com.
Enjoy the show? Leave a review on your favorite podcast app and be sure to tell your friends and family about us.
Have a question or comment? Drop us a line at [email protected]
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Compassion and empathy. Two traits that help elevate Rocky Balboa out of his hardscrabble life as a small-time boxer who will need both his fists of stone and his heart of gold to escape the crucibles that have dogged him most of his life.
This week, in the eighth episode of our summer series CLASSIC FILMS, CLASSIC CRUCIBLE LESSONS, we take a look at 1976’s Oscar-winning ROCKY, both written by and starring Sylvester Stallone. The movie is a simple yet monumental achievement that explores the power a mindset shift and the support of fellow travelers can have on turning a life of aimlessness into a life of significance.
Rocky Balboa always dreamed but never really thought he’d get his shot to change the spiraling trajectory of his life … but then a chance to fight for boxing’s grandest title, and his romance with his best friend’s shy sister, gave him a vision he could believe in and the self-respect he’d never been able to muster.
To explore Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com.
Enjoy the show? Leave a review on your favorite podcast app and be sure to tell your friends and family about us.
Have a question or comment? Drop us a line at [email protected]
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Courage. It’s indispensable to our pursuit of a life of significance in the wake, and especially in the midst, of a crucible. That’s one of the key truths we unpack in our discussion of THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING, the latest movie from the American Film Institute’s Top 100 we discuss in our summer series CLASSIC FILMS, CLASSIC CRUCUBLE LESSONS.
The first movie in director Peter Jackson’s trilogy of films based on JRR Tolkien’s epic novel has at its center the most unlikely of heroes: Frodo Baggins, a Hobbit – a race of beings known for pursuing leisure more than adventure.
But when dark forces threaten to overtake the fantasy world in which the movie is set, it’s Frodo who is entrusted to carry the powerful ring of the title, not the heroic men, elves and dwarves who become his trusted fellow travelers – not to mention the wizard who becomes his mentor and guide.
And although he didn’t seek, doesn’t want and is in fact often terrified by the calling he’s inherited, Frodo finds the bravery and resolve to lead the charge to save civilization, discovering along the way that true heroes don’t need to expertly wield swords, just humbly wield character.
To explore Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com.
Enjoy the show? Leave a review on your favorite podcast app and be sure to tell your friends and family about us.
Have a question or comment? Drop us a line at [email protected] -
Classic Films, Classic Crucible Lessons VI: To Kill a Mockingbird
One person doing the right thing. That sums up succinctly TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD, the movie we discuss this week on the sixth episode of our summer series, CLASSIC FILMS, CLASSIC CRUCIBLE LESSONS.
The person who keeps doing the right thing in this movie the American Film Institute ranked at number 25 on its Top 100 list is Atticus Finch. He’s a kind, compassionate lawyer and honest, dedicated father who refuses to bend to the racial prejudices of his time and place – 1930s Alabama. In defending his client, a wrongly accused black man, he models for his children, Jem and Scout, what character that doesn’t see color looks like.
As one of his neighbors tells the children at the tragic conclusion of the trial, “Some men in this world are born to do our unpleasant jobs for us ... your father is one of them.”
That would have been an agonizing crucible for many men of the era, but for Atticus Finch it was a role he fulfilled with honor and humility that can teach us a lot about weathering our own crucible experiences.
To explore Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com
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Helping other people and having a higher purpose. That's a spot-on definition of what a life of significance is all about ... and also what IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE -- the movie we discuss on this week’s episode of our summer series -- is all about.
The movie’s become an iconic Christmas tale because, as we discuss here, it shows that when we live our lives guided by our character and values, rather than simply by the things we want, or at least think we want, we find the kind of joy and purpose self-interest can never give us.
That’s the lesson of George Bailey’s life … the kind of life that’s within our grasp when we place the needs of others ahead the desires of ourselves.
To explore Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com.
Enjoy the show? Leave a review on your favorite podcast app and be sure to tell your friends and family about us.
Have a question or comment? Drop us a line at [email protected]
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