Weirdly Helpful (formerly The Best Advice Show)

Halimi Afi Cassells is an artist, mother and gardener from Detroit. Learn more about the Free Market of Detroit here - https://www.facebook.com/freemarketofdetroitTRANSCRIPT:HALIMA: Hi, my name is Halimi Afi Cassells and I am an artist, a mother, a gardener and I'm super happy to be here.ZAK: Halima's great aunt recently turned 100. On her birthday, the family paid a visit to her house.HALIMA: And sat on her porch and talked and gave gifts and you know, just kind of hung out for about an hour outside of her house and she was like, 'You know, in a hundred years, in a lifetime, the best thing ever is to be in a circle of love. Walking away from that we all had little, teary eyes. hahaha. But, yeah, I really do think that, you know, humans are best in circles. And best meaning filling fully supported, loved but also giving insights and the ability to do more.ZAK: Inside this pandemic, when we're feeling isolated and possibly alone, this concept of being in a circle strikes me as especially poignant. Halima has figured out all sorts of ways to live and work with the circle ethos in mind. She started a literal free market in her neighborhood for the free exchange of ideas, items and info. HALIMA: You know, just kind of like an open invitation for people to give and take and participate, co-create.ZAK: She's also part of a builders and gardeners circle where members help each other out with projects that would be much harder to do solo. HALIMA: Things can just be born out of a few people's imaginations in a backyard at a barbecue. Like, 'Hey, it would be so cool if...' 'Oh yeah, what if we did this.'ZAK: Being in a circle takes some intention and organization but Halima makes it sound intoxicating. Think about the people in your life who are in your circle, or who's circle you want to be in. Maybe you'll send this episode to them and get something started. You can find us at BestAdvice.Show and we're on Instagram @bestadviceshow. Thanks for listening. Our GDPR privacy policy was updated on August 8, 2022. Visit acast.com/privacy for more information. ---Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow---Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9---Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at ZAK@bestADVICE.show---Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Charlie Harding (@charlieharding) co-hosts the podcast, Switched on Pop. To offer your own advice, call Zak @ 844-935-BEST---TRANSCRIPT:CHARLIE: It's a terrible thing but I feel like we're all in contest for each other's attention and there is an art to capturing someone's attention and respecting it. ZAK: Charlie Harding is a musician and co-host of the wonderful podcast, Switched on Pop. He's got some advice today about e-mailing and doing your best to get the attention of whomever you're writing.CHARLIE: I get way too many emails asking for things because I'm a music journalist and that means I get nearly 100 press requests a day where people are saying, like, 'hey, I would love to have x artist on your show' or I have really wonderful listeners who are like, 'hey, I have this brilliant musical idea. I'd like to share it with you. Can we discuss it?'ZAK: And what does it do to you, getting all these messages?CHARLIE: I live in a constant stat of panic. I feel a great sense of responsibility to get back to people. And it would take more than my full day to provide a meaningful response to every note that I get. ZAK: What would make your life easier in dealing with this barrage of emails?CHARLIE: Because I sometimes have to ask for things. I try to put myself in the other person's shoes and think, well, they don't have any time so how can I say something meaningful. And it basically distills down to this. If you're gonna write an email, it should be three very short paragraphs. We're talking like, six sentences total, maybe eight. And it should have a pretty clear structure.First paragraph, who are you? Why are you writing?Second paragraph is, show me that you've done extensive research about whatever your question is...that you know the work that I've done...I think especially because I make work for public consumption, I expect that you've gone and looked to see if I've actually reported on the thing already. And then third paragraph, make a very ask with a very specific question that clearly, I'm the only person that can provide the answer to that question and I feel so thoroughly ingratiated by all the research that you've done, of course I'm gonna get back to you.ZAK: And it's also reminded me that as I've been pitching a lot of people to come on this show, what I've grown to love maybe the most, is a quick no, When people can't do it, when they respond fast and say, 'thank you so much for asking but it's not gonna happen,' like that's great. I'm so grateful for a quick response.CHARLIE: Totally. No, that's for real. Being dragged along forever and ever like I did for you is probably the worst thing anyone can do. hahah.ZAK: It wasn't forever and ever.CHARLIE: But here's the thing is like, like, the reason why this is actually an important matter is that we all just need to be freed from the constraints of our barrage of communication and had everybody else been writing me nice, effective, brief emails like yours then I would actually get to them all much more timely. hahaha. ZAK: Yeah, and now maybe they will. CHARLIE: I hope so. hahah.Charlie Harding podcasts and responds to emails from Los Angeles, California. ZAK: Do you have some advice that might save us some time or energy? I would love to hear it. Let me know by calling our hotline 844-935-BEST. Our GDPR privacy policy was updated on August 8, 2022. Visit acast.com/privacy for more information. ---Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow---Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9---Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at ZAK@bestADVICE.show---Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Veronica