This episode of Bri Books lifts back the curtain on how I PRODUCE/MAKE THIS PODCAST. The tools I use, how I organize show content, and all of my behind-the-scenes production processes.

Dedication: This episode is dedicated to Larry Long, father of former guest Lura. Larry uses oral history, music and art to strengthen communities and foster reconciliation--and he had questions about how to start a podcast! Who am I to stand in the way of intergenerational storytelling?!

 If you’re interested in going in-depth on how I create this podcast, I'm sharing all of my tips, secrets and resources! All in the Bri Books Podcast Newsletter.

• 2:15 - Define ‘batching” - Grouping similar tasks in order to decrease likelihood of procrastination and stress.
• 2:30 - Creating “Bri Books” requires I utilize six different batching processes. Each element must be completed and delivered in order to produce a finished product (pod). Remember, every batching process is DIFFERENT! Customize it to fit YOU!
• 3:10 - Batching #1: Reading Day
• 4:10 - Batching #2: Recording Day + Myleik Teele’s podcast wisdom on requesting time on someone’s calendar (part one, part two)
• 5:10 - Batching #3: Editing Day(s)
• • Edits A: Chop and clean audio
  • Edits B: Deep edit (identify transitions, log tape, storyboard episode)
  • Edits C: Final edits and killing my darlings  
• 5:30 - I’ll share my fave editing resources resources in the Bri Books Newsletter--join at bribookspod.com/newsletter.
• 7:30 - Batching #4: Editorial Day for writing (research, book notes, building social posts, building blog posts, building show notes)
• 8:12 - Batching #5: Launch Day (episode goes live, blog goes live, first social push, listen to the response--give the episode a moment to ‘breathe’)
• 8:40 - Batching  #6 - Analysis and Experimentation Day (devote time to ideation and monitoring content performance)
• 9:40 - A great resource to get productivity on 100% and self-judgement on 0%, check out Side Hustle Pro podcast and community (“How to start your own podcast with zero experience,” “How to push past overwhelm and get things done.”
• 10:05 -The tools used to create this podcast (more in newsletter, grab @ bribookspod.com/newsletter)
• 10:40 - Editing: Adobe Audition (via Creative Cloud, access to Photoshop and InDesign). Garageband and Audacity are also editing/ recording software options.
• 11:10 - Hosting service: Libsyn. Check out the Libsyn "The Feed" Podcast, all about podcasting!
• 11:54 - Web and social: Squarespace domain. I create most of my social assets via canva.com, and WordSwag. Tweetdeck for Twitter, Facebook for native posting, Later app for Instagram posting and curation.
• 12:50 - Microphone: Yeti from Blue Microphones
• Resources: Side Hustle Pro podcast and community; Transom.org

15:15 - How do you go about batching with your processes? Tell me at @bribookspod, always send a note to hi@bribookspod.com, and if you want a full digest infographic. bribookspod.com/newsletter.

• @BriBooksPod - Instagram
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• What are you reading?! Show and tell using #bribooks

Today’s episode is a continuation of our conversation about Sarah Knight's “Get Your Shit Together,” and features guests Amanda Yepez and Lura Long, two fans of the book In this episode, it gets real. Here’s how we’re pulling it together…and what it looks like when our “shit” is in shambles.

 If you’re interested in my post-college story, I want to let you know I’m sharing all of my tips on the post-college job search, nailing informational interviews, and more on the Bri Books Podcast Newsletter.

• 1:34 – Meet Lura and Amanda, what they do for work, and what they love
• 2:50 - Where were Amanda and Lura in life when they each read “Get Your Shit Together?”  
• 5:00 – The Chipmunk Theory: How “Alvin and the Chipmunks” is a perfect analogy for our “Get Your Shit Together” styles (Spoiler: I’m Alvin, Lura’s Alvin/Theodore hybrid, and Amanda is Simon)
• 6:00 – Simon, Alvin, and Theodore.
• 11:05 – Amanda on the struggle of getting one’s own shit together in the workplace. Tl; dr: “Worry about yourself. Mind your business.”
• 13:59: How a VERY direct question from her therapist helped Amanda notice that her shit wasn’t together
• 14:32 – Lura on the cost of committing—when you decide you’re going to do something, you must also make decisions NOT to do something else.
• 14:43 – Lura’s journey to figure out what she must do to keep herself healthy in the midst of never-ending “to-do” lists
• 15:27 – Lura on the financial costs of prioritization
• 17:15 – GAME: ‘Get Your Sip Together
• 17:33 - #1: Take a sip if you’ve decided to invest instead of spend in the last month
• 17:40 – A shout out to 401(k)’s
• 18:30 - #2: Take a sip if you’ve controlled an impulse
• 20:10 – #3: Take a sip if you’ve decided to be selfish with me-time.
• 20:35 – Lura’s all about her alone time. What’s done in this magical hour?
• 21:30 – Amanda on how “me-time” can lead to splurging…gel manicures, anyone?
• 24:45 – Thank you to @bricandles for partnering on this episode of Bri Books podcast!
• @BriBooksPod - Instagram
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• What are you reading?! Show and tell using #bribooks

Hello and welcome to Bri Books! In today’s episode, we’re talking about “Focus: The Hidden Driver of Excellence” by Daniel Goleman. Meet Paulana Lamonier, a multimedia journalist who loves to tell compelling stories.

• 2:05 - How I discovered “Focus” in a bookshop in Taipei (here’s an epi I recorded about travels to Asia.)

• 2:45 - When I finished the book on the flight, I didn’t feel bad about myself. I didn’t feel like, “I suck at focusing and this book confirmed it.” It was more, here are tools and different ways to think of focus. Don’t think of it as a single moment—it’s a muscle. It takes practice. You have to build up the muscle of focusing.”
• 3:37 - Paulana’s main takeaways from “Focus”: The importance of self-awareness
• 4:04 - How P. Diddy and Beyonce epitomize focus as a driver of excellence. “Their success isn’t built on breaking anyone down, but on edifying, improving, getting better, and focusing.”
• 4:30 - What Paulana has learned about focus from studying culture makers and how Beyonce and Diddy have mastered marrying self-awareness and focus...and how we can, too.
• 5:55 - “When you break down focus, it’s determination. Hard work. Discipline. Like you mentioned earlier, focus is a muscle. Yes, you’ll keep exercising and doing it. When you’re sore or tired of doing something, the muscle is expanding and getting bigger. Soreness is weakness leaving the body. So, when you’re feeling like you’re focusing on something, there’s gonna be times when you’ll be tired, but you have to push through that.”
• 6:40 – Daniel Goleman on focus and practice: “When practice occurs while we are focusing elsewhere the brain doesn’t rewire the necessary circuitry for that routine. Those who browse online while working out will never reach the top ranks. Paying full attention seems to boost the mind’s processing speed, strengthens synaptic connections, and expands/ creates neural networks for what we are practicing.”
• 7:39 – Goleman says, “You don’t get benefits from mechanical repetition, but by adjusting execution over and over, tweaking the system by pushing and allowing for errors at first as you increase the limit.”
• 8:26 – Let’s discuss #ComplexPleaseHirePaulana. “Complex” isn’t just a magazine. It’s a media company that focuses on culture—news, pop culture, entertainment, tech. They’re all about the culture. They were looking for anchors.
• 9:45 - Paulana lets us inside the thought process that led her to create #ComplexPleaseHirePaulana--and what came next.
• 10:15 - I’d seen that “Complex” had retweeted a man who wanted to be an intern for Chance the Rapper. His name is Hopsey. He created a website called Chancehirehopsey.com.
• 11:00 -  I added a few gifs in there (I wanted website to show my creativity and abilities and what I can bring to the table) to show I’m multifaceted and can entertain people.
• 11:15 - I bought the domain—didn’t have much money left, I had $20 to my name —I went to work, and within a week’s time I got the website done. I put a link to tweet for friends to send out.
• 11:35 - Long story short I ended up not getting the job, I felt like it was to prove to myself that, whatever you do just go 100%. It got me in the doors and it got me the audition, but it is what it is. I know that what’s for me is for me.
• 11:50 – I love what you just said! It went beyond focus as an idea/ mental state, and into focus helping you create something tangible. I think everything you’re talking about is the hard work element. That focus is a DRIVER of excellence—it’s not the be-all-end-all, but it’s the fuel you have to put into your brain and body. You put in that fuel. You focused on a goal, went all out, and finished strong. You did everything that YOU could. But you produced something out of your focus.
• 12:45 – You put yourself out there, and you put your focus out there.
• 12:40 – Paulana, the last thing I want to talk to you about tonight is hard work. For two whom college and the college years are fairly close in the rearview—we were talking before that we were in school for 18 out of 22 years, there’s a reward system of hard work wired in our brains that says, “Do the hard work, get a good job, move onto the next level.” And once you enter the professional world…
• 13:15 – Let’s talk about how we learned to work hard, even if hard work doesn’t get us gold stars.
• 13:25 – With hard work, you’ve got to accept disappointments but not dwell in it. Say, I’m gonna deal with it, but make sure you move past it. As women, we dwell in rejection and beat ourselves up. That’s what happened to me with the Compel thing—I went so hard and did it publicly! I went all out, and the fact that they told me no was like a door that shut in my face publically.
• 14:14 – But this is where the discipline comes into play. Plan A didn’t work out, what for plan B, plan C, so the train is still going on and the dream is still happening.
• 14:30 – And another thing with the site, I wanted to people that even if complex didn’t hire me, I’m gonna get a job before the end of the year. God didn’t give me this idea and I didn’t create this website for me to stay broke. Someone’s got to acknowledge that. They may not do it this month, but it’s gonna happen.
• 15:00 – You’ve gotta be so good. That’s what determines who you are—after you get rejected. That shows who you are as an individual—how do you cope with rejection and loss? Are you going to let that situation change who you are as an individual? Are you going to develop it? What do you do? How will this work out, and this is what I’m gonna do to move forward.
• 15:39 – Paulana thanks for joining me in my studio/ bedroom on this Friday night! You could be anywhere, but you’ve spent the last hour with me.

Paulana’s #bribooks: “Living Well, Spending Less: 12 Secrets of the Good Life” by Ruth Soukup

Paulana on Twitter - @itspaulana

Paulana on Instagram - @itspaulana

ComplexPleaseHirePaulana.com

If you’re interested in my post-college story, I want to let you know I’m sharing all of my tips on the post-college job search, nailing informational interviews, and more on the Bri Books Podcast Newsletter.

@BriBooksPod - Instagram

@BriBooksPod - Twitter

What are you reading?! Show and tell using #bribooks

If you’re interested in my post-college story, I want to let you know I’m sharing all of my tips on the post-college job search, nailing informational interviews, and more on the Bri Books Podcast Newsletter.

