Matt Langdon is the President of the Heroic Imagination Project (HIP) and the author of The Hero Handbook. This episode describes that ways that we can develop our capacity to take risks when the world needs our help. Matt shows that it is possible to train heroes and to diminish the possibility that we will just stand by and let bad things happen. His stories of heroic action illustrate how the possibility of stepping forward can develop in all of us. 1:24 What is the Heroic Imagination Project: heroism as the antidote to evil. 4:06 Spreading the learnings of research about heroism. 5:03 Can heroes be trained? Research interviewing heroes to find out what makes a hero? Why people don’t do the thing they think they should. 7:30 What is the Hero Round Table? 8:10 What is a hero? A person who takes action on behalf of others when there is a risk or sacrifice to the person who performed the act. A sacrifice is a risk that has 100% chance of happening. 12:10 How heroes are trained – turning bystanders into potential heroes. The larger the group, the less likely people are to help and stand back. 14:20 Identifying and feeling strongly identified with a bigger group makes it more likely you will help. 17:25 How getting comfortable with being uncomfortable can increase the likelihood of being a helper. 18:35 What happens after people are trained to be heroes. How a younger girl recalls her hero training to overcoming the barrier to inaction and stand up to an older girl who is being a bully. 23:40 Training children versus training adults. How kids are more ready to try out new thing. 24:40 How imagination trains heroism. 28:30 How training in one domain relates to acting in different domains. 31:20 Empathy is a characteristic of heroes. How heroism is an act that challenges character and values in the moment. 34:20 Can society train heroes more effectively? Helping to inspire risk taking versus the bubble wrapping of children. 39:00 Slow progression toward independence and the overprotective of young people. 40:50 How to develop an inner hero. Thinking about what else could I do? 43:00 All the different ways that people think about heroism. Having your own heroes, consuming stories about heroes and unsung heroes. 45:35 Find the Heroic Imagination project. https://www.heroicimagination.org/ The Hero Round Table presents multiple ways of thinking about heroism.

HERO: Zoe Huml
EXPERT: Dr. Jamie Wu

Zoe is a young adult who founded the HIP Hero Club, an initiative to help high school students take social risks and become the kinds of heroes who speak up when they see things that are wrong. Jamie then discusses what it takes for youth to develop as prosocial leaders like Zoe. She highlights how adults can work with youth to decide the direction of programs, the kind of supports they need to offer and how adults sometimes need to step aside to allow youth not just to have the potential to lead but to be out front.  


Zoe Huml: Founder of the HIP Hero Club
1:46 What is the Heroic Imagination Project and the HIP Hero Club that she founded.
2:40 How ordinary people can allow bad things to happen.
3:30 How ordinary people can also become heroes.
4:20 How youth underestimate their power to do things in the world.
5:18 Her involvement in clubs and using the club format to develop the Club-In-A-Box. 
6:30 Zoes’s early interest in psychology supported by her father and her athletic involvement.
8:15 What happens in the HIP Hero Club: Fortify, inspire, actin heroically.
9:20 The importance of visualization in preparing heroes.
10:15 Helping students to recognize their goals and passions and empowering them to contribute to social change.
12:25 Her personal experience of learning that she can do something that contributes to change in the world.
13:30 A hero is someone who acts for others when there is risk. Risk can be physical. but it is often social, the risk of speaking out.
15:00 Get in touch at www.HIPheroclub.org 
Jamie Wu, PhD: Associate Director for Community Evaluation Programs, University Outreach & Engagement, Michigan State University  
17:00 The need for both a combination of adult involvement along with the young person’s intrinsic motivation, what they care about. 
19:00 Social-media can empower youth but it can go both ways.
20:40 Youth need a mentor that they naturally relate to develop their leadership capabilities.  
22:10 How programs can tap the intrinsic motivation of youth. Giving youth opportunities for leadership, giving them real decision-making roles in deciding the direction.
25:00 What it means to fail safely for youth includes paying attention to how they have improved, what they have learned, and appreciation of their effort.
28:00 Leaders are not just the charismatic and most experienced people. Youth lean toward the idea of leadership as a learned skill. 
29:40 Egalitarian spaces can include a no adult talk time to allow youth voices to emerge.
31:00 Youth agency needs to come from a broad set of skills that they can develop. Taking leadership roles is a way that the skills can develop. Adult support is very important to that development.
33:40 Youth have well-developed social media skills but may need adult scaffolding to move that toward prosocial initiatives.
35:00 Youth-adult partnerships start with asking youth what programs they need and what they care about contributing. 
38:40 The freshness of youth voices and how youth can help one another.
Zoe Huml: Founder of the HIP Hero Club,
Jamie Wu, PhD: Assistant Research Professor, Department of Human Development and Family,
Associate Director for Community Evaluation Programs, University Outreach & Engagement, Michigan State University  
https://engage.msu.edu/about/departments/office-for-public-engagement-and-scholarship