Simmonds (@VeeSimmonds) is a radio producer and audio artist based in Toronto, Canada.To offer your own advice, call Zak @ 844-935-BEST---TRANSCRIPT: VERONICA: I feel like I'm often repeating the advice of my father to people cause he has all these cute, little, one-off, one-sentence advice pieces. And I actually feel like the one that I say to people the most is, 'shoulds are the shits.' So whenever anyone is saying like, 'I should call this person' or 'I really should have made that application' or like 'Oh, I should go visit my great aunt.'So first of all, maybe you just shouldn't be doing things that you only are doing out of obligation. Like, you should only do things that you like, genuinely care about and genuinely want to do. So that's the one thing, don't just do it out obligation and then there's this other thing that's like, if there's something you really want to do, don't let it fester in should land. Just go and do it. Don't wait around. Don't let it be a should that's sitting on your should shelf. Just go make it happen.ZAK: Yeah, because shoulds piled up just do become this kind of foggy clutter and I feel like it is a a kind of clarifying expression. It's like do it, or don't do it and if you don't do it, don't have these regrets about it.VERONICA: Oh yeah, and I feel like you'll do such a better job and I feel like in these very transformative and uncertain and intense times that we're going through, there's so many different lanes that people can be in to make things happen and make change happen and I just feel like recognizing what are you actual capacities and what you actually can do with energy and sustainably. Like I think like really paying attention to that is gonna be so important going forward. ZAK: Rather than like doing the rote social media thing that you see other people doing, or? Yeah, like just reading all the memes and feeling like this meme is telling me I should do this, I should do this, I should do this. Yeah, you have capacities. You have skills and you have things to offer. But like, tap into the ones that make sense for you as opposed to shoulding yourself in a corner. Actually I think that can be really immobilizing is to feel like there is so much that should be done and you can't do it. I'm Veronica Simmonds and I'm a radio producer and audio artist based in Toronto.ZAK: You've been listening to The Best Advice Show. I want to hear your advice. Give me a call at 844-935-BEST. But don't call because you feel like you should do it. Call because you really, really wanna. Our GDPR privacy policy was updated on August 8, 2022. Visit acast.com/privacy for more information. ---Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow---Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9---Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at ZAK@bestADVICE.show---Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Michael Strausz is an associate professor of political science at Texas Christian University.To offer your own advice, call Zak @ 844-935-BEST.TRANSCRIPT:ZAK: One thing I really miss from pre-COVID days is hosting dinner parties. One day, I hope soon, we're going to get back to that point where we can safely invite people into our house, but until then we can dream about dinner parties and what we want to make, and we can learn how to be most prepared to host dinner parties.ZAK: Today, cousin Mike, we're going to talk about meal planning, right?MICHAEL: Yes. Specifically for a big group. So I think the place to start is the people. You need to think about who you have coming over. If they have allergies, if they have strong preferences, if they're not a very adventurous group. This is, it goes back to my years doing high school debate when you'd always think about judge adaptation, you'd want to make an argument that would appeal to the judge that you were debating for. It's like the same kind of thing with food. Yeah. So, audience adaptation. So then, then the second thing you do... try to pick a main dish that's going to appeal to the largest number of your guests as possible. It might not be possible to appeal to everyone. If there's some people, you know that they can't eat it for allergies, then you want to make something really good for them as one of the side dishes.Make a grocery list. And then ideally you want to try to make a plan that's not like, okay, I'm going to make this dish. Then I'm going to make this dish. Then I'm gonna make this dish, but that's allowing you to work on multiple dishes at once. So you want to look at all the steps, then all the different recipes and try to think, okay, while, this is warming up. I'm going to do this. You kind of integrate the steps. And often, you know, when I'm cooking, I'll make a list that will include things like, you know, get the oven heating up, set the table, and then like stir-fry the vegetables. And it incorporates things that I want to do around the house with different steps for the different dishes. So there'll be sort of a master list. And then I just work my way down that list. And as I do, I get the house ready and then I get all the dishes ready.ZAK: Let me ask you this. After you've put on this beautiful dinner party, do you clean up the night of, or do you wait until the next morning?MICHAEL: So I would say this is a place where, um, there are some marital differences for me. If I were living alone, I would probably do it all the next morning. But, uh, my spouse, I think, does not like to wake up to a disgusting house. So she likes to at least get a significant amount done the night before.I am Michael Strausz. I'm an associate professor of political science at Texas Christian university. And I'm the cousin to Zachary Rosen.ZAK: Thank you for listening to the Best Advice Show and Food Friday. If you're enjoying this show, please consider rating and reviewing on Apple podcasts. And if you don't listen on Apple podcasts, no big deal. Maybe you can consider sharing the show with your