@BriBooksPod - Instagram

@BriBooksPod - Twitter

What are you reading?! Show and tell using #bribooks

• 0:00-0:15 - Hello and welcome to BrI Books podcast. Today’s episode is all about “Get Your Sh*t Together: How To Stop Worrying About What You Should Do So You Can Finish What You Need to Do and Start Doing What You Want to Do” by Sarah Knight.
• 00:22 - I’m so happy to be back in front of the mic. It’s October 1. Hello,  Q4! It feels like just yesterday we were brushing off the cold and snow in January. Andhere we are staring autumn in the face.
• 00:45 - I’m thrilled to be in front of my mic today. I had a plan for an upcoming episode, but I figured we’d do a #unplugged session instead. I recently completed the book, and I’m positive Knight has slipped into our home and read our imessages, because this book is strumming my pain with its...pages.
• 1:30 - I first encountered “Get Your Sh*t Together” in early 2017. The book existed on the periphery of my reading list for most of the year. I’d heard about Knight’s bestseller, “The Life-Changing Magic of Not Giving A F*ck.
• 2:20 - Finishing “Get Your Shit Together” left me motivated but also feeling internally empowered. I realized I have all the tools necessary to use the time, skills and energy I have in the most effective and vibrant way possible.
• 2:45 - Here’s the plan for this episode. First, we’re going to talk about what “getting your sh*t together” actually means. I find myself muttering it to myself under my breath when I’m shuffling through papers or search an email inbox. I think, “Gosh Brionna, pull it together. Wrangle your life up, because it’s out of control.”
• 3:10 - Reading this book helped me realize my “sh*t” didn't come undone in one day, so I can't expect to put it all back together in one day. Being an “adult” means strategizing, focusing on and committing to your goals. There’s a lot of mental clutter surrounding who we think we are, and the goals we ~think~ we should be setting.
• 4:00 - Sarah breaks down in “Get Your Sh*t Together” why it’s so important to STRATEGIZE, FOCUS, and COMMIT to goals tailor-made for YOU.
• 4:10 - Next, I’ll talk about my own struggles with getting my “sh*t” together, and how I’m applying new techniques from the book.
• 4:38 - First there’s strategizing: setting a goal and making a plan to achieve it in a series of chunks.
• 4:58 - This is where things get important. If you’re like me, you have a goal. Say the goal is to “Update my Linkedin”--a vague yet important task.  Instead, we getting paralyzed by procrastination and anxiety because of all the things swirling in your head (headshots, resume, connect with everyone, send out emails, etc.) See how it’s easy to psych yourself out? That’s why it’s so important to break goals into series of CHUNKS. Pick a chunk, and then focus.
• 5:55 - Focus is simply intentionally setting aside time to complete a chunk or task. This is an aspect of the professional world I’ve found myself struggling with--budgeting and allocating time realistically. I Tend to under budget those sorts of things can be fixed by understanding the series of chunks that go into task, and setting aside time to complete each chunk. If you’re like me, when you don't ocs you judge yourself and procrastinate and wonder why you ever set goal. Now time for third step. Commit.
• 7:00 - Reading “Get Your Shit Together” brought me back to a conversation hosted by Vinterlude. Vinterlude is a collection of women who host bespoke events for black women and black vendors as a method of modern political activism. I was invited by Depth and Candor host Hiwote Getaneh.
• 7:50 - At the end of the day, the main tenet is that practice is just practice. The point isn't mastery at the end of the session. It’s to strategize, focus, and commit on movement and improvement.
• 8:15 - I’ve shared my struggles with you, now i'm gonna tell you how i’m trying to get my shit together to finish the year strong. Let me know what you’re up to and how you’re doing the same. Use #brit books @bribookspod. Subscribe to Bri Books Podcast Newsletter.
• 8:52 - Brionna’s Q4 2017 theme:“Streamline, Strengthen, Fundamentals and Foundation.”
• 9:20 - “Strea: the theme is the streamline and strengthen fundamentals of my foundation.
• • Professionally, that means reading industry based books and finishing an online course
  • Personally, it means creating a sustainable volunteer schedule
  • As for the Bri Books community, my Q4 goal means staying disciplined and building processes into the Bri Books podcast foundation.
• 10:10 - The third stage is to COMMIT to set goals. I’ll be first to admit I struggle with discipline and telling myself, “no.” I’m Queen of #TreatYoSelf. But as part of streamlining and strengthening fundamentals and foundation, I’m learning that it’s not about how I feel. My procrastination may be a sign of discomfort, and discomfort comes with growth. So, instead of trying to return to a state of comfort (“Game of Thrones” marathon re-watches, anyone?!!) and when I find myself procrastinating, I say i'm not afraid of hard work. Also there’s no such thing as too hard, it’s just degrees of difficulty along an achievable continuum of goals.”
• 11:23 - Thank you for listening to this episode it was so fun doing this unplugged top of the dome style episode. Tell me what you're reading. If you’ve already read gyst, tag me using #bribooks. Of course we're at bribookspod on instagram, twitter, facebook. Bribookspod.com is where this stuff lives. I really am so grateful everyone here is listening. Have an amazing start to October 2017. Let’s get it!

Today’s episode took me to Harlem, NY to meet with and interview Tiffany Dufu, author of “Drop The Ball: Achieving More By Doing Less.” Tiffany is also Chief Leadership Officer @ Levo, a platform and community that helps millennials navigate and design careers they love. Enough about her resume! Here’s what’s going to be on her tombstone: “She got to as many women as she could.”

I discovered “Drop The Ball” via the Call Your Girlfriend podcast!  Ann Friedman interviewed Dufu in early 2017, and just like that, “Drop The Ball” was added to my summer 2017 reading list.

To an untrained eye, “Drop The Ball” on its face could be mistaken as a “Millennial How-To Live” book. And yes, I’ll be the first to admit that Tiffany’s life could be mistaken for looking like a fairytale--family and career in check, with a seemingly on-fire interior life. But as she says in the first pages of the book, “fairytales don’t cover logistics.”

In this episode, Tiffany and I talk through a couple of exercises on how to #DropTheBall in our own lives. Check out Levo League at levo.com, and follow Tiffany’s work online and on Twitter.

• 4:30 - Tiffany on her life mission: “My life’s work is advancing women and girls. That’s why I’m on the planet.”
• 4:45 - Inside Tiffany’s portfolio career--from serving as Chief Leadership Officer at Levo to serving on nonprofit boards, and learning to #DropTheBall in her own life--and not judge herself for it!
• 7:35 - Why it was so important for Tiffany that she let go of the insidious feeling of guilt associated with not being *good enough* to *all people* at *all times.*
• 7:55 - “It starts at looking at the roles we enter when we first come into our lives and experiences. Most of us, when we’re born our first role is ‘son,’ ‘daughter,’ ‘sibling.’ We become friends, students, citizens. Sometimes we become wife, mother, or father.”
• 8:25 - “For most of us, if we’re ambitious, it’s not enough to be just mother or daughter or sister--we want “good!” in front of those roles. Not just a daughter, a “good” daughter not just a friend, a “good” friend. All of those roles has an invisible job description.”
• 10:35 - On how the first step of “Drop The Ball” is tuning into the feeling of, “I’m not quite doing it all, I feel all this pressure,” and understanding that all of the expectations come from somewhere else, and they don’t begin with us.
• 10:50 - The first question Tiffany asks before helping someone #DropTheBall is, “In relationship to your role, what does a good [insert role] do?” From there, “How do you know that’s what a good [insert role] does?” You begin to notice, the answer is never us. It’s never, “I made that up,” you start with the people you aspired to be like when you grow up.
• 12:10: “The exploration of ‘why do I feel this way,’ and ‘where is this pressure coming from,’ is an important A-ha! Moment we all have to create for ourselves. It’s a humbling experience to recognize and reconcile the fact that what we feel and think are our choices, are pretty much default positions. And even though we feel we’re in the driver's seat of our lives, we’re actually living someone else’s story. But until we curate that story and create  a new job description for what it means to be a good X, we haven't done the work and will continue to be in the spiral of trying to meet other people’s expectations that aren’t our own.”
• 13:06 - Tiffany mentions in the book it’s important to  decide what matters to you--which ball to drop. What matters to you, and where can you not judge yourself too harshly? Is there are an area in which Tiffany thinks women and girls judge themselves too harshly?
• 14:00 - “We all have values that are for the mostpart noble. The problem is we attach behaviors to those values, that don’t have to be attached to them.
• 14:18 - Tiffany expresses how a chance meeting with her daughter’s piano teacher could’ve sent her into a spiral of guilt and self doubt...but instead, she stood behind knowing her value as her daughter’s mother.
• 16:40 - Tiffany’s “highest and best use: a combination of, what do I do well with very little effort?”
• 17:34 - How Tiffany evolves her idea of parenting, based on her highest and best use: “My highest and best use in raising conscious global citizens is engaging my kids in meaningful conversations each and every day.”
• 19:00 - “In reading the book, I came up with the mantra,“my humanity is not optional or a luxury.”
• 19:43 - Tiffany’s advice to recent grads on how to establish themselves as a priority
• 20:00 - “I’d encourage them to go to WITHIN! I think that before you can convince yourself to develop the discipline to go to events and the gym, it’s about learning to listen to yourself and your voice. The challenge is that there’s a voice in your head. It’s the voice of doubt that says, “We’re not enough,” “That’s so stupid.”
• 20:55 - How Tiffany’s learning to quiet the doubt in her head--named Cynthia.
• 21:40 - “The first step is getting intune with your own voice separate and part from the voice of doubt. That’s the voice that will guide you to the other go-to’s.”
• 22:45 - Tiffany’s #Bribooks:
• • “Insight,” by Tasha Eurich - “If I’d had this book as I was going through my #DropTheBall journey, I would've cut it down by 12 months.”
  • “The Power of Onlyness,” by Neila Merchant. “I’m always struck by books I complete and take action on as a result of reading it.”
  • “The Big Life,” by Ann Shoket. “I recommend it to my millennial colleagues!”

Many thanks to @podcastsincolor for being love!

If you’re interested in my post-college story, I want to let you know I’m sharing all of my tips on the post-college job search, nailing informational interviews, and more on the Bri Books Podcast Newsletter.

@BriBooksPod - Instagram

@BriBooksPod - Twitter

What are you reading?! Show and tell using #bribooks

Today’s episode is an interview with the women behind “The Swirl Suite,” a squad of women of color in the wine and spirit professionals from DC to Paris. We met via #PodcastLinkUp Twitter chat, traded wine book recommendations, and the rest is Internet history!

The book: “The Wine Savant: A Guide to the New Wine Culture” by Michael Steinberger. I picked the book up a couple of years ago while still working my first ~job~ post-college, at NBC News. The book focuses on the basics of wine through the lense of French wine culture (“viticulture”). A vacation to the Amalfi Coast changed everything for me when it came to tasting wine, and I read Steinberger’s work in between sips.

The voices you’ll hear are:

• Sarita, Vine Me Up - Instagram, Twitter
• Melissa, The Liquor Lady - Instagram, Twitter
• Tanisha, Girl Meets Glass - Instagram, Twitter
• Leslie, Vino 301 Wine Concierge - Instagram, website

SHOW NOTES

• Summerhill Bar in Brooklyn’s “bullet hole wall” “decor” x gentrification and artisanal drinking
• The Swirl Suite talk about their first jobs in the wine and liquor industry, and the moment they knew they had a future here.
• How did they find out their dream jobs even *existed*??
• They walk us through the different roles in the liquor industry--from the soil to the shelf.
• Misconceptions and myths about the wine and spirits industries

• 8:00 - On Summerhill Bar, craft beer, and gentrification.
• 10:00 - How Melissa got her first job, and why she LOVED the entry level phase of her career
• 11:10 - Tanisha’s life changing (and silly!) conversation with a winemaker
• 14:53 - Tanisha finds out she inspired Melissa to start teaching undergraduates about the spirits industry!
• 15:45 - Sarita’s chance trip to Napa changed EVERYTHING. Then she started running out of money.
• 17:00 - Sarita: “I sent an email to every winery in Maryland. There was one that had just opened, Black Ankle vineyards. I was there for five years.”
• 17:45 - The Swirl Suite breaks down the different roles in the industry--from soil to shelf.
• 19:30 - Why Leslie begged to do inventory at a premiere wine shop in DC, and what she learned
• 22:15 - The tasting room at a winery/ vineyard = “The Room Where It Happens!”
• 23:40 - Melissa knows that breweries, distilleries, and tasting rooms are great opportunities to go behind-the-scenes!
• 26:00 - How to get in the vines NOW (hint: It’s harvest time in Maryland and Virginia vineyards!)
• 28:30 - Melissa on why being open to EVERY experience in the beginning is key
• 29:00 - When it comes to wine, “Your learning doesn't stop with a book. You have to get out there where the vines are.”
• 29:35 - Staying current in your industry is a necessity. Read up on the industry news, read books, magazines and blogs, earn certifications, and join local clubs! Get OUT and TALK about wine! :)  
• 32:00 - Leslie wants you to know, “Don’t be afraid to fail. As long as you learn the lesson from it, it wasn’t a waste.”
• 33:00 - Oh, and don’t be intimidated by ANYONE in the wine and spirits industry + how to be comfortable not “knowing,”--”You’re not born knowing this stuff!”
• 35:50 - Wine isn’t elite!

What they’re reading - Melissa: Imbibe magazine, Chilled magazine x Leslie: “Forgotten Maryland Cocktails” x Tanisha: “Into Wine: An Invitation to Pleasure,” Sarita “It’s Always Seems Impossible Until It’s Done”

On today’s episode, we're talking about Game of Thrones season 7, episode 7. Thanks for listening! Subscribe on iTunes and SoundCloud. @bsvocalfry on Twitter!

If you’re interested in my post-college story, I want to let you know I’m sharing all of my tips on the post-college job search, nailing informational interviews, and more on the Bri Books Podcast Newsletter.