Our Heroes’ Story: Keisha and Teegan Simpson

Keisha and Teegan Simpson are twin sisters who started the Instagram account called Live Life Unfiltered. They wanted to reach out and talk about the negative impacts of social media and of curating our lives to post images. Starting with talking to their friends, they have now reached tens of millions of people. Dr. Renee Engeln is a Psychology Professor at Northwestern University and the author of Beauty Sick, a book about how the cultural obsession with appearance hurts girls and women. She joins us to discuss the idea of an unfiltered life. Her insights shine light on how culturally embedded our appearance concerns are.  
Minutes
1:46 How Keisha and Teegan felt pressured by social media to make it look like, “we were having a lot more fund than we were.’’ 
3:00 How the negative impact of social media in their own lives led them to the idea of Live Life Unfiltered
4:00 The research phase of their project, learning about both body image and how social media works.
4:25 Introducing their idea to their friends. Getting input and support.
5:20 Live life unfiltered on Instagram: from a challenge to friends to show unfiltered photos on social media
6:50 Expanding to the As She Is campaign: the massive work of getting celebrities and influencers to take part, reaching 100 million people on social media
7:50 How people connected to the As She Is message, even celebrities struggle with body issues. 
8:45 The importance of starting to see the many ways that we filter our lives.
10:15 Advice to others, if you have an idea ‘Just do it’. Don’t let you brain get in the way and don’t be afraid to ask for help.
Our expert commentator Renee Engeln: Professor at Northwestern University and author of Beauty Sick,: How the cultural obsession with appearance hurts girls and women
12:40 How the concern of young women about appearance is a natural response to the culture. 
14:00 The floodgates of emphasis on appearance with the advent of photo-driven social media.
16:00 Awareness of the influence of social media and powerlessness. The benefits of being on social media versus the costs.  
17:00 Our drive to compare ourselves to others. How the tools to enhance images have become so readily available that we easily lose track of how people really look.
19:40 Moments of performance versus living life unfiltered, the need to find the people who accept as we are.
21:00 Consequences of believing in filtered images. How feeling that we fall short can contribute to mental health problems.
23:00 Media literacy. Knowing that images are filtered does reduce the impact of the comparison process. TAking fewer personal photos can diminish appearance concerns.
26:00 The impact of sharing real moments is different from the impact of sharing posed images.
27:30 Form versus function: What your body gives you versus what it looks like turns down the volume in how much we care about appearance.
30:00 Self compassion: you are not alone in this hurt; the culture does not serve you well.
32:20 For helpers, should we engage in body talk? Shifting to asking better questions, opening the door to meaningful conversations about values.
35:00 Social media is supposed to be about connection but is often much more, “Me. Me. Me.” How connecting to others is also self care. 
Renee Engeln
https://psychology.northwestern.edu/people/faculty/core/profiles/renee-engeln.html
http://beautysick.com/ 

Our Hero story: Sheila Laursen

The Hero of today’s episode is Sheila Laursen, a lifelong community organizer who established a community group that helps asylum seekers get a start on their lives in a new country. Following Sheila’s story, Professor Allison Russell - an expert on volunteering and civil society development - will discuss volunteering across the lifespan. Using Sheila’s story, she helps us understand what motivates both older and younger people to volunteer, what keeps them motivated, and how they benefit at different phases of life. Minutes 2:10 Sheila’s helping background 2:50 Sheila talks about the importance of caring and of being practical 4:10 The story of the first asylum seeking family and the growth of the initiative 5:55 How Sheila knows that what she does has meaning Our expert commentator: Allison Russell, Ph.D., 8:00 What motivates older adults to volunteer, volunteering as maintaining a life identity and an extension of work 12:00 Volunteering and caring for the whole person 13:00 Volunteering and making connections 14:00 The reciprocity of volunteering: benefits for the volunteer (mental, physical and social) and for the world 17:45 Young volunteers: rates of volunteering and time volunteered, motivations in young people 21:50 Emotional investment in volunteering, just being asked to help 23:00 Making a difference as the primary reason to continue volunteering 24:10 Recommending volunteering to students, to clients and to your children 25:30 Volunteer opportunities are everywhere 32:40 Informal volunteering and recognizing what you already do as volunteering 36:40 There is a volunteer opportunity to fit anyone Allison Russell, Ph.D. Public and Nonprofit Management Program, University of Texas Dallas https://profiles.utdallas.edu/allison.russell

Our Heroes’ story: Kim and Kayla Reid

The Heroes of today’s episode are Kim and Kayla Reid who run a community organization called On Rock. On Rock has never stopped changing in response to what its community needs. Starting with a place to buy affordable Christian rock, it grew to be a drop-in center for youth at risk, a food bank, a pay-what-you can café, and a thrift store all serving one of the poorest postal codes in Canada. Following Tim and Kayla’s story, Dr. Louise Hayes - author of What Makes You Stronger: How to Thrive in the Face of Change and Uncertainty Using Acceptance and Commitment Therapy talks about values and vitality as the center of a model of thriving and change. Using the DNA-V model, Louise will help us understand how to thrive when our world is constantly changing. Minutes 2:00 Kim on the development of On Rock from a place for at risk youth to gather and hear music, to include a food bank, a pay-what-you-can café, and a thrift store. 8:00 Kayla’s passion for community work 10:00 Creating a place that is cool and is welcoming while meeting community needs Our expert commentator: Louise Hayes - psychologist, author, ACT trainer 14:00 The model of how to help healthy people change and thrive, DNA-V: Discoverer, Noticer, and Advisor, Valuing and Vitality 17:20 Values and passions as the base for Kim and Kayla’s development of On Rock 19:40 Noticing and changing: how to overcome the feeling that I’m too small to make a difference 21:45 How values drove Kim and Kayla to the discoverer role; finding new ways to do things; moving out the comfort zone, diving in, and trying. 24:30 Values and vitality. How hero stories come from these things. 28:00 The advisor and taking risks: what we can predict and how valuing, noticing and discovering together can help take on risk 31:30 Noticing: finding ways to notice the world and notice our inner world 33:30 How to take action on values: starting small, pausing to ask what is my most important thing right now/today 35:20 How thinking about what you care about is tough; making it real 37:00 Going from thinking to action, the importance of saying it out loud, just take a step even if you don’t believe it, how tiny things grow if we suspend belief 41:30 “What will you do with your own wild and precious life” (Mary Oliver) 42:40 The importance of connecting with others, it is what we wake up for. Dr. Louise Hayes: psychologist, trainer, author of What Makes You Stronger: How to Thrive in the Face of Change and Uncertainty Using Acceptance and Commitment Therapy https://www.louisehayes.com.au/ https://www.newharbinger.com/9781684038602/what-makes-you-stronger/

This week’s Hero Next Door is Chantal Thomas who has worked throughout her career in the non-profit sector serving communities, indigenous and immigrant populations who are in need.  Her work shows her humility, the focus of our discussion, which characterizes the way in which she demonstrates caring actions. Following our discussion with Chantal, Dr. Pelin Kesebir, a social psychologist and Honorary Fellow at the Center for Healthy Minds at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Dr. Kesebir’s research has focused on how  happiness, virtues, and values intersect each other and how people can be encouraged to pursue heathy values. This podcast will turn the lens on what humility is, how it impacts us, and