network. I'd really appreciate it. Talk to you soon. Our GDPR privacy policy was updated on August 8, 2022. Visit acast.com/privacy for more information. ---Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow---Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9---Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at ZAK@bestADVICE.show---Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Chase Barron (chasematthewbarron) is documenting his journey towards improved health.Chase did 100 BURPEES for 30 days. Here’s what happened. - https://youtu.be/pnqO8sh7ztcTo offer your own advice, call Zak @ 844-935-BEST---TRANSCRIPT: ZAK: When you fall down, get right back up again. In terms of advice, that one is a classic. So much so that it's pretty much lost all its meaning. But what if there was a way to truly internalize that advice? For Chase Barron, that meant doing 100 burpees a day for 30 days in a row.CHASE: It starts from a standing position. Then you squat down, put your hands on the floor, kick your legs back, do a pushup, bring your legs back to your hands, squat upward and vertical leap. And then you're back to square one.ZAK: But essentially, all a burpee is, is falling down and getting back up. CHASE: There are great lessons to be found in so many body weight plyometric movements, but it just so happened that the burpee is this relentless process of falling down and getting back up. And you know, this kicks around in your head for a total of 3000 repetitions of the burpee throughout the month.ZAK: What kicks her out in your head exactly? CHASE: Just that mantra of fall down, get back up is kind of what my brain would tag onto as I kept doing them. Like, it's kind of the thing that kept me going. Obviously there was a little bit of counting in the background too, but every time I did the repetition, it was just kinda like fall down, get back up, fall down, get back up. And at first it's just like, fall down and get back up, fall down, get back up, fall down, get back up. And then, you know, two weeks later it's like taking on this whole new metaphorical meaning where I'm like, yeah, fall down, but get back up! And it, it has a much different connotation when you stop thinking about it like a cue for the exercise and you think about it more like a cue for your entire life. ZAK: Chase made a really entertaining video chronicling his burpee challenge. I put a link in our show notes.What's your 30 day burpee challenge? That daily task that's going to get you back on the up and up. Maybe it's literally doing 100 burpees a day. Maybe it's making your bed every morning, whatever you decide. Let me know at best advice dot show. Our GDPR privacy policy was updated on August 8, 2022. Visit acast.com/privacy for more information. ---Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow---Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9---Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at ZAK@bestADVICE.show---Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jo Murphy hums, works and lives in Boston, Massachusetts. To offer your own advice, call Zak @ 844-935-BEST. ---TRANSCRIPTJO: Hi my name is Jo Murphy. I'm from Boston and I work at a hospital. So I take a lot of elevators all throughout the day and my advice is to hum when you get in an elevator.I am getting on the elevator. (Begins humming). Fade under.Sometimes I guess there's the possibility that people will be slightly annoyed but I would say most of the time you get a lot of slight smiles and best case scenario, people start humming along and you sort of have the potential to create a temporary capsule of delight. ZAK: Creating temporary capsules of delight. I love that. You know what I like to do on an elevator? I like to wait until I'm alone and do some very serious dancing. And like, dance until the second the doors open up and then act like nothing was happening when someone sees me. I find that satisfying. JO: Getting off the elevator. ZAK: You've been listening to The Best Advice Show. If you want to call in and offer your own advice I would love to hear it. My number is 844-935-BEST. That's 844-935-BEST. And you can follow us on Instagram @BestAdviceShow Our GDPR privacy policy was updated on August 8, 2022. Visit acast.com/privacy for more information. ---Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow---Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9---Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at ZAK@bestADVICE.show---Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Luis is a trainer, educator and consultant. Learn more about his work @ LouKnows.com---LOU READS:The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love - bell hooksAll About Love - bell hooksEmergent Strategy - adrienne maree brownA New Earth - Eckhart TolleSacred Instructions: Indigenous Wisdom for Living Spirit-Based Change - Sherri Mitchell---TRANSCRIPT: LOU: So. my name is Luis Alejandro Tapia. I'm a son of Dominican immigrants. My pronouns are he him and you might hear some folks call me Lou!ZAK: In his job as a facilitator, Lou organizes difficult conversations.LOU: So, most recently I've been supporting conversations around consent, around accountability, around toxic masculinity, around machismo in our culture. Right? And, and really it was in response to, um, some call outs in our neighborhood. You know, our loved ones, our partners, being like, yo, like y'all gotta do something. You gotta speak up because women don't feel safe. Uh, and we, we don't feel safe around cis/het men in our neighborhood. And so this was like a voluntary reaction to like, yo, we need to do something. Let's meet.ZAK: And inside these meetings of cisgender, heterosexual men, Lou encourages the participants to think about and engage in, what he calls, the practice of truth-telling. Especially when it comes to sex and relationships.You can name your intention. Right? And you can talk about what it is that you want and talk about what it is that you'd like. Right? And do that in a conversation with a person and also hear what they want want and they like, and we don't have those conversations. Right. We kind of play this game of like, well, I'm going to try this and see if it backfires on me. Right. And at that point it's too late. Then we have to figure out like, Ooh, what are the cues and how would I know. Right? But imagine a situation where you're being honest and be like, Hey, this is, this is how I feel. This is what I would like. This is what feels good to me. This is my love language. This is what I love. And I'd love to hear from you how you feel about that. Right?ZAK: And, it's not like this is the end of romanticism, right?LOU: No, no. Because you know, that's like the thing is like, Oh, that doesn't feel right. Patriarchy, machismo tells us like, ah, that's not, that's not seduction. Like bro, like stop. Right. I think there's, there's so much more pleasure available, uh, at the other side of that conversation where it's like, Hey, are you sure you're ready for this? Are you, how far, how far do you want to go? What do you want? Because when that is a yes, it's a yes. There's no in between. And when it's a no, it's a no. Yes. No.ZAK: Lou is a great follow on Instagram. Find him @LouKnowsGood. You've been listening to the Best Advice Show. To offer your own advice, give me a call on the hotline at 844-935-BEST. And as always, if you're finding this show helpful, think about some other folks you know who might also find it helpful and send them a link, BestAdvice.show. Thanks. Our GDPR privacy policy was updated on August 8, 2022. Visit acast.com/privacy for more information. ---Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow---Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9---Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at ZAK@bestADVICE.show---Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Gretchen Rubin (@gretchenrubin) is the co-host of the Happier podcast and wrote New York Times bestsellers Outer Order, Inner Calm, The Four Tendencies, Better Than Before, and The Happiness Project.  Try the one-minute rule. - https://gretchenrubin.com/2006/12/need_a_simple_a/---TRANSCRIPT: ZAK: Gretchen Rubin has so much good and helpful advice. She's devoted her life to conveying how we can be...better. healthier. happier. She's gonna be on a bunch of episodes of this show. but i want to start with this... The 1-minute rule. GRETCHEN: Anything you can do in less than a minute, do without delay. If you can hang up your coat instead of throwing it over the chair. If you can put a document back in the folder. If you can put a dish in the dish-washer, go ahead and do it without delay. And what this does is gets rid of the scum of clutter on the surface of everyday life. And for most people outer-order does contribute to inner calm and this is a way that you can create more outer-order without spending a lot of time or energy dealing with it. You just do it as you go and so many people have told me that this is massively transformed their surroundings and really helped them, kind of get a feeling of focus and energy and productivity. Just all those little things aren't nagging at your attention all the time.ZAK: Gretchen's podcast is called happier. she wrote about the 1-minute rule on her website back in 2006. you can find the link to that piece in our shownotes. Lemme know if you start living by the one minute rule. I've been trying to do it since Gretchen first told me about it...it's really helped with my junk mail clutter. Gretchen's podcast is called Happier. She wrote about the 1-minute rule on her website back in 2006. You can find the link to that piece in our show notes. And lemme know if you start living by the one minute rule. I've been trying to do it since Gretchen first told me about it. It's really helped with my junk mail clutter.  Our GDPR privacy policy was updated on August 8, 2022. Visit acast.com/privacy for more information. ---Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow---Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9---Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at ZAK@bestADVICE.show---Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Katie is a recent college grad from Metro-Detroit. #FoodFridaySo much of this show originates with your hard-earned advice. To contribute please call me (Zak) at 844-935-BEST. Leave your name and your advice, followed by your email address in case I have any follow-up questions.Regarding your advice. I’m not particularly interested in platitudes and truisms. I’m after specific, odd, uplifting, effective, real tips from you about how you make it through your days. Our GDPR privacy policy was updated on August 8, 2022. Visit acast.com/privacy for more information. ---Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow---Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9---Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at ZAK@bestADVICE.show---Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Terry Rawls it the president of Strategic Transitions Group. So much of this show originates with your hard-earned advice. To contribute please call me (Zak) at 844-935-BEST. Leave your name and your advice, followed by your email address in case I have any follow-up questions.Regarding your advice. I’m not particularly interested in platitudes and truisms. I’m after specific, odd, uplifting, effective, real tips from you about how you make it through your days. Our GDPR privacy policy was updated on August 8, 2022. Visit acast.com/privacy for more information. ---Help Zak continue making this show by becoming a Best Advice Show Patron @ https://www.patreon.com/bestadviceshow---Fill out the TBAS listener survey to help Zak get to know you better.https://forms.gle/f1HxJ45Df4V3m2Dg9---Call Zak on the advice show hotline @ 844-935-BEST or email him a voice-memo at ZAK@bestADVICE.show---Share this episode on IG @BestAdviceShow Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices