In this episode of What is a Good Life?, Mark McCartney sits down with Jennifer Garvey Berger - author, global leadership coach, and co-founder and CEO of Cultivating Leadership - to explore one of the most honest questions a person can ask: am I actually living in alignment with what I say matters most?

Jennifer has spent decades helping leaders untangle big questions and find more courageous, compassionate ways to lead. All four of her books are Stanford University Press top sellers of the last decade. But here, she turns that same rigorous curiosity on herself.

She shares the moment she realised her deepest values - generosity and curiosity - have their own shadows. She unpacks the concept of values as polarities, why rigid adherence to a single value leaves the whole system weak, and how she learned to hold temporary certainty without pretending to have all the answers.

If you're interested in personal growth, leadership, values, conscious living, philosophy of life, intentional community, or a good life, this episode is for you.

For more from Jennifer Garvey Berger:
Company Website: www.cultivatingleadership.com
Books:
Unleash Your Complexity Genius: https://www.sup.org/books/business/unleash-your-complexity-genius
Changing on the Job: https://www.sup.org/books/business/changing-job-second-edition
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jennifer-garvey-berger-7b4a264/

For more from Mark McCartney:
Newsletter: https://www.whatisagood.life/
Website: https://www.mmcleadership.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-mccartney-14b0161b4/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/ ⁨@whatisagoodlife3875⁩

00:02 A Question Worth Following
01:31 Closing the Values Gap
04:01 When Values Cast Shadows
08:53 Generosity and Curiosity's Dark Side
13:02 Shame and the Human Condition
16:29 Learning to Take Stands
18:49 Standing for Love
23:19 Certainty at Sea
26:21 Time, Physics and Reality
33:39 Rising to Love
38:05 The Intentional Community
50:28 What Is A Good Life for Jennifer?

In this episode of What is a Good Life?, Mark McCartney sits down with Laura Beckingham - a modern mystic for turbulent times. It's a conversation that remains as grounded in the bread and butter of life as it ascends into the spiritual.

We move from asking what existence is all about through radical inclusion, Family Constellations, ancestral wisdom, the right size in relationships, grief and death, the energy of birth - and why a good life for Laura is about staying in contact with the pulse of life.

It will leave you with plenty to sit with.

Laura works one-to-one with senior execs who are dismantling the system from the inside, and with people practitioners and creatives who are doing something of the same in their own way. You can also join her in community online, for ritual and reflective practice in The Sanctum, and at The Loom.

For more from Laura Beckingham:
Website: https://spacewith-in.com/
The Sanctum: https://spacewith-in.com/category/the-sanctum/
The Loom: https://spacewith-in.com/the-loom-2026/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/laura-beckingham-109bb625/

For more from Mark McCartney:
Newsletter: https://www.whatisagood.life/
Website: https://www.mmcleadership.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-mccartney-14b0161b4/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/ ⁨@whatisagoodlife3875⁩

00:00 What Is All of This?
02:15 Born Curious
07:10 Knowing and Not Knowing
10:25 Old Wisdom, New Ways
14:50 Radical Inclusion
18:30 Do No Harm
20:45 The Right Size
25:10 Life as Attunement
28:30 Opening and Closing
34:00 In Motion and Still
40:40 The Witch and the Field
55:35 Grief, death, birth
1:01:00 What Is a Good Life?

In this episode of What is a Good Life?, Mark McCartney sits down with Dave Snowden - Founder and Chief Scientific Officer of The Cynefin Co., creator of the Cynefin Framework, and one of the most original thinkers working at the intersection of complexity science, organisational design, and human decision-making.

The conversation moves through substrate theory, complexity science, psychological safety, the dangers of homogenisation, coherent heterogeneity, Celtic identity, indigenous rights, conflict resolution in Northern Ireland, and what a good life really comes down to.

It is a beautiful mixture of thought provoking ideas and powerful lived experiences.

For more from Dave Snowden:
Website: https://thecynefin.co/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dave-snowden-2a93b/

For more from Mark McCartney:
Newsletter: https://www.whatisagood.life/
Website: https://www.mmcleadership.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-mccartney-14b0161b4/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/ ⁨@whatisagoodlife3875⁩

00:00 Substrate and What Emerges
02:37 Fed Up With Management Fads
05:54 When Ideas Come Together
07:25 Celtic Presence and Attention
10:20 The Reformation's Long Shadow
13:28 The Problem With Safety
16:38 Phase Shifts and Flipping
21:17 Changing the Granularity
24:48 Witnessing Violence
29:12 Identity as Flow
37:43 Metaphor as Intelligence
51:57 What Is a Good Life?

What if it were easy? What would you do if you weren't afraid?

This week I am joined by Dr Myriam Hadnes who shares with us two questions that have really influenced her life. We explore how passion can grow through doing rather than preceding it, why conflict in relationships can be a form of intimacy rather than a threat to it, and what it really means to act in integrity even when the cost is potentially high.

It is a beautiful conversation about communication, courage, and what it means to feel truly accepted.

Dr Myriam Hadnes is a behavioural economist, facilitator, and host of the Unprofessionalism podcast, exploring what gets lost when professionalism becomes performance. Her agency workshops.work partners with global organisations to build the conditions where people think together, speak up, and do honest work.

For more from Dr Myriam Hadnes:
Website: workshops.work
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/myriam-hadnes/

For more from Mark McCartney:
Newsletter: https://www.whatisagood.life/
Website: https://www.mmcleadership.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-mccartney-14b0161b4/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@whatisagoodlife

00:00 Two Life-Changing Questions
04:09 What If It Were Easy?
07:08 When Easy Gets Scary
09:31 Finding Meaning in Work
13:24 Teaching What You Live
19:00 Conflict Doesn't Mean Unlove
23:01 Sisyphus and the Paradox
25:30 The Radical Honesty Moment
30:35 Lessons From A Client Conflict
38:31 Walking Away With Integrity
44:55 Easy Love, Redefined
52:30 What Makes a Good Life

Robert J. Anderson joins the show for a wide-ranging conversation about purpose, intuition, shadow work, and the question that has guided his life. He talks beautifully about doubt and fear alongside grace and synchronicity, and what it takes to keep saying yes when you can't see where it's going.

Robert J. Anderson has been a pace setter in the field of Leadership Development for over 30 years. He is the Founder and Chief Knowledge Officer of Leadership Circle, and the co-author of Scaling Leadership and Mastering Leadership. Bob created the Leadership Circle Profile, a 360° assessment used by organisations worldwide to measure the effectiveness of their leaders (individually and collectively), chart a pathway for their development, and assess their progress as they develop. In 2005, the Stayer Center for Executive Education at the University of Notre Dame Mendoza College of Business awarded Bob the Partner in Innovation Award. The MEECO Leadership Institute awarded him the International Thought Leader of Distinction in 2018.

If you sense you are still not fully committing to the path you are already on, this will offer plenty of inspiration.

For more of Robert J. Anderson's work:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robert-j-anderson/
Company Website: https://leadershipcircle.com/

For more from Mark McCartney:
Newsletter: https://www.whatisagood.life/
Website: https://www.mmcleadership.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-mccartney-14b0161b4/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@whatisagoodlife
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/markcmccartney

00:00 The Guiding Question
03:30 Becoming Who I Am
07:00 Writing the Musts
11:30 Learning to Trust Intuition
16:00 Around the World Experiment
22:00 The Brennan School Years
28:00 Leadership Circle is Born
34:00 What Is Wanted Now
40:00 Unity as Foundation
47:00 The Soldier and the White Light
54:00 The Divine Elephant
1:03:00 Joy at the Bottom
1:10:00 What is a good life for Robert?

Podcast Keywords: Meaning of Life Interviews | meaning of life conversations | exploring life | big life questions | meaning of life discussions | creating a meaningful life​

What does a truly good life look like - and how do we find our way back to it?

In this episode of What is a Good Life?, Mark McCartney speaks with Ally Kingston about recovering the capacity for "right relationship": with ourselves, with nature, with community, and with something greater.

Ally is a creative strategist and facilitator, and strategy lead at non-profit Purpose Disruptors and Agency for Nature. She designs interventions to galvanise public imagination and redirect our creative skills to work in harmony with the natural world. Also passionate about holding space for grief and loss in our changing times, she has also trained as a death doula and rites of passage holder. Once an advertising and sustainability leader, and one of Forbes’ 43 People Changing Advertising for the Climate, she writes & lectures on storytelling, imagination and new conceptions of the good life.

They explore:

- What "right relationship" actually means — and why we've lost it
- Sobriety as a gateway to a fuller life
- The Artist's Way and morning pages as a daily return to self
- What four days alone in a forest teaches you about civilisation
- The imagination crisis - why our vision of the future is shrinking
- Death, grief, and why learning to let things end well matters now more than ever

If you're searching for meaning beyond consumption, or asking what it means to live well in uncertain times, this conversation is for you.

🎙️ What is a Good Life? - conversations that go to the heart of what matters.
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Leave a review if this episode resonated with you.

For more from Ally's work:
Purpose Disruptors: https://www.purposedisruptors.org/ally-kingston
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ally-kingston-75922025/

For more from Mark McCartney:
Newsletter: https://www.whatisagood.life/
Website: https://www.mmcleadership.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-mccartney-14b0161b4/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@whatisagoodlife
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/markcmccartney

00:00 How to be in right relationship?
03:45 Two Tomatoes and an Epiphany
08:25 The Word Recovery
09:45 Sobriety and the Paradigm Shift
17:02 Threads Pulling Together
21:24 Morning Pages and the Artist's Way
25:29 Four Days in the Forest
33:24 How Do I Help Things Die?
38:12 Accompanying Her Grandmother
48:30 The Shrinking Imagination
53:04 What is a Good Life?

Tags: good life, meaning, right relationship, sobriety, nature connection, death doula, climate, imagination, morning pages, the artist's way, wilderness, grief, belonging, mindfulness, purpose

Podcast Keywords: Meaning of Life Interviews | meaning of life conversations | exploring life | big life questions | meaning of life discussions | creating a meaningful life​

How do you hold on to that feeling of childlike enchantment that you remember as a kid?

In this captivating conversation, Mark sits down with Sam Lee, singer, composer, and author. We explore the nature of wonder, the role of ritual, and the significance of rite of passages and thresholds. He talks about his apprenticeship to Scottish traveller and balladeer Stanley Robertson and how that completely dismantled what he thought folk music was. We talk about songs as medicine and what it means to be their custodian, as well as being being dangerously surrounded by a dozen shepherd's dogs in the Carpathian mountains.

Sam Lee is a Mercury prize-nominated singer, composer, arranger, folksong interpreter, connecting his passion for nature and song into timeless unique ways. Collector of songs from across the British Isles & Ireland he’s also the creator of many live nature immersions including the annual sell-out Singing With Nightingales. Penguin recently published his debut novel 'The Nightingale, Notes on a songbird' telling the epic tale of this highly endangered bird. And his latest album is the critically acclaimed, Guardian 5 star and Mojo Album of the Month ‘songdreaming’. Sam is also an Ambassador for The Global Rewilding Alliance.

This conversation and Sam's stories are for anyone seeking more aliveness in this life.

For more from Sam Lee's work:
Website: https://samleesong.co.uk/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/samleesong/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/samleesong

For more from Mark McCartney:
Newsletter: https://www.whatisagood.life/
Website: https://www.mmcleadership.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-mccartney-14b0161b4/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@whatisagoodlife
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/markcmccartney

00:00 Does Wonder Ever Cease?
02:29 A Life of Proximity
05:00 The Gift of the Puffball
09:04 A Rite of Passage
17:30 On Ritual and Threshold
18:03 Bar Mitzvah to Bison Tracking
26:58 Surrounded by Shepherd's Dogs
35:10 Apprenticed to Stanley Robertson
48:30 Songs as Medicine
53:40 Walking Into Darkness
59:40 What is a Good Life?

Keywords: Meaning of Life Interviews | meaning of life conversations | exploring life | big life questions | meaning of life discussions | creating a meaningful life​

What does it mean to be fully alive?

Mark sits down with Joel Monk to explore the journey from spiritual bypassing to embodiment. They talk about dark nights of the soul, the "yum" of visceral wellbeing, trauma-informed healing, the role of grace and prayer, and what it actually means to feel safe, okay, and enough. An episode for anyone on a path of dropping deeper into their own humanity and body.

Joel Monk is the founder of Coaches Rising, one of the world’s leading platforms for transformational coaching, with a global community of more than 65,000 coaches. He is the host of the Coaches Rising Podcast and is known for his work in transformational coaching, embodiment, and human development. He has coached hundreds of entrepreneurs, CEOs, and senior executives — even a Zen master — helping high-level leaders unlock deeper presence, wiser action, and profound personal transformation.

For more from Joel Monk's work:
Company website: www.coachesrising.com
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joel-monk-33952613/
Coaches Rising Podcast: https://www.coachesrising.com/podcast/

For more from Mark McCartney:
Newsletter: https://www.whatisagood.life/
Website: https://www.mmcleadership.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-mccartney-14b0161b4/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@whatisagoodlife
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/markcmccartney

00:00 Awakening Into Full Humanity
02:00 Magic Mushrooms on the Moors
07:15 Coming Into the Body
10:20 The Yum
13:47 Clinging to Bliss
17:00 Safety, Okayness, and Intimacy
20:45 Intoxified by Life
27:42 Moving Beyond Renunciation
31:07 The Gift of Grace
38:52 Inquiring Into God
46:17 Fully Alive in Dark Times
51:37 What Is a Good Life

Keywords: Meaning of Life Interviews | meaning of life conversations | exploring life | big life questions | meaning of life discussions | creating a meaningful life​