Today’s special episode of the Passion Struck podcast features some of our best moments of 2022, showcasing the power of intentional greatness. You must not undervalue the effort required to change your life. There are habits to break, ideas to reconsider, and abilities to hone as you aim higher, which I explore with our guests in today’s episode.
The Passion Struck podcast has featured a number of influential and inspiring guests over the course of 2022, including Jen Bricker-Bauer, Susan Cain, Seth Godin, Rachel Hollis, Jean Oelwang, Daniel Pink, Gretchen Rubin, Robin Sharma, Claude Silver, Admiral James Stavridis, Jeff Struecker, and Jeffrey Walker. Today’s episode features some of these guests’ best moments.
What is the Power of Intentional Greatness?
Intentional greatness is the ability to consciously set intentions and work towards achieving goals, achieving excellence, or becoming great in a particular area. It involves focusing on what you want to achieve and taking purposeful action toward achieving it.
The strength of intentional greatness rests in its capacity to enable you to realize your full potential and have a beneficial influence on both your life and the planet. Instead of just being a victim, it empowers you to take charge of your course and create your own destiny.
Intentional greatness requires discipline, hard work, and perseverance, which involves continuously striving to improve and overcome obstacles and setbacks. It also requires setting clear and meaningful goals and being mindful and present in your actions as you work towards achieving them.
The power of intentional greatness lies in its ability to help you achieve your full potential and positively impact your life and the world around you. It enables you to take control of your own path and shape your own destiny rather than simply reacting to the circumstances that come your way. By setting clear goals and working towards them with purpose and intention, you can unlock your potential and create the life you want.
And what I found from these 21,000 regrets is that in most cases, people regret not taking the chance. Not in all cases, but in most cases, people regret not taking the chance not going on that trip, not speaking up, not asking that person not starting that business. And that’s what I call a boldness regret. And what I found is that around the world, when you just go one layer beneath those domains of career, education, health, finance, whatever, those were the regrets that were persistent.
Daniel Pink
Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Podcast Addict, Pocket Casts, Stitcher, Castbox, Google Podcasts, Listen Notes, Amazon Music, or on your favorite podcast platform. You can watch the interview on YouTube below.
Enjoy!
What We Discuss About the Power of Intentional Greatness
If you want to achieve greatness in your life, you need to listen to the best episodes of the Passion Struck podcast from this year. In these episodes, John R. Miles and his guests share with you the power of intentional greatness, how to live with intention, and more.
One of my favorite books of the year was bittersweet by Susan Cain. And Susan has been one of my favorite authors. And she released Quiet which completely revolutionized how I looked at myself and what it meant to be an introvert. It was such an honor to have her on the show. And during our interview, I asked her why this whole topic of melancholy and bittersweet doesn’t get much press or attention in society and why she felt it was so important to concentrate on the importance of what it means to be bittersweet.
And on this topic of powerful emotions, one of the most influential books this year came from Daniel Pink on The Power of Regret. In our discussion, I asked Dan about his extensive research, which initially came back with a list of things that, on the surface, people regret the most. But then he did a much more diverse sampling. And those findings changed. It was so amazing what he learned.
I was fortunate to have Jen Bricker-Bauer on the show this year. Jen is a motivational speaker, aerialist, and author of The New York Times best-selling book. Everything is Possible. And in our discussion, I talked to her about how often we want to accomplish something important in our lives and achieve intentional greatness. But our inner voice keeps telling us that we can’t. We end up in this constant loop of being stuck. And I asked her how do you change from a mindset of I can’t to one of I can.
Another one of my favorite interviews this year was with Admiral James Stavridis. We discussed his book To Risk It All. During our interview, I asked Admiral Stavridis about The true meaning of courage and intentional greatness through the story of Medal of Honor recipient Commander Ernest Evans,
One of my other favorite authors is Gretchen Rubin. And she and I discussed happiness, how to achieve intentional greatness, the importance of knowing yourself, and how to declutter your life. But another topic that I asked her about was that if there are many problems in your life that you need to work on, how does one identify the priorities, as well as how do you go about fixing them?
Seth Godin joined me to discuss a very different topic for many that I cover here. On the podcast, he was instrumental in coordinating the creation of the Carbon Almanac, which is a book that lays out about 1000 different facts on climate change and does it through the lens of having over 300 different collaborators put this information together. And during our interview, I asked him why it will take systems to change to solve this global issue.
Rachel Hollis is a three-time New York Times bestselling author, the host of the very popular Rachel Hollis show, which has over 100 million downloads, and one of the most sought-after motivational speakers in the world. She and I had a very candid discussion about how her life has transformed over the past few years. And I asked her about the season of her life, how she overcame its challenges and her advice for listeners.
Robin Sharma is one of the world’s top leadership and personal mastery experts and has sold more than 15 million books internationally. Robin joined me on the podcast to discuss his latest best-selling book, The Everyday Hero Manifesto. During our interview, I asked him why taking the first step is the most important thing that you can do on your journey to greatness and how, by taking that first step, you can transform your life by unleashing your gifts and innate talents.
Claude Silver is the Chief Heart Officer for VaynerMedia. And when she was initially placed in this position, which is the first of its kind globally, her boss Gary Vaynerchuk told her that he wanted to build the best human empire in the history of time. Claude wondered how do you pick up that gauntlet after it’s been thrown down by the founder and CEO of your company. For Claude, it starts and ends by possessing emotional optimism. And during our interview, I asked her to talk about the power of emotional optimism and how it can address this global issue we’ve seen of employee disengagement.
Jeff Struecker is a pastor, author, motivational speaker, and former Army Ranger who earned the Silver Star for his bravery during Blackhawk Down. And to give you some context, he was in the lead Humvee during the operation and had just come back from recovering Todd Blackburn, another Ranger who had fallen from one of the Blackhawk helicopters and on their way back, they took gunfire from point-blank range that ended up taking the life of one of the men in that Humvee with Jeff, and upon getting back and going through that entire ordeal.
The general who was in charge of the operation told Jeff and his team that they had to go back in Jeff thought he was going to die but went out anyway. And in our interview, he discussed with me the importance of being a man of your word.
Jean Oelwang is the founding CEO and President of Virgin Unite, an entrepreneurial foundation that builds collectives to incubate ideas and reinvent systems for a better world. Over the past 15 years, she has worked with partners to lead the incubation and start up several global initiatives, including the elders, the B team, the Carbon War Room, ocean unite the Caribbean climate-smart accelerator, 100% human at work, the Virgin Unite constellation in the Branson centers of entrepreneurship. Last year, she came out with a great book on the power of partnership. And during our conversation, I asked her how she became the catalyst for so many incredible collaborations and how she brought them all together to create intentional greatness.
For over 25 years, Jeffrey Walker was the founder and CEO of CMP capital and JP Morgan partners. He also became the vice chairman of JP Morgan and company as well as becoming the chairman of the JP Morgan Charitable Foundation. He is currently the chairman of new profit, a social change Investment Fund and vice chair in the office of the United Nations envoy on health. Jeff is one of the most prolific philanthropists I have ever met and has sat on more than a dozen different boards. And we discussed in our interview the importance of collaboration in creating impactful systems change.
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Starter Packs
New to the show? These Starter Packs are collections of our most popular episodes grouped by topic, and we now have them also on Spotify. To find your old favorites, you can also browse starter packs for existing listeners. Every week, John interviews everyday heroes from all walks of life. Learn how to subscribe to the show and never miss a new episode and topic.
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Resources From The Show On The Power of Intentional Greatness
Please note that some of the links on this page (books, movies, music, etc.) lead to affiliate programs for which The Passion Struck podcast receives compensation. It’s just one of the ways we keep the lights on around here. Thank you so much for being so supportive!
Episode 121 with Susan Cain: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/susan-cain-on-bittersweet-the-happiness-of/id1553279283?i=1000556277566
Episode 197 with Daniel Pink: https://passionstruck.com/daniel-pink-the-power-of-regret/
Episode 107 with Jen Bricker-Bauer: https://passionstruck.com/jen-bricker-bauer-on-everything-is-possible/
Episode 140 with Admiral James Stavridis: https://youtu.be/lTQU4_mVA7A
Episode 134 with Gretchen Rubin: https://passionstruck.com/gretchen-rubin-the-key-to-happiness/
Episode 187 with Seth Godin: https://passionstruck.com/seth-godin-we-need-systems-change-save-planet/
Episode 191 with Rachel Hollis: https://passionstruck.com/rachel-hollis-becoming-your-best-self/
Episode 209 with Robin Sharma: https://passionstruck.com/robin-sharma-everyday-hero-manifesto/
Episode 101 with Claude Silver: https://passionstruck.com/claude-silver-on-using-heart-leadership/
Episode 212 with Jeff Struecker: https://passionstruck.com/jeff-struecker-being-a-person-of-your-word/
Episode 165 with Jean Oelwang: https://passionstruck.com/jean-oelwang-what-will-you-love-into-being/
Episode 99 with Jeff Walker: https://passionstruck.com/jeffrey-c-walker-collaboration-systems-change/
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About John R. Miles
John R. Miles is a serial entrepreneur and the CEO and founder of Passion Struck. This full-service media company helps people live intentionally by creating best-in-class educational and entertainment content. John is also a prolific public speaker, venture capitalist, and author named to the ComputerWorld Top 100 IT Leaders.
John is the host of the PassionStruckPodcast. The show focused on exploring the mindset and philosophy of the world’s most inspiring people to learn their lessons to living intentionally. Passion Struck aspires to speak to the humanity of people in a way that makes them want to live better, be better and impact.
Stay tuned for John’slatest project, his upcoming book, which will be published in 2023.
Learn more about me: https://johnrmiles.com