@BriBooksPod - Instagram

@BriBooksPod - Twitter

What are you reading?! Show and tell using #bribooks

Show Notes

• 0:23 – The title of this week’s episode was “The Dragon and the Wolf.” It was the season finale…allegedly. But this finalized nothing!
• 0:50 – We start the episode in King’s Landing—the Kings and Queens are Landing! The gang’s back together again! But, nobody wins when the family feuds.
• 1:40 – This week’s episode highlighted issues with the season’s plotlines. Tyrion’s plan all season has been to show Cersei a Whight, hoping it would activate humanity in her, and push her to fight with the North against the Whights.
• 2:09 – Let’s get into Cersei’s fashions! She mixes textures like nobody’s business! I have so many questions for the costumers! Cersei is giving me fall 2017 luxe plush crushed black velvet. Armor has been incorporated into her character’s wardrobe from season 1. Back then with the armored corset belt in season 1, to the intensification of it after Robert’s death. After a mother’s mercy, we see another full shift in her costuming. But post mother’s mercy, she’s like READY FOR THAT WAR READY FOR THAT WAR READY.
• 3:30 – This season felt like x-over fanfiction, and like they had too much money to spend. It was all pyrotechnics, live animals, and CGI.
• 3:45 – Family dynamics at plat across the board! The Clegane’s the Lannister’s. The most entertaining reunion was Tyrion and Bron!
• 5:30 – Daenerys and Jon are in King’s Landing calling for a truce with Cersei. Cersei’s ultimatum, after she experiences the terror of the Whights, calls for Jon Snow to remain neutral in the North.
• 6:00 - Cersei is trying to make Jon Snow the same offer she made Ned Stark--“Go die in your frozen wasteland and leave us alone.” Ned said no, got imprisoned, and we know how that worked out. We see the same thing happening now, the same offer being extended. Instead of saying “No,” Jon says, “No, because I’m with Daenerys Targaryen!”
• 8:00 – Meanwhile, while the male starks continuously ride south to fight the battles of others, WHO RUNS THE WORLD/ THE NORTH?! GIRLS!
• 8:22 – This was my favorite part of the episode. This was one part of the season that seemed to actually pay off.
• 8:30 - Brionna is shimmying in the studio
• 8:45 – Sansa’s talking over her thoughts with LIttlefinger regarding Arya. LIttlefinger discloses to Sansa how he manages to “have it all”—he assumes the worst, always.
• 9:35 – We’re back in King’s Landing, where Tyrion is preparing to talk 1-on-1 with his sister Cersei.
• 9:50 – Tyrion decides its time for a good ol’ fashioned heart-to-heart with his big sis. This, to me…I love when Cersei talks about family, because you get a glimpse into how deep her delusion is. I feel like her children masked that for a while. Now, she’s using the idea of a child and projecting herself into the future in order to harness herself in the now. that’s why she’s manipulating Jamie.
• 10:38 – I’m frustrated with the TV trope of impending pregnancy and the impending doom of a miscarriage. It’s happened over and over (see Downton Abbey). I’m sick of Thrones leaning on women’s sex and sexuality as a cliffhanger. Maybe that’s how Cersei is.
• 11:30 – Cersei meets up with Trion and they barter a deal. Later, Cersei emerges and says she’s going to partner with Daenerys and Jon to fight the Whightwalkers.
• 11:45 – Then Cersei reveals her master plan to Jamie! And Jamie delivers his greatest line of the series: “You made a promise!” Jamie’s in the exact same place he was at the end of season 6. Why does he continue to be surprised at Cersei’s secretive shenanigans?
• 13:05 – Eventually Jamie has enough, and he’s like, “Screw you guys, I’m going home!” This has been a long time coming for Jamie.
• 14:00 - …And then winter descends on King’s Landing. After we leave King’s Landing, Jon, Jorah and team Dany are at Dragonstone plotting next moves.
• 14:30 – It felt like an arranged military marriage—as a show of strength together, let’s present a united front.
• 15:08 – Dany and Jon decide to sail together, but not before Theon has a private conversation with Jon.
• 15:20 – This felt, again, like crossover fanfiction gone awry. In these two AUs that have never had any slash or interaction, it seems irresponsible for someone to hang their moral hat on someone else.
• 15:53 – Theon’s character arc is very weird. After he helps Sansa escape Ramsey at the end of season 5, you feel that he’s redeemed himself of most things. But then he abandons his sister!
• 16:59 – And we’re back in Winterfell, pouring one out for the homie LIttlefinger, who rode the car (wagon?) until the wheels fell off.
• 17:30 – Why is everyone so mean to Sansa?! A flashback to season 2 gives us a glimpse into how deep her survival instincts run.
• 18:45 – The Stark kids are back in the ‘Fell, and Sansa turns the tables like a G.
• 19:20 - “My sister asked you a question!” DRAG HIM!!!!
• 19:45 – Rush thinks the Sansa-Arya character arc is the strongest of the season. “A lot of times in shows like this, women are strong if they take up male characteristics like Arya. But they’re rarely strong if they take up feminine ones like Sansa. You see Arya abandoning her femininity (something she never really cared for to begin with) to become a warrior. But Sansa never abandons her femininity, but uses it and her experience as a survivor to beat LIttlefinger, the guy who had been manipulating things from the jump.
• 22:30 – MEANWHILE, AT THE WALL, THE NIGHT KING HAS A NEW WHIP! The ice-zombie dragon starts breathing ice fire…? A song of ice and fire?! The fire destroys the wall, and we see Tormund and the team running from the wall as a portion of the Wall at Eastwatch comes down and the dead come marching through.
• 23:35 – I feel like this season was rushed. Not only logistically (time, continuity), but also in terms of plot and suspended disbelief. It feels like what happens when you’re working with a live entity like high-budget primetime TV. It comes with the territory-you have a lot of money you need to spend quick fast in a hurry and BIG. The focus was “CGI! LIVE ANIMALS! PYROTECHNICS!” which are all expensive AF. There are big machines behind endeavors like this. It felt like the first half of season 7 suffered under the weight of that machine.
• 25:05 – Yes, everything felt rushed. It was a shorter season, which comes with the territory. This was a sprawling season with a lot of plotlines. But what’s upsetting is, if you watch earlier seasons of GoT (1-3) and compare to this season, it’s like night and day in terms of character dev. What made me fall in love with the show wasn’t that there were dragons and half naked women in every other scene. I can watch any show with that. It was the political intrigue, the writing, how it all felt like a chess game. Now it just seems like all the characters are stripped down and their plots are moving at warp speed to fastest possible conclusion. It feels like the writers are done with the show and have been done for a season and a half.

If you’re interested in my post-college story, I want to let you know I’m sharing all of my tips on the post-college job search, nailing informational interviews, and more on the Bri Books Podcast Newsletter.

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Editor’s Note: "Welcome to Bri Books podcast! I knew that reading Washington Post reporter Wesley Lowery’s book “They Can’t Kill Us All:Ferguson, Baltimore and a New Era in America's Racial Justice Movement” would knock me off my feet, but I wasn’t expecting that on the day this episode was recorded, (8/11/17), exactly two days to the date of Michael Brown’s murder in my hometown (Ferguson, MO), that same evening hundreds of grown men and women in Charlottesville, VA would march on a college campus in the name of white supremacy and racism. That reality is hanging over this episode, and I hope the book we discuss, “They Can’t Kill Us All,” encourages and challenges you. I can’t recommend the book enough. Let’s get into it.

 Resources: Ju-Hyun Park’s essay on thefader.com, “Love Needs Fury to Defeat Hate”

DeRay McKesson’s podcast “Pod Save The People,” “BONUS: CHARLOTTESVILLE”  

@wesleylowery – Twitter, Washington Post

 SHOW NOTES

 As I prepared to read Wesley’s book, I first read “Wars of Reconstruction” by Douglas Egerton, to remind myself of the systemic obstruction of police and black self-advocacy that immediately followed Civil War, Emancipation Proclamation and Lincoln’s assassination. The book talks about how the time post-Emancipation Proclamation was the most violent yet politically progressive time in America’s history for freed blacks, as literacy rates and involvement in political and social office grew exponentially. The inclusion of African-Americans in the Union Army definitively helped the Union clinch the war. I wanted to read “The Wars of Reconstruction: The Brief, Violent History of America’s Most Progressive Era,” by Douglas Egerton.

• 1:03 – Wesley’s first book is a reporter’s notebook of sorts, chronicling his work as a reporter dispatching from Ferguson, MO at the height of the shooting death of Mike Brown. From there he found himself flying to Cleveland, Baltimore, and too many cities to cover too many people who had become hashtags in the light of police violence and the death of black men and women at the hands of police
• 1:30 I knew Wesley’s book would knock me off my feet but I wasn’t expecting that on the day we recorded, 3 years and 2 days to the date of Brown’s death, hundreds of men and women would march on a college campus in the name of white supremacy and racism. That very real pall is hanging over this episode, and I hope our conversation encourages and challenges you.
• 2:00 – Resources: Ju-Hyun Park’s essay on thefader.com, “Love Needs Fury to Defeat Hate”
• DeRay McKesson’s podcast “Pod Save The People,” “BONUS: CHARLOTTESVILLE”
• 3:15 – This episode has special place in my heart because Ferguson is my family hometown. My mom grew up there at a time when her own mom was the first black person to live on the block. By the time my grandmother died when I was 18, there were no white people left in the entire neighborhood.
• 3:55 – Wesley thanks for being on this episode. Watching my hometown become a hashtag was interesting for me. Tell us about where you grew up.
• 4:10 – Thank you! It’s important to me, as someone who writes about places I’m not from to really listen and learn the context of those places. I was fortunate enough to spend a lot of time in STL and Ferguson before having to write about it in a longform way. I had dozens, then hundreds, of conversations that hopefully help me portray things that are accurate and right true to the people who lived the lives I’m depicting.
• 4:45 – Wesley spent his childhood in 2 places, first in a Jersey suburb until his early teens. At 13, moved to Shaker Heights, Ohio, a suburb on the East Side of Cleveland. It used to be held to be true that the East side is where blacks lived, west is where ethnic whites, Slavic, Italian, city workers, cops and firefighters on the west side. East side was where black families lived.
• “Shaker Heights was one of 2-3 cities that began instituting public school bussing before the supreme court order. It’s a hyper-progressive community, has always ben extremely diverse. I grew up in a place where we were constantly having conversations about race, racism, prejudice, stereotyping. I was in programmers as a high schooler focused on mentorship and achievement. And having tough conversations. It prepared me for the work now.”
• 6:35 – I love that your book really humanizes protestors. It adds color and dimension to their lives outside of moment they became known as protestors with capital P. what did you learn from the act of protesting, when you were reporting in Ferguson, that you brought back to newsroom in terms of how you tell stories.
• 7:02 – “One of the things I still think of a lot, that is how those of us in the media and who haven’t protested, want to subscribe and ascribe solutions/ motives to protests. Most of us who work in media have never attended a protest we were participating in. many of our decision makers like in DC have never themselves felt like this is how they’re going to petition the government.
• 7:45 – “The reality was in Ferguson, Baltimore, charlotte, Milwaukee, this was an organic overflow of pain and anger. no one was calling the residents of Ferguson saying come outside and be upset. They were looking out their window and seeing the body of a teenager and saying this is where I draw the line I deserve better for my government.
• 8:07 – “We hear of people very often who are dismissive of protest, is why don’t they why don’t they go vote? Write a letter to congressman? That type of mindset fundamentally misunderstands protests. People who take to the street do so because their government has otherwise not listened to them when they’ve petitioned them in other spaces. Protest is in many ways, a means of voicing and demanding an audience for otherwise unheard needs. I think that’s not something that those of us who often have our needs heard that people can appreciated.
• 8:50 – “There’s this deep skepticism sometimes, and we always hear these conversations, people who say, “If you want to win me over, why did you block the highway?” It fundamentally.it fundamentally misunderstands point of disobedient protests, and why they’re taking to the streets.
• 5:29 – “People aren’t taking to street to convince you in your house they’re right about something. They don’t care about you. That’s not the point of this. They’re directly communicating what the powers that oversee their government, etc., and they’re saying, you value order.
• 9:40 – Chris Hayes’ book “A Colony in the Nation” talks about this idea of order. That we, in the majority, what we care about is traffic lights that at work, busses that run on time, no traffic jam, my street being clean. In many ways, we prioritize the order of our spaces or the rights and liberties of other people. That we care about things seems peaceful and calm, and the way you made my street orderly is by stopping and frisking every black person on my street or harassing them for their music, I don’t care about that because t’s orderly. It’s my comfort.”
• 10:30 – With conversations about highway, its people saying, why would you disrupt my order with your silly concerns about your lives? You see drastic disconnect in priority. And like I said earlier, there’s a standard misunderstanding of the point of these protests.
• 11:00 – In his “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” Martin Luther King, Jr. says this isn’t about negotiating or gaining a seat at a table. It’s not about winning allies or friends. It’s about making the conditions of this political problem so untenable that it makes it impossible for the powers to be to do nothing. Not only are we upset with you, but these people who have been inconvenienced are calling your office. It’s calling you to do “something,” which means you’re gonna call and say, “what is it you really want?”
• 11:45 – “For those of us who value order, we can often underestimate the power of political disorder as a tactic.
• 11:55 – Part of the currency that helped Wesley report so deeply is that you could’ve even classmates of protestors or the young brother of any of the young boys who got killed. How did you take it from reporter’s notebook to workable manuscript?
• 12:35 – “Procedurally it started by me sitting back and looking at the first anniversary, and tracing back my previous year. Where’d I gone? Ferguson, Cleveland, New York City, Charleston, Baltimore. How did pit stops tell the story of what was going on and tell the story of what became a protest movement?
• 13:15 – “I sat down and would begin with stories I’d written from city, and grabbing.in the emails, grabbed, all the unedited feeds id sent in from protests, people I’d interviewed previously.
• 13:40 – “In one case I’d interviewed Jonathan Butler in Ferguson. I literally just man-on-the-street interviewed him. The next year, he launches hunger strike and university of Missouri. Before he was hunger strike student. I’d take all the material from take period of time, copy and paste the articles and drafts back in, and say, how do I convert this whole thing into first person? How’d I get there? I’d write it long, whittle it down, and convert it into a guide into how I did some of the reporting. I’ll be honest, I wasn’t always the most comfortable with writing in first person I’m not someone who came up writing in 1st I was always doing 3rd persons. I was hesitant to insert myself in the story that way.
• 15:00 - “In a way, especially when people don’t understand he media and literacy is low…there’s real value in showing people how we do what we do—woke up. Story happening. People don’t assume that reporting process for everything they rad anymore…I think there’s real value in walking people through these processes of how we get these stories how we see them, how we choose the story.
• 16:00 - “If I tell you how I got here, why seeing, what I was seeing, could help you understand the subjective decisions that were made. That’s part of what I was trying to do.
• 16:20 – You succeed at that. Your book knows you’re in the story but not the subject of the story. In the first chapter, you say there’s a moment when I became a thing. But you moved past it. Was that a strategic decision?
• 17:00 – “That was a purposeful decision. 2 days after arriving in Ferguson, my friend Ryan and I were arrested covering the protest. We were first of dozens of journos who would find themselves arrested. Eric holder commented on it, we became these political footballs…
• 17:35 – I knew to write this book there would be people saying you got this because fame. No, no, I helped cover Boston Marathon bombings for Boston Globe before this. Got a lot of blowback from people ho didn’t know me or work. By writing this, I wanted to dispense of my moment of fame at the very beginning. I wanted to say yes, I’m that guy, let’s deal and never talk again. This book isn’t’ about me. Its’ about all these young people and these families who lost loved ones and had been so gracious as to allow me to tell me their stories.
• 19:00 – “I really wanted to, through this book, tell the story of the young people who stepped into the streets. From someone whose covered this protest movement from close to the beginning, I find myself frustrated. I spent time talking to activist’s demonstrators, I found almost all of them to be thoughtful, intelligent, deliberate. But I’d see this caricature of many of them in the media by and large especially in conservative media….and I’d hear this from my colleagues, editors, and also my readers. And I felt frustrated. I knew all these people personally at this point, and for whatever reason, it wasn’t being communicated to a broader audience.
• 20:12 – “I’d written dozens, maybe over a hundred articles about Black Lives Matter, about protests, police shootings. And I’d still get emails from subscribers saying I don’t get this.
• 20:29 – “For me, I think that to be a reporter writer is to be a translator. I’m dispatched to a place. I’m witnessing something that’s happening. It’s my job to translate what has happened to a bunch of people who can’t be there, to explain it to them. I’m writing articles about a protest, and you send me an email saying I don’t understand what this protest is about, it means that at some point in my translation I have failed you.
• 20:52 - “So, the goal of writing a book was to say, what if I can do it in a longer form? What if I can write everything I know about this down? And if I do that someone who is genuinely interested can sit down and read all the stuff I know, see all these different people and places, and then maybe if they don’t agree with the politics of the protestors, maybe they can understand. That’s the goal of what I was doing.”
• 21:20 – I sometimes wonder, if I’d be going home…I always wonder, how would I have served that community? Would I be protestor? Organizer? Religious sense?
• 21:46 – For you, in Cleveland, do you ever wonder how, if you’d been home and been a civilian, how you would’ve voiced your frustration?
• 22:00 – “I think that’s something a lot of us think about. Is, if this happened where I live what would I do? If I’d been there what would’ve I do? There’s this feeling, every time we hear of new case, see a new video, there’s a moment where everyone simultaneously has a guttural need to do something. You watch Philando Castile video, the Eric Garner video, you say that’s wrong I want to do something about it. You hear it all the time.
• 22:40 – “I thought a lot about how if I’d made one or two different decisions in life, how I very likely would’ve been on a different side of these protests. I think of how if I’d gone student government instead of student newspaper. Or if I’d stuck with political science major instead of barely getting my journalism degree. I wonder if those would’ve changed any of these moments. And I don’t know the answer to that.
• 23:10 – “I’ve always been an inside the room at the table type. But I do wonder, had I stayed out of journalism, had I not been a writer and reporter tethered to this idea of fairness and distance (not personally involved,) if the events of the past few years would’ve been enough, for someone like me, who valued respectability politics who valued working through systems, would it have been enough for someone like me to step in the streets. I don’t completely know the answer to that, but I see a lot of people for whom it was enough, and I think I might’ve been in the same boat. I see peers and colleagues of mine. And for them, the crisis in front of them was enough to demand a new tactic.
• 24:40 – “I like to think that if I’d been in another field at another time, that would’ve been enough for me too.
• 24:50 – That said. What I like about the field I’m in is that in that moment of crisis, pain and trauma, when new names start trending and there’s a new hashtag, I have something I can do every single time. When I see Michael Brown, Jordan Edwards…I don’t have to sit in this moment of pain and trauma. I don’t have to sit here and wonder what I can do. I pick up the phone I start calling people. I start writing things down. And I start collecting the information that hopefully will allow other people to process what has happened. And empower them, to if they so desire, act and do something themselves. 25:33 - So, I think the role of the journalist and reporter is important. Especially at times when the federal government may not be so inclined to address the systemic issues that still exist in our CJS, I think it’s more important than ever for journalists to write down true things so in the future we can write down what was happening in the summer of 2014 2015 2016 2017. And that’s what I think of when I wake up wondering, I have something I can do.

On today’s episode, co-producer Rush Perez are talking about Game of Thrones season 7, episode 4. This is Bed Stuy Vocal Fry, a sister pod to Bri Books, focusing on the shows Rush and I can't stop talking about. Thanks for listening! Subscribe on iTunes and SoundCloud. @bsvocalfry on Twitter.

• 1:15 - The episode looks at 4 locations throughout kingdom, starting with King’s Landing.
• 1:30 – When we look at King’s Landing, we’ve Game of Thrones Cersei talking to a banker from Braavos. They’re the Sallie Mae of Game of Thrones. They always get their money. They’re the student loan debtors at Game of Thrones.
• 1:55 – The crown owes a lot to Iron Bank. One of the things Cersei gets to is that she’s holding on tooth and nail to the power she does possess. When she’s talking in King’s Landing to Iron Bank, she says the debt will be paid within a fortnight. She intends to pay by robbing the Tyrell's, the house she destroyed. It seems like the deal is sealed.
• 2:45 what’s up in Winterfell? Some new kids on the block in the ‘fell, aka that’s where they live.
• 3:00 – There’s constant reunions in Winterfell. Last episode we saw bran come back to Winterfell after not being there since season 2, when Theon took over.
• 3:30 – Bran last episode had a reunion with Sansa. Now it’s Arya’s turn! The scene starts with Arya on the horse, overlooking the home she hasn’t been to in six seasons. The last time she was there her entire family was still alive. Now her mom, dad, oldest brother, younger brother all dead.
• 4:00 – Arya reconnects with Sansa then Bran. It felt truly like the circle is complete they’re all back together, and so different. The scene of Arya wheeling bran as Sansa walks nearby, you realize how much life has happened to these kids. As much has changed in their short lives in the show. You get the sense things at Winterfell are closer to being better, not fixed. But everyone’s favorite creepy uncle LIttlefinger is lurking!
• 4:55 – Did you catch Bran saying “Chaos is a ladder?” it’s like, Littelfinger is SHOOK. When he realizes that Brans out of nowhere reciting this.
• 5:15 Littelfinger strikes me as a character who doesn’t’ buy into magic, White Walkers. He’s into palace intrigue, what he can manipulate. I think it’s the first time LIttlefinger realizes he’s up against something out of his control that he can’t outsmart.
• 5:45 – Bran was creeping out everyone. I think it’s because he’s become the 3-eyed-raven, he’s not Bran anymore. He’s something else, but still has bran’s memories.
• 6:00 – he’s the collective memory of the universe. He says that to Myra, in what may be the most cold-blooded scene in the series. I’m like, UGH! I was so happy the season bran was beyond the wall. Because I was like good, you’re a sour boy with a bad attitude. Like, we get it, but still! UGH! You could’ve been like, thank you…no one wanted to wheel and carry you around. It just shows you, he’s the 3-eyed-raven. I thought that he’d be like an apprentice. But now he IS the memory.
• 7:12 – it was accelerated because the original 3-eyed was killed. Whose fault? Bran’s!
• 7:25 – Cersei’s in King’s landing, the Winterfell kids have returned and they’re worse for the wear. Now in Dragonstone
• 7:30 – you have Khaleesi and Jon Snow. Daenerys is up against a wall.

• 7:55 it’s because she started the season with a strong hand. She had the Greyjoy siblings with their navy. He had the Sand Snakes. She had the Tyrells/ Highgarden, the richest house in the kingdom. She had all that, and in the course of three episodes she lost all her allies. She still has dragons and an army, but no longer any Westerosi allies.
• 8:40 the closes she has to an ally is Jon, who is only there to dig and go. He’s not trying to be anyone’s king of anyone’s kingdoms. He’s’ like, these White Walkers are in route, we should make haste.
• 9:00 Daenerys discovers a mine of dragon glass under Dragonstone. That scene felt cop-out-y, like “a world of everything we need.” Yeah, you’d think this is perfect, but what’s gonna go wrong? Everything as to this point.
• 9:30 it’s too convenient. He spent 2 episodes trying to convince Daenerys, then he shows her pictures in the cave and she’s like I believe you. Seemed too quick for a turnaround. But the plot has to move forward. Clock is ticking.
• 10:00 Daenerys decides Jon can start mining and she says she’ll fight for the north, only if Jon bends the knee.
• 10:25 – After Dany and Jon have discovery in cave and romantic tense sexual tension…it’s creepy…but Targaryen’s wed brother and sisters for centuries….
• 10:50 – after the cave discovery, Daenerys finds out from Tyrion that their plan to take Casterly Rock has failed, and the unsullied fleet has been burned by Euron Greyjoy. She finds out Yara has been taken captive, and she’s like screw y’all I Game of Thrones these dragons. I’ll go ride on them and figure things out. But her council try and talk her out of attacking king’s landing by appealing to her better nature, saying if you do this you’re just like your father who did the same.
• 11:45 – we forgot, there’s a return of a character—Theon and what remains of the Greyjoy fleet.
• 12:05 – Theon comes up on the beach, looking for Daenerys’ help to find his sister. But she’s’ gone, and he has an awkward reunion with Jon snow, which is awkward AF because Theon took Winterfell.
• 12:30 – Theon asks Jon where Daenerys is. Where is she?
• 12:45 – we circle back on the rose road, and It’s Jamie, Bron and the Tarley's, who were bannermen. Having come back from their victory in Highgarden.
• 13:00 – the Tyrrells were the richest family in the kingdom, and had the most fertile lands. They were the family that supplied the army and kingdom.
• 13:30 – an important point—Randall Tarly comes up to Jaime, says we Game of Thrones gold through city gates. What’s on the road is the food. That’s important to know because they hear something.
• 14:00 I think the noise is the sound of a thousand butterflies. AKA a Dothrak horde that they’re using as a plot device. They come out of NOWEHRE at the drop of a hat.
• 14:22 – how far is Highgarden from Dragonstone? Have they been riding horses for 2 weeks and no one knew?? Those are a ton of Dothrak. A ton of logistic questions about this show and episode.
• 15:06 – as you see the Dothrak horde—which is scary—you see the Lannister army is shook. And then…we hear a screech. And see two gigantic black wings come out.
• 15:30 – the look on Jamie’s face is the look you have when you look at your bank account and it’s low, and you see you haven’t paid your student loan payment this month. It’s like, this is gonna get much worse. Jamie looks like debt.
• 15:55 – hell breaks loose! There are flame everywhere!
• 16:00 – flames everywhere. On all surfaces—as soon as those fires come out of the dragon’s mouth, it lays waste to all the booty Cersei was literally banking on. They make a BBQ. This is a cookout now.
• 16:30 – a disturbing and interesting effect was, you saw people turn into ash. And it would like, be swept away into dust.
• 16:45 – on epis like this of Game of Thrones, I want to talk to prop masters! The horse trainer union! The guys doing pyrotechnics in the sky, it’s just so…you have to realize they’re creating a world! It’s giving me "Battle of the Bastards" vibes.
• 17:45 – my dragon sound effects! Jamie was shook.
• 17:53 –Bron runs to a caravan, and he gets the crossbow that Quiberon shows Cersei that he thinks could kill a dragon. He shoots and Daenerys dodges.
• 18:25 – Bron’s trying to hit Daenerys with crossbow. She realizes it, and goes straight towards Bron. She’s not zigging or zagging.
• 18:45 – she’s on her Rickon Stark game. Maybe they’re all related! When arrows come their way, they run towards them!
• 19:00 – he goes down but not all the way down. For a second, I’m like is this how she’s gonna die?? She gets off the dragon, tries to get arrow out of his shoulder, and then we see Jamie. And he sees the dragon down, and he sees Daenerys. all the while, Tyrion is on the sidelines watching it. Jamie is running towards Daenerys. Dany turns around, the dragon turns around and breathes a jet of fire. Bron grabs Jamie, pulls him into the river, and episode ends with Jamie drowning in the water as the screen goes to black.
• 20:20 – It’s insane. It was the craziest most intense episode I’ve watched in a long time.
• 20:30 – we haven’t seen a battle in a long time. We’ve seen a few sword-to-sword clashes, but otherwise lots of mutilations and surprise killings. But you’re seeing, this is what war looks like. As Tyrion surveys, he zeroes in on a horse on fire. It shows you war. We haven’t seen a badass war in so long. This one was so good! It gave us more dragon!
• 21:40 – we haven’t seen this much dragon action ever probably.
• 21:50 – we’ve seen it in Mereen when she was rescued and the episode where she takes out Slaver’s Bay and unleashes the dragons. But nothing like this. This was like, it was only one.
• 22:15 – wild predictions for episode 5? It’ll be near the end of first half of last season.
• 22:40 – I think that you’re gonna see Daenerys getting more assertive with Tyrion and with Varys, because they were the two telling her to be more cautious and to play it their way. She’s seeing none of Tyrion’s plans worked. It was kind of on him. The only play she did on her own worked pretty well and took out most of the Lannister army what does Cersei have? Gold but no food. What happens with Theon?
• 23:30 – I have an idea, Theon gets to king’s landing, either kills Euron or sacrifices himself for Yara. I think he’s dead before end of the season.
• 23:50 – as you were talking, I was thinking he hasn’t had his “ultimate sacrifice” redemption yet.
• 24:00 – I think what’s coming is as showdown of the Lannister kids. Once Cersei finds out Tyrion is why Jamie’s dead captured or injured…. whoa. when she finds out the role that he’s had in whatever happens to Jamie, Cersei’s gonna come after Tyrion.
• 24:55 – and Jamie just found out it wasn’t Tyrion that killed Joffrey, it was Oleanna.
• 25:10 – FMK segment!
  • Rush’s picks: Yara (MARRY), Lady Oleanna (FUCK), Myranda (KILL).
  • Brionna’s picks: Ned Stark (FUCK), Jamie (MARRY), The Mountain (pre-zombification (KILL)
• Thanks for listening! Subscribe on iTunes and SoundCloud. @bsvocalfry on Twitter.

If you’re interested in my post-college story, I want to let you know I’m sharing all of my tips on the post-college job search, nailing informational interviews, and more on the Bri Books Podcast Newsletter.

Today’s episode features Shauna Beni, Multimedia Editorial intern @ ABC News and SUNY Plattsburgh grad as we chat about our very first NABJ (National Association of Black Journalists) Career Fair and Convention experiences! Whether it’s your first time hearing that acronym or you’re a participating member, this episode will give you a tatse of the community that both Shauna and I found within the National Association of Black Journalists.

Bri Books episode feat. Benet Wilson, VP, Digital, NABJ and Aviation Expert

Shauna Beni - Instagram
Shauna’s book recommendation, courtesy Stephon Dingle, “ Make it Memorable”

• 4:14 - The National Association of Black Journalists (NABJ) is “an advocacy group established in 1975, the largest organization for journalists of color in the nation.” The annual career fair and convention is a valuable experience for recent grads to learn from industry leaders, network, and gain valuable career insights that will pay dividends later in their careers. This podcast is not in partnership with NABJ or the NABJ Career Fair and Convention in New Orleans.
• 6:35 - How Brionna met Shauna: NABJ 2016 in Washington, D.C.
• 7:00 - How Shauna helped establish a student chapter of NABJ on campus
• 8:00 - Shauna’s first impression of NABJ 16
• 9:45 - Shauna’s first impression: “When I stepped in there, it was a breath of fresh air.”
• 11:40 - Shauna’s first job out of college--expectations and realities!
• 14:30 - Stephon Dingle recommends “ Make it Memorable” by Bob Dotson
• 16:30 - Hard truths that surprised Shauna about the workplace post-college
• 19:50 - Encouragement for recent grads--”Don't be afraid! You have to take big steps in order to get where you want to get. The only two answers are yes or no, so don’t be afraid. If it’s a ‘no,’ just try elsewhere.”
  
  

If you’re interested in my post-college story, I want to let you know I’m sharing all of my tips on the post-college job search, nailing informational interviews, and more on the Bri Books Podcast Newsletter.

@BriBooksPod - Instagram

@BriBooksPod - Twitter

What are you reading?! Show and tell using #bribooks

Here's what I learned after taking three international vacations in six months! This episode is NOT sponsored by Travel Noire or #TNExperiences--I’m just sharing the love. If you’re interested in my post college story, I want to let you know I’m sharing all my tips and tricks about job interviews, informational, and way more via my Bri Books Podcast newsletter. To get this content weeks and weeks before it goes online, just sign up for bribookspod.com/ newsletter. I’m prepared to give everything away, for you to make the first or second summer out of college really pop and you hit the ground running in September. Because you’re not going back to school! That’s bribookspod.com/newsletter.

• 1:23 - Hi! Welcome to Bri Books podcast.  It’s July 2, 2017, and I’m back home after being on
  vacation. Again. I was on the Amalfi Coast in Italy for the last 7 or 8 days.
• 1:45 - I decided I wanted to do an episode that talks about the recent travel I’ve been experiencing. If you’ve consistently listened, you’ll know I spent a week in Ubud, Bali in February before going to Cuba at the top of March. I just completed my third vacation on the Amalfi Coast.
• 2:21 - The purpose of this episode is to give overview of what I’ve learned after taking 3 personal
  trips in 6 months.
• 2:30 - A bit of background--I’m not a millionaire. I have a fulltime job at ABC News as Social Media Analyst. But last year, I decided that in 2017, I wanted to force myself to confront my work anxiety by purchasing 3 TN experiences I knew I didn't want to spend another year dreaming of all the places I wanted to go. I looked up and realized I had these vacation days, and money saved, and I knew when I travelled I wanted to do it very intentionally. And travel noire is a travel company that focuses on helping travelers have very intentional vacations. Everything from personal cooking classes in Bali, to yoga in a rice paddy to taking a hike up one of the steepest paths on Amalfi Coast to surfing in Indian Ocean to understanding point of views of Afro-Cubans in Cuba, my travels have been challenging and rewarding.
• 4:15 - In this epi, I want to talk about what I’ve learned and what each of my trips have taught me about myself, and the sort of person and team member I want to be in the world.
• 4:22 - The first vacation I took was February 9-15, I went to Ubud, Bali, Indonesia. I was encouraged to take the trip because I saw a girlfriend of mine take the same vacation a year before, and I knew the first time I invested in a #TNExperiences, I wanted to go somewhere I wouldn’t go otherwise. I wanted to have a relaxing experience. So, I figured, Ubud in February, what better way to spend Valentine's Day than eat pray loving it up in Ubud.
• 5:04 - 7:02 - The story of how I missed my international flight...by 12 hours.
• 8:41- Missing my flight to Bali taught me that it’s how you respond to mistakes and uncertainty that makes experiences better or worse for yourself. I chose to respond to a mistake I’d made, instead of beating myself up and cancelling the trip, I chose to be solution oriented in that moment. And that’s carried along with me in my trips so far.
• 9:20 -  When you’re traveling and on vacation, things happen you're paying to put yourself in an unfamiliar environment. And it's more about how you respond to the mistakes that you make, that affect how you're able to roll with the punches.
• 9:35 - Bali taught me that it’s about how you respond to uncertainty and mistakes you make while travelling that shape the overall experience you have.
• 9:50-  The second #TNExperiences I invested in was Cuba. I had 9 workdays in the office before I was jetting off again, this time to Cuba. We spent 4 days in Vinales, 3 in Havana.
• 10:10 - Whether or not you’ve traveled to Cuba yourself and you're an American and that privilege is still new, odds are you've heard of someone speak of their experiences in Cuba.
• 10:25 -  As tempting as it may be to romanticize or vilify a nation experience because it’s different, traveling to Cuba taught me how to give grace to situations, and how to soothe myself
• 10:40 - I went to Cuba with Travel Noire #TNExperiences because I’d decide that the first time I went I wanted it to be intentional--not just a quick “Miami Part II trip to ride around in classic cars.”
• 11:05 - I wanted it to be education based, and I wanted to leave knowing something that I’d only learn having a first-hand experience.
• 11:22 - Not everything went the way we expected--difficulty during travel, little glitches here and there. But after a while, you have to put your preconceived notions aside and give grace to the situation, and realize it is what it is. Which was an experience like no other. Yes, there were hiccups, but that’s to be expected.
• 11:32 - Traveling to Cuba with TN taught me how to give grace to the moment when things didn’t go according to plan, by learning to soothe myself. When things are choppy and uncertain, what do you do to ground yourself?
• 12:24-  I learned how to soothe myself by reading and journaling. If I needed a moment, or wanted to take a walk, I’d take a book and journal, and even if I didn't write, having those things with me to soothe myself was grounding and humbling. I like having a book with me and starting the day with journaling and reflection.
• 13:00 - When I’m in a foreign place, that's always the first thing to slip for me. But really trying to ground myself with that everyday helped me inject a part of my faith that became a nonnegotiable this would become part of my undeniable reality, no
  matter what. It helped me learn to sooth to myself while travelling
• 13:35 – The third vacation with  is one I’m still low-key jetlagged from Amalfi Coast.
• 14:15 - What I learned while in Italy was learning how to let myself digest the moment. On the first
  full day of the TN experience trip in Italy, I broke my cellphone. From the second day onwards, I didn’t have that distraction at my fingertips. I couldn't just click around in my inbox or snapchat or Instagram or take pictures. I didn't have my headphones to slip into my own world
• 15:20 – Being in Italy taught me that disconnecting a choice we have to make. Not having tech helped me remember that, if conversation lulls, that doesn't mean pull out your phone. It means enjoy silence. Italy helped me learn when I feel powerful or powerless. Notice when I feel like my value is depending on me performing something, whether that’s on social media or trying to get attention at a dinner. Not having my phone helped me be more in tune with reading the room and the flow of conversation and community, especially with new people.
• 16:15 - I notice how often I’d go to my phone for security. It was a distraction. But, as I learned in Cuba, I made sure to always have a notebook, pen, etc. with me.
• 16:45 - Italy taught me that it’s important to lean into the discomfort especially when it comes to meeting new people and being in a new place. Not to be so concerned with appearing cool, but being open, honest with myself and my feelings.
• 17:00 -  I’m so grateful I’ve been financially blessed to be able to carry 3 international trips. The next things in my radar are all work or friend related. We’re doing duffel bags and backpacks! I’ve enjoyed what I’ve learned about myself and what I’ve learned by travelling.
• 17:50-  I recommend you check out Travel Noire! Being in touch with the trip--Instagram, email, or trips. I highly recommend it. This podcast isn’t sponsored by TN, I just know that going on these vacations has helped me deal with my workplace anxiety. My vacation days are mine. There’s nothing wrong if the world doesn't fall apart. All these trips have made that a nonnegotiable for me, and it’s made me get clearer on the work I enjoy doing, which is what I’m doing!
• 18:45 - Thank you for listening! I'll be putting photos up on @brionnajay, and also on the Instagram for @bribookspod. As always, tell me what you're reading using #bribooks on Instagram. If you’re travelling, let me know! Send an email at hi@bribookspod.com, and leave a review. Let me know what you love and how I can be of service to you. Sign up for newsletter!

The episode featuring Cyndii Johnson, "The Defining Decade"

Travel Noire links: Travel Noire site, Instagram, #TNExperiences and CEO Zim’s Instagram

Congrats, grads! A thank you to my recent grad listeners + a gift as you enter the summer of your life. Join newsletter here, for EXCLUSIVE postgrad series dedicated to post-grad life and decision making! Get the episodes WEEKS BEFORE EVERYONE ELSE by joining bribookspod.com/newsletter. This #Bribooks series is meant to be the bridge from recent grad life to early career. In this series, I’m giving it all away--my informational interview tips, what it means to network effectively, how to make informationals worth the time of the person you’re asking, and more. I’m excited to be sharing what I know, and create a challenge that encourages you to take action when it comes to preparing yourself for the post-grad life. If you want to get this content weeks ahead of everyone else, just join the newsletter! bribookspod.com/newsletter. Bri Books Pod - Instagram

What are you reading?? Let me know using hashtag #bribooks on Instagram and Twitter!

• 0:32 - I know that not everyone graduates in the same way or the same time, so I’m trying not to project a single sense of achievement onto what’s such a personal journey.

• 53: I’m a first generation college grad. I have an idea how significant graduating college can be for you and as a member of a family. That’s part of the sweetness of grad season
• 1:13 - If you’re a recent graduate listener, thanks so much for rocking with me and bringing me into your post-grad routine.

Drumroll, please…!

• 1:24: I'm starting a new series dedicated to post grad life and decision-making. Make sure you’re in on it on the beginning, by subscribing to the newsletter. bribookspod.com/newsletter. From there, I’ll send you exclusive podcast content weeks before it goes live.
• 2:00: In this project, I’m giving it all away--my informational interview tips, what it means to network effectively, how to make informational interviews worth the time of the person you’re asking, and more. I’m excited to be sharing what I know, and create a challenge that encourages you to take action when it comes to preparing yourself for the post-grad life.
• 3:15: This Bri Books series is meant to be the bridge from recent grad life to early career. I want to help you feel energized and confident, and tell you what I did in the weeks and months after graduating that taught me how to do hard work.
• 3:30: In the days and weeks after I graduated Tufts, I remember so much of my fear and anxiety coming from my job status. This podcast series is going to be a little about what I  learned then, and I’m able to metabolize now in ways that will help you bridge the gap from recent grad to early career.
• If you want to get this content weeks ahead of everyone else, just join the newsletter! bribookspod.com/newsletter. It’s a challenge, and I want you to sign up to receive podcasts, about being nicer to yourself post-grad, and seeking community while you also seek a job. Bri Books Pod - Instagram
• What are you reading?? Let me know using hashtag #bribooks on Instagram and Twitter!

Hey, soon-to-be and recent grads! You DON'T want to miss what's in store for season 3! Keep up with me (and share your good news!) by joining the Bri Books Podcast newsletter here! Subscribe using your Gmail instead of your .edu, so I know it's real :) Don't worry! Just taking a quick break, then we're back with the shenanigans. In the meantime, enjoy the best of the best of Bri Books, season 2! 

Hi guys! From BrionnaJay of Bri Books podcast and Rush Perez, we bring you @BedStuyVocalFry, a bi-weekly podcast focusing on the intersections of our fave TV shows (Game of Thrones andVEEP, among others), and professional development (who wokrs these jobs after all? What are the thoughtleaders reading and thinking about?)

We can't wait to grow with you! In the meantime, email us at hi@bribookspod.com with any and all questions, praise, notes, etc. Leggo.

Twitter - Bed Stuy Vocal Fry

Welcome to Bri Books! Today is April 17th, and I’m excited to be releasing this episode. Exactly two months ago today, I returned home from vacation in Bali. I’ve mentioned on the podcast, on social media and IRL that in 2017, I chose to go on 3 vacations with Travel Noire Experiences. The first was Bali in February—I recorded an episode of the podcast in Bali! I went to Cuba in March—and I’m so grateful I went. If you’re interested in hearing more about my time in Cuba, let me know on the @bribookspod Instagram and via social. But I’ve never told the real story about how I almost missed the trip in the first place. My trip to Bali and relationship with today’s guest (actor/ storyteller Cyndii Johnson) started with a missed flight.

Bri Books Pod - Instagram

What are you reading?? Let me know using hashtag #bribooks. 

• 0:22 - This episode is all about “The Defining Decade: Why Your Twenties Matter--And How to Make the Most of Them Now” by Meg Jay, PhD.  Today is April 17th, and I’m excited to be recording this intro. Exactly two months ago today, I returned home from vacation in Bali, Indonesia. I’ve mentioned on the podcast, on social media and IRL that in 2017, I chose to go on 3 vacations with Travel Noire Experiences. The first was Bali in February—I recorded a couple of episodes of the podcast in Bali! I went to Cuba in March—and I’m so grateful I went. If you’re interested in hearing more about my time in Cuba, let me know on the @bribookspod on Instagram and @bribookspod on Twitter. But I’ve never told the real story about how I almost missed the trip in the first place.
• 1:33 - My trip to Bali and relationship with today’s guest (Cyndii Johnson) started with a missed flight. I almost didn’t even make it on vacation. Long story short, I missed my flight by 13 hours. I thought my ticket was for Wednesday midnight, but I didn’t realize it was midnight on  Tuesday, leading into Wednesday.
• 2:00 - So, on Wednesday I was at work,excited for midnight flight go home get bag take shower prep for my flight...and then Google sends alert that my flight will be landing in 9 hours. In a moment of complete panic and shock then calm, I gathered my things, took cab form Upper West to Brooklyn, grabbed my bag, hopped into the same cab and went to Newark. I’m all the while looking on all the apps for first thing smoking out of Newark!
• 3:00 -  I get off the plane full day late to vacation, took a taxi about an hour and a half outside of Denpasar to Ubud, Bali. I’m stressed, worried I’ll be the odd person out. The first face I see is that of Cyndii Johnson--she was the Experience Designer for the trip with Travel Noire. She says, “I’m so happy you’re here--you have a massage scheduled in a half hour.” I couldn't have prayed or asked for a more welcoming end what had been trying episode. And today we’re talking about being in our 20s because duh.
• 3:51 - This epi is a bit more  more conversational than usual. I hope you enjoy the format--if you like it,  let me know by leaving a review on iTunes.
• 4:04 - Cyndii is an actor and storyteller in NYC, but she’s’ from Midwest like me. One of her survival jobs when she’s not being an AMAZING nanny and working as SoulCycle is as an Experience Designer with TN Experiences,  which is how we met
• 4:20 - “The Defining Decade” book touched Cyndii, and how a relationship a few years ago prompted her to get passport. Since then she’s been to six countries. Then we get into how “distraction is the opiate of the masses”--so here’s what we’re doing to stay focused and develop discipline--which is a practice!.
• 4: 47 I love Cyndii’s commitment to telling her story while in the thick of it.

• 4:58 - Cyndii, we met in Feb. 2016 when I arrived late for vacation. What were you doing before we met?
• 5:04: I was working a restaurant ABC Kitchen. I was a back-waiter, runner, server, maître di. I was working 40 hours a week making a lot of money but not doing anything else. I usually worked the nightshift and you want to, because when you make the most money. I'd be so exhausted from the night before I wouldn’t do anything until it was time for work at 4pm, work from 4pm to whenever, have a drink and go home to sleep.
• 5:50 - I was grinding my gears. NOt even grinding--just grinding my gears for no reason. I got accustomed to a certain lifestyle but I lost sight of everything I came here to do.
• 6;13 - “These past three years in New York flew by. I’m from Ohio, so age has a different...the timeline I gave myself when I was younger, babygirl ain’t on that timeline anymore.
• 6:45 - Yo, our age is now acceptable childbearing age. Whoa.
• 7:05 - It’s like, I have so many things I’m trying to do. I nanny which is one of my jobs. And the agency told me my girl is 8 in the 2nd grade. I had no concept of what an 8 year in 2nd grade was. I was like, do they talk?
• 7:30 - We’re both from Midwest. I think something interesting is people in NYC and transplants, is I find that we’re just one generation away from poverty. A lot of people I know in NYC are first-generation college students.
• 8:00 - “If you meet me within 5 min you’re find out I’m from Cleveland. I love, love love where I’m from. I think it makes up everything about me. And just what Cleveland stands for what happened to it. How it was this big industrial city and people flocked there for jobs and the jobs went away and everyone was like what do we do? How make this work? We didn’t go to college because we went straight here to make a life for our family and we got a home and all that's been taken away. What do you do with that? What do you stand upon?”
• 8:43 - My dad’s a steelworker. Any day he could not have a job. Detroit and Cleveland are very similar in that way.
• 8:52 - Even the way I think and speak I tell people is Midwestern. They say, ‘You're nice but southerner without accent, not country…’ I think we’re all the sum of everything that’s happened to us. Not that I’d ever go back home. It takes me going away from home to love it so much.
• 9:17 - Even though now I have a job where I make significantly less amount of money, I’m so much more happy. And not even the fact that I’m so much more happy--I value my sanity my time, my drive for my actual career over money.
• 9:40 - I’d rather be uncomfortable in one sense than uncomfortable in another. But now I waste less. I figure out what I really need. Like, once you figure out what you truly need…
• 9:55 - It’s like, I have everything I need. We live in a world of excess. Why do you need...whatever...we have more than what we could ever want, all the time. And we’re just like, ‘buy, you need, advertisement,this is what to do.’ We’ve been fed that since we were born. People’s literal jobs are making us believe we need these things that we’re trying to sell. You can go get a college degree about how to make someone believe they need the thing you have.
• 10:46 - But getting down the basics: All I truly need is food shelter love and freedom, when you get down to the nitty gritty!
• 11:00 - Yes, I want to do all these other things and travel. And you find time and space to do that. You make it important to you. But not at the sacrifice of your needs.
• 11:21 - On “The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up” - Minimalism isn’t about having only 5 shirts--it’s about having only shirts that spark joy. I’ve taken that into every aspect of my life, and I don’t do “just because” anymore.

MUSIC BREAK: Jenn Mundia

• 12:18 - It’s amazing all the things that had to go into effect for us to meet! We create life!
• 12:40 - When I got this job, I didn’t realize...I see people like flourish every week. I literally watch these life changing moments happen, and I’m able to witness it. As a storyteller, I’m like I have so much to pull from because I’ve seen so many types of people.
• 13:15 - And sometimes these (TN Experiences trips) are the things the only things people do for themselves. And look forward to this. Some may have it easy and taking these trips ain't nothing. But some of them this is a huge sacrifice. But they saw it was important to do.
• 13:30 - In this way, travel is an onward reflection of the inner transformation that’s happened. You’ve done the hard work this is the treat.
• 13:52 - I literally see it sometimes. Me and my friends, I’m like, one day they’re gonna ask in an interview do you know so and so...and I’m gonna be, like, “DO I KNOW THEM?! WE WERE IN BROOKLYN ON SUNDAYS RECORDING PODCASTS IN OUR LIVING ROOM. WE WERE IN THE TRENCHES TOGETHER! YES I KNOW THEM!!”
• 14:57 - I see it happening with my friends they’re getting show's, pilots, these huge things where everyone’s getting to know who they are. And I’m like, this is just my friend. I remember when they weren’t getting anything and they were so sad. You could’ve never told me that I’d be here.
• 15:29 - I tried to change my life so much to be this thing I wanted or thought I wanted. I tried to so hard.
• 15:40 -The relationship I was in before, they were the person who made me get a passport. My ex loved to travel, that was their thing. I ‘d never been out the country before--only family trips to Baltimore, Virginia, etc.
• 16:00 - I was like, “I want to travel,” they’re like, “Let’s do it,” I’m like “well”…. it's’ a farfetched thing to me. I never thought like doing it. And they were like, “I bought these tickets to Trinidad. You have to get your passport.” I went out of the country for the first time.
• 16:40 - And in 3 years, you’ve been to 6 countries.
• 16:55 - What blew my mind is Awkward Black Girl premiered on YouTube 4 years ago. I’ve spent 3 years in NYC and what have I done?
• 17:05 - I’m saying, your time is valuable. And once you stop messing around with that...you’re either going to stay in the same place, or not. My friend has this thing he was talking about where you could write a letter to be delivered to your future self. He wrote himself a letter for 4 months from then and he talked about all the things he was proud of himself for ding. And that kept him accountable--to know that that person in the future depended on him to do the things he needed to do.
• 17:50 - The other day I said I feel so young I don’t feel 26. But what does 26 feel like? I thought one day I'd wake up and belike this adult. But it’s the little things over time
• 18:03 - The quest for adult underwear. I was like, “I have to stop buying panties out the pack.” That’s grown shit.
• 18:26 - It’s like graduating from Ikea to West Elm--you value quality. You start investing yourself more because you also have less time. Time is an investment.
• 19:10 - In “The Defining Decade,” it’s all about how you have to choose to make a choice. And not choosing is still a choice. You choose not to choose! And people are afraid to make decisions.
• 19:37 - In 3 years Cyndii has been to 6 countries. In the book makes point that the 20s is a time when simple exposure can lead to dramatic transformation: “You can’t think your way through life. The only way to figure out what to do is do something.”
• 20:05 - There are so many things I could do that I’m good at . but at the same time I’m overwhelmed by the possibility. I’m paralyzed by the possibility of all these things. I’m like I don’t know if I want to do podcast, blog, video content. And my dad’s like,you're not gonna know until you try. So many times you make decisions based on things that haven’t even happened yet.
• 20:43 - Never tell yourself no!
• 21:05 - Cyndii  was talking to friend about budgeting, and decided that when she got her taxes back she’d pay credit card. But her friend said, “you can’t spend money you can’t have.” The Bible says “Don’t worry about tomorrow--tomorrow will worry about itself.”
• 22:02 - Never again will we be so quick to learn new thing. I think that’s at the root of everything we’re saying moving going...travel while you have the light.
• 22:15 -  We have light packages and we can do whatever we want. And I know, especially for me, that is crippling. That means I can do anything. So what do I do? So many options.
• 22:35 - I just went to Chicago and I packed a little small carry on. That was the first time I hadn’t over packed. I packed just enough for what I needed, and it felt so good!
• 23:15 - What Cyndii resonated with in “The Defining Decade” was under employment. For her fellow artists, the survival job is a necessary evil. But is Cyndii putting her time and energy into the things she came here for?

MUSIC BREAK: Jenn Mundia

• 24:10 - I think it’s about being more intentional with your life. It’s about being intentional with your time and knowing your time is valuable. Instead of frolicking letting the wind whatever flap you about, you’re being intentional, and honest with yourself.
• 23:26 - Cyndii on being intentional in relationships
• 25:00 - The strength of weak ties, and how associations give us access to something fresh. “People you don’t know can be the best bridge,and there’s no telling where that could lead.”
• 25:25 everything Cyndii got in NYC  is through someone she knew. And, in the art world where people are hiring their friends and actors they knew before, it’s like how am I supposed to break in, if everyone wants to work only with people they know? Then I realized it’s not out of a place of malice--people want to help people they know. You want to come up with your circle of people.
• 26:10 - I think career wise, friendships, it’s like you’re building bridges in your 20’s. The hard part for me is to maintain relationships. I’m good at sowing seeds, sending update emails, but when it comes to reaping, I let things die--fruit, ripen, and die. I think that this part of “The Defining Decade,” talking about weak ties and associates giving us access to something fresh--it’s not about it being lasting forever. It’s something fresh. Let people bring life into you!
• 26:48 - And don’t hang out with all the same people! It’s about showing up for your friends, too.
• 27:30 - But I think you also have to learn to show up for yourself. And when people don’t show up for you you’re like, “Oh it's fine,” because you’re not showing up for yourself. And then once you start showing up for yourself, you realize how important it is to show up for other people, and showing up for other people makes them realize they should show up for themselves.
• 28:15 - Cyndii Johnson is an ARTIST, YA’LL! From a 6th grade to 12th grade drama major to earning a degree in her craft, she’s flexing her storytelling muscles.
• 29:11 - “I call myself a storyteller. Whether directing, acting or writing, I’m telling stories. Storytelling I think is how we view world see world know what we know about the world because these stories are passed down. Stories are powerful. “Moonlight” changed the game. It's’ the  human experience reflected back to you as you realize you’re not alone. You can learn lesson watching things close to you and far away from you.
• 30:00 - Cyndii’s writing a web series and a play!
• 30:17 “The Defining Decade” says “Distraction is the opiate of the masses, and we think that by avoiding decision now, we keep all our options open for later. But not making a choice is a choice.”
• 30:33 - It’s interesting she said opiate. Isn’t heroin an opiate? It makes you drowsy, nod off, and if you stop doing it you’ll die. And I think that’s part of distraction--part of you has to die to give that up.
• 31:15 - What Cyndii’s nanny client is teaching her about distraction and discipline: “The little girl I’m babysitting, this like if you just DO these 3 things, you can play. If you put in 5 minutes of focus energy, it can be done!” And I’m like, that’s as simple to me! If you give yourself this amount of time focused energy instead of a second here there... if you just get it done, it can be done!
• 31:58 - It’s called going through it because you go through it. Not over not over, it doesn’t  go through you, you go through it! Not under, over, it doesn’t go through you, you go through it.
• 32:15 - How floating and teaching swimming is magical for Cyndii: “When I teach people to swim, I first teach them to float.  But you can only float if you let go. You have to trust that the water underneath you will support you and keep you buoyant. And it’s hard because water is so very powerful. You can drown in 2 tbsp. of water. But your body’s 70% of water. So it’s something you have to know deeply and let go of that can kill you. You have to believe it can support you. You have to lay on top of it. When people swim, I tell them, you work with the water...you cup and pull yourself through it. Everyone should learn how to swim.”
• 33:15 - “I’m not afraid of drowning because I know if anything happens, all I have to do is turn over and float.”
• 33:30 - Surfing in Bali felt meditative, like yoga. You’re working this living breathing thing.
• 33:46 - While surfing, you go under, the board you’re on could still be flipping in the air while you come up. So you have to put your hands over your head. It’s like, when you fall, the thing you fell by, even when you come out, it could still hurt you.
• 34:05 - Bloom where you’re planted….it’s 2017, we’re 26, live in Brooklyn, you know brionna and you both have passports and you’re living your life. And you’re creating your life.

Find Cyndii on Instagram at @cyndiiluwho

Meet Evette Dionne, a black feminist culture writer, editor and scholar based in New York City. On today’s episode, we’re talking about Shonda Rhimes’s “Year of Yes,” a book both Evette and I both found both freeing and challenging. We dig into how we’re both wading through anxiety a la Shonda, and moments when Evette has said ‘YES!’ to herself, her writing, and her love. Speaking of love--if you’re loving this podcast, consider recommending it to your friend on the glow-up, or leave a review on iTunes. Whatcha reading? Show me using #bribooks on Instagram and following @bribookspod. Bribookspod.com

• 2:30 – Evette loves to write about pop culture and politics, and loves being a black woman.
• 3:35 – How Evette and I discovered “Year of Yes”
• 5:34 – “God can’t steer a parked car.”
• 7:51 – Evette on Shonda Rhimes’s bluntness about being fueled by anxiety: “She has a whole night dedicated to her work and people investing in her work. And she’s still able to admit she has anxiety. And it doesn’t cripple her. It wasn’t something that stopped her from achieving what she set out to do.”
• 8:08 - What does Evette need to say “yes” to in her life??
• 10:30 – When Evette started writing, she was rejected…a lot. “I went through a year and a half where no one would accept anything I’d written.” How did move beyond? She leaned on her network and resources, something that for some of us is still all-too-hard to do. “Mentors, parents, people who said I could be a writer and asking, how do I go about making this happen?”
• 12:04 - “I realized that rejection was part of the process, and if I’m going to do this, I’m going to be a writer, I need to keep pitching.”
• 12:43 – Evette says you’re not an aspiring writer: “Either you write or you don’t.”
• 13:00 - Evette says yes to refusing to be silent: “My viral tweet shows how unsafe the internet is for black women.”
• 14:33 – “I am not...the first black woman to be harassed on the internet.
• 16:44 – Evette says yes to her love, and a quest for partnership a la Oprah and Shonda: “Why Shonda Rhime and Oprah’s convo about marriage is revolutionary.”
• 19:33 – Evette says yes to not having the answers: covering the Mike Brown verdict in the classroom: “How can I explain what happened in Ferguson to my students?”
• 25:00 – “That's the beautiful thing about life: you have multiple times to reinvent yourself and figure out your passion. Life’s short, but it’s actually really long. You have so much time to figure out what you want to do.”
• 28:15 – How being a schoolteacher taught Evette how to manage people
• 28:54 – Other People’s Podcasts and what Evette’s loving rn: “The Read”, “The Combat Jack Show,” “Complex” magazine, the writing of @ishmashfizzle, @MorganJerkins
• 30:13 – Evette couple’s fiction and nonfiction—I think I’ll start doing the same!
• 30:21 – Evette’s reading “Give Us the Ballot,” to explain how the voting rights act has been undermined since its very inception and gives a clearer image of what’s at stake; “Into the Go Slow” for strong, compelling fiction, and “Wild” because Cheryl Strayed MY GOODNESS.
• 32:30 – My OPP: “Dear Sugar” podcast featuring Cheryl Strayed and Steve Almond. The podcast isn’t prescriptive. The hosts talk to experts and use their backgrounds in writing to get inside the minds of letter writers in need.
• 33:17 – We buried the lead—here’s how Evette and I met, thanks to the Glorious Glory Edim and “Well Read Black Girl.”

If you’re loving this podcast, consider recommending it to your friend on the glow-up, or leave a review on iTunes. Whatcha reading? Show me using #bribooks on Instagram and following @bribookspod. Bribookspod.com

Hi! Welcome back to Bri Books. Once again, Happy Women’s History Month. I’m so excited about this episode. Today’s guest is JoiMarie McKenzie, author of “The Engagement Game” (OUT TODAY!) When she’s not busy writing up epic lifestyle and entertainment stories at ABCNews.com, she found the time to WRITE an AMAZING first book—and a memoir no less. In this episode, JoiMarie shares how and why she wrote her first book (a memoir), what she hopes readers to take away from it. She also shares for the first time publically her bout with depression after a relationship went south, and how she learned to be compassionate towards herself, and how a little piece of insight from singer Jill Scott got her through. I know this episode will be really interesting and informative, especially for readers who are navigating relationships with significant others, and ultimately the most important relationship of all—your relationship with yourself. Enjoy! If you’re feeling this episode, consider leaving a review.

• 4:16 – How “The Engagement Game” is like “The Odyssey”—each experience teaches something that’s useful and applicable later down the line.
• 4:40 – How JoiMarie is fighting to take consumerism out of celebrating engagements and marriage.
• 10:28 – JoiMarie on shame if an engagement goes awry: “I feel like oftentimes when things don’t work out or go our way or relationships or jobs or friendships end, we are kind of warded off into a hall of shame. Where we shouldn’t be. And I think it’s amazing how shame makes us hide.”
• 11:15 – Would JoiMarie’s character in “The Engagement Game” even be HAPPY if life had turned out how she wanted, and how JoiMarie “avoided her divorce.”
• 13:30 – JoiMarie defines “covenant spouse,” a phrase that revolutionized how I see partnership and dating: “I found out that a husband is defined in relationship his wife. But a ‘covenant spouse’ is defined by his relationship with God. It’s essentially having God at the center of your relationship. And when my godfather prayed that prayer for me, I decided that’s what I wanted.”  
• 15:55 – On the significance of being 28 years old, “the first time in life where everything seems to being going right.”
• 17:42 – On “the Saturn Return”
• 21:00 – On cultivating self-compassion, slowly.
• 23:10 – On how dating and faith influenced JoiMarie’s approach to depression
• 25:00 – JoiMarie on the disconnect between therapy and black communities of faith: “I think it is a cultural thing, but I think more so that we’re so not educated enough or comfy enough talking about it, and so you have to get to that point where it’s ok I can’t go to my home girl she doesn’t have the answers.”
• 25:51 – what interview have you done that was most informative when it comes to helping you write the book?
• 26:00 – The one interview with Jill Scott that helped JoiMarie get clear on what she wanted from love and life.
• What JoiMarie is reading: Lots of feminist theory, so tweet and Instagram her your picks with #bribooks!

Meet Jenn Mundia, singer-songwriter behind this very podcast’s intro music!  Jenn just finished Phoebe Robinson’s “You Can’t Touch My Hair: And Other Things I Still Have to Explain,” and we just HAD to talk about it. In this episode, we dig into Phoebe’s love for black girls, the EPIC moment in black women/ Shondaland TV history (“WHY IS YOUR PENIS ON A DEAD GIRL’S PHONE?!?”), the subversive power of Phoebe’s unique style of humor and relatability, and why you should never EVER engage with “Devil’s Advocate” guy on Facebook or IRL. Find Jenn’s glorious music here, and here!

SHOW NOTES

• 2: 49—If Jenn’s voice sounds familiar, it’s because she’s literally the first voice you hear when you open this podcast!
• 3:58 – Jenn found Phoebe’s writing style very conversational, and thoroughly 2017
• 4:10 – My thoughts on the conversational, informal style of “You Can’t Touch My Hair,” and how her writing grounds the book without dating it.
• 6:20 – Phoebe is using her writing style to set the stage for what she wants to discuss about being an actor, comedian and all-around black woman in Hollywood and beyond.
• 6:48 – Phoebe makes a point that black hair is so integral to OUR culture, and how black hair is a THING, and how the way our hair is styled can affect how people treat us, and how we think of ourselves.    
• 8:15– How Jenn resonates with Phoebe’s commentary on black hair, as a singer-songwriter-performer.
• 11:30– What Phoebe says is the single greatest moment in black woman TV history: “WHY IS YOUR PENIS ON A DEAD GIRL’S PHONE?!”
• 12:10– How removing Annaliese Keating’s wig removal on “How to Get Away with Murder” was “revealing” for Viola Davis as an actress, and gave us the greatest moment in Shondaland history.
• 13:30 – Is Jenn the “black friend” for anyone?
• 14:00 – Why Phoebe says not to become friends with any new white people in summer.
• 14:30 – My favorite way to not become the “black friend” is to NOT to keep talking to the “Devil’s Advocate Guy.”
• 14:45 – You know the “Devil’s Advocate Guy.” His posts on Facebook usually start with, “I never start with my opinions on Facebook…”  
• 15:00 – Brionna’s “Devil’s Advocate Guy” story, and how she disengaged from his shenanigans (TRIGGER WARNING: We discuss the N-word from 13:45-17:30i)
• 17:45 – Jenn’s OPP recommendations: “The Black Guy Who Tips” because it’s “super informative and ratchet”; “Another Round” because it’s great to see black girls thriving; “Storycorps” for the amazing interviews of families and friends interviewing each other.
• 18:45 – My book rec for Jenn is Issa Rae’s “The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl.”

17:55 – Find Jenn Mundia at jennmundia.com and on Facebook, Instagram, iTunes.

Happy Women’s History Month! What better way to kick off the month than with….chatting all things vagina. Fellow traveller Nichelle was reading “Pussy: A Reclamation” by Regena Thomashauer over breakfast one morning, and we began a conversation about the vagina, shame, self-knowledge, and much more. Enjoy this bonus episode of Bri Books, just in time for Women’s History Month. If you’re loving the show, write a review of the podcast on iTunes!

Show Notes

• 0:20 - On the poignancy of celebrating Black History and Women’s History back to back
• 0:45 - Welcome to Women’s History Month on Bri Books! In March, all episodes will feature and be about women in different industries and interests.
• 2:40 - Meet Nichelle (@inspire1824), a medical social worker celebrating her 50th birthday year in Bali. Nichelle makes a point to spend every big 0 birthday abroad, and this was the most wonderful place she could think to travel. She loves to read sci fi, fiction, mysteries.
• 4:30 - “Pussy” was a gift to Nichelle from a friend, born out of honest (albeit awkward) conversation among girlfriends. They talked honestly, about what the book is, the body, and how the author discusses bodies.
• 5:30 - The book focuses a lot on understanding where your beliefs come from--looking back on how you were taught to look at your body and vagina, and how you were taught to take care of and look at it and how to reconnect.
• 6:40 - Define: “Pussy” v. “vagina”
• Nichelle’s reading: More Octavia Spencer, and hopefully more writing
• I’m reading: A Children’s Illustrated History of Korea
• Nichelle on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/inspire1824/

I recorded this episode while vacationing in Bali (!!),in between surfing lesson and a delicious authentic Balinese dinner. While there, I broke down my “Transformational Reading” reading list, and what’s helping me be more strategic and get better quality reading time. I want to make my reading as intentional as possible--reading for transformation, not just information. So each quarter I’m reading a transformative  book to develop a working knowledge of different topics.

• 2:25: Q1: “The Ultimate Small Business” My goal is, if I watch or engage with anything small business-related, I’m not hung up on the vocabulary and technicalities--this book will help me gain a certain fluency (or at least comfort hearing the language) of business.
• 3:30: A bit of my briCandles founder’s story: What started as creative personalized gifts (my candles) has become an online shop, with nowhere to go but up!
• 4:42: I partnered with friend and founder of “Gabby’s Nice Things” lotion to sell candle and lotion combo boxes for Christmas. We did an extraordinary job, and the process alone was so eye-opening. I want to make sure that at every turn, I’m learning and getting my hands on transformational new information.
• 5:30 Q2: “The Motley Fool Investment Guide for Teens.” I learned about this book from the Think and Grow Chick Courtney Sanders. She has amazing resources when it comes to understanding money and how to make it work for you.
• 6:15 Why I’m buying book for cousins: I want to understand how to build knowledge of wealth, how to create value and create wealth and it’s something I want to pass on to my cousins/ next generation.
• 7:50: Q3: “How to Cook Everything” by Mark Bittman. I’m excited to learn the basics of how to make good food.I want to understand the basic art and science behind feeding myself and feeding others. Excited to read it this summer with my CSA!
• 9:08: Q4: “Effective Project Management.” This book was thrifted to me by someone who had just completed their MBA.  I’m becoming the best team member I can be and the best leader I can be.

Recap:

Q1: “The Ultimate Small Business Guide”

Q2: “The Motley Fool’s Guide to Investing”

Q3:  “How To Cook Everything”

Q4:  “Effective Project Management”

Whether you’re going on vacation, studying abroad, or just want to make the most of downtime on a plane, here are the 5 books you meet abroad. Any book recs for when on vacation, studying abroad or just while on the road? Show me with #BriBooks on Instagram! This epi is in honor of listeners Elexxa Thomas and Marche’ Hill, and other young women circling the globe, or thinking about it :)  

 Past Episodes About The Five Books You Meet Abroad

• The Circle
• What I Know For Sure
• Leave Your Mark
• Americanah

• 2:55: Book #1: Good Fiction, a page turner that you pull out every chance you get. Fiction can be very freeing when dealing with the stressful logistics of making a home in a strange place. I did an epi about the book “The Circle,” good piece of fiction. Escapist. #Protip: I did an epi about the book.
• 3:54: Fiction recommendation is “Land of Love and Drowning” by author Tiphanie Yanique, set in US Virgin Islands at the turn of the 20th century, spanning nearly a century of how this family grew and fell apart.

• 4:25: Book #2: Personal Development, a book written by a professional or about a company you’re interested in.To “meet’ this book abroad, pick a title that’s written by a founder or professional you’re interested in. Think of a few companies you admire (Amazon? Google? KIND bars?), and dig into their processes. This is a “primary source” of sorts, an up close and personal look at the inner workings of something great to you.
• 5:18: Personal development recommendation is “ What I Know for Sure” by Oprah Winfrey. Reading the collection of columns was very affirming for me. Of course, I did a podcast episode about the book.
• 5:42: Book #3: Good Nonfiction. You want this book to count, so that when you put it down, you’re armed with more information on something you care about. Whether that’s media, sports, fashion, investment banking, find a writer or author who really understands the zeitgeist and the industry, and is able to  put context behind that. You want something by industry insider or something religious, the focus is to expand your knowledge so that you’ve been entertained and informed.
• 6:20: Nonfiction recommendation is Aliza Licht’s “Leave Your Mark.” This book taught me a ton about PR. Brandi Kellam at NBC News and I chatted about this book on a previous episode on this book, focusing on how to become a professional who communicates effectively, and brand  yourself based on hard work instead of the perception of hard work :-)
• 7:30: Book #4: Good Lit You’ve Been Meaning To Get Around To. This is the title you see everyone reading, keep hearing about, or you’ve been meaning to get around to reading. For me, that book was “Americanah” by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (yes, I did an epi about that book, too!) The purpose of this “meeting” is to finish something you've been thinking starting.
• 8:19: Book #5: A Book That Honors Where You Are. What’s the purpose of being somewhere new, unique, adventurous and not digging into that space?! This is a very authentic and personal way to root yourself into a culture, history and moment.  Every country and culture has noteworthy and famous authors--do a bit of research, find an author, and pick up their latest title. Who is the literary darling of where you are?
• 9:00: I’m reading “A House in Bali” by Colin McPhee, because….I’M GOING TO BALI IN TWO WEEKS WITH TRAVEL NOIRE!
• 9:30: Being out of your element is aw ay to establish new habits--make a habit of spending the first two hours reading on the plane, or read before bed. It’s a good way to normalize something and inject routine into a chaotic and adventurous time like being abroad.
• 10:15 - Instead of an OPP, we’re going to do what are the books we want to read if we want our brains to study abroad.
• 10:30 - Rush’s pick: “Underground Railroad” by Colson Whitehead--it’s very popular, it’s alt historical fiction where they imagine underground railroad as a literal train.
• 11:28: Brionna’s pick: “Too Big to Fail” by Andrew Ross Sorkin. It was one of the first free books I picked up in NYC, I know the story, but i’ve never read the story!

Meet Kovie, culture & identities writer and Deputy Entertainment Editor at @buzzfeednews. Kovie and I luv author Luvvie Ajayi ( AKA @AwesomelyLuvvie) for being lowkey judgemental (for all the right reasons). On today's epi, we share our fave takeaways from Luvvie’s NYT Bestseller (!!!) “I’m Judging You: The Do-Better Manual.” Kovie wrote about Queen Sugar. Then, Ava DuVernay wrote a thank you Kovie. She totally buried that lede.

SHOW NOTES

Luvvie on Side Hustle Pro Podcast (which BANGS)

#BriBooks OPP’s (Other People’s Podcasts) This Week

From Brionna: Tea with Queen and J.

From Kovie: Minorities in Publishing podcast (hi Jenn Baker!), Another Round, The Friend Zone

• 1:15- How Kovie and I found Luvvie via #TGIT Scandal Twitter

• 3:30 - Luvvie’s consistency, and taking 10 years to become an “overnight success.”
• 4:45 - Kovie on judgement
• 7:10 - #RelationshipGoals Goals: Are you on the same team?
• 9:45 - Doing the branding v. doing the WORK!
• 11:00 - Being a black woman, using humor and being taken “seriously” as a critic
• 12:15 - Luvvie is an active LISTENER and authentic RESPONDER.
• 12:40 - Kovie on why we are children no longer, how 2016 prepared her for 2017, and why the darkness was never a stranger to us.
• 16:07 -  “Africa is a continent and people have to respect that.”
• 18:45 -  “Do Better Manual” for 2017 - Get disciplined!
• 24:35 - Tired? Get up off your ass, say a prayer, and go to work!
• 25:00 - OOP’s: Minorities in Publishing, Another Round, The Friend Zone, Tea with Queen and J.
• 26: 41 - The ULTIMATE lede burial - Kovie wrote on Queen Sugar. Ava wrote Kovie. Epic.

*Sanaa Lathan ‘Brown Sugar’ voice* “So, when did you fall in love with video games?”

In this episode of Bri Books, co-producer Rush Perez and I talk video games, nostalgia, and Blake J. Harris’ 2014 book, “Console Wars: Sega, Nintendo, athe the Battle That Defined a Generation.” The book remembers the rise and shifting significance of gaming consoles in the home in the 80s. Since then, the console has moved from a box connected to a TV screen, to the screen connected to our hands.

• 0:30 - Brionna and Rush’s first consoles, and how we got into gaming as kids
• 1:30 - A brief history of Nintendo v. Sega
• 2:30 - How game consoles acted as an “excuse to go into other people’s houses.”
• 2:50 - All together, alone (gaming online)
• 3:15: Brionna’s top 5 video games of all time! (1. Dig Dug, 2. Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, 3. Mortal Kombat, 4. Crusin’ USA 5. Pole Position)
• 4:30 - How “Mortal Kombat” continues to age gracefully.
• 5:17 - Do we recommend this book?
• 6:15 - Rush’s  (#OtherPeoplesPodcasts) #OPP podcast recommendations for the week: “Keepin’ It 1600”, “Undone” (especially this episode called “The Deacons”)
• 7:20 - Brionna’s pod rec (#OtherPeoplesPodcasts) is the recent  “Freakonomics” series “Bad Medicine,” all about the hidden side of the medical industry, especially pharmaceuticals and research.

Remember, we’ve changed the pod name but kept the delicious pod flavor. On Twitter we’re still @bribookspod, now on Instagram and Facebook as @bribookspod. Tweet me what you’re reading using #BriBooks on Instagram and Twitter!

Resolutions and goals and action items, oh my!

Past goal-setting episode - “There Are 83 Days Left in 2016”

Happy New Year! I hope you’re coming off of the high of a well-rested holiday. There’s so much energy in the air at the end of the year, and I love to use that time to set goals. I did an episode all about the process back in October 2016, but here’s a more drilled-down version of goal-setting, just in time for the New Year. So, let’s dig into how to get our goal-setting “weight up” in 2017.

Show Notes

• 0:40 - There’s something intoxicating about the end of the year. Because there’s so much energy in the air we feel invigorated, but we want to set goals that will invigorate month over month.

• 2:00 - I did a podcast in October titled ‘There Are 83 Days Left in 2016’
• 2:20 - Why quarterly and monthly goal-setting keeps everything in perspective for me
• 3:05 - #1, in goal-setting: Take an assessment (a la Myleik Teele’s podcast). Critically ask, where am I? What worked and what didn’t? What did I try? I call this my “remix.”
• 3:45 - #2, treat yo self! What did you accomplish and what are you grateful for? For me, in 2016, I collected a lot of great feedback on this podcast,and completed the first season and started work on the 2nd season, all while doing a rebranding! I kept up with volunteering with Junket NYC (mentorship program), NYABJ. I committed to serving with my church. I got my candle shop up and running!
• 5:00 - #3, set a mantra for the time period. Because I have quarterly goals and annual goals, the mantra/ words I live by. Those words are ‘DOMAIN EXPERTISE.’ I’m striving to be someone who’s an expert in my space, and knows my role and contribution deeply.
• 5:50 - #4, create goal areas! Self care learning, home, health, bri books, finances, professional, friends and family, spiritual, personal, service, bricandles, fun adventure, reading
• 6:00 - Good goal areas to start off with, and go from there!
• 6:15 - Brionna’s 13 goal areas. I make my weekly and monthly to-do lists, I focus on action-based tasks that can move the needle across my goal areas, or at least give me more information to make a more informed decision.

Tell me how you set goals--what are your goals for 2017? Do you do vision boards? prayers/ devotionals? What do you do and use to keep yourself accountable? Show me your vision boards, goal lists, and boss moves on Twitter, on Instagram and Facebook as @bribookspod using #BriBooks on Instagram and Twitter! I hope this demystified goal setting for you. Of course, I need to know what you’re reading and looking forward to in 2017!

I hope this demystified goal setting for you. Of course, I need to know what you’re reading and looking forward to in 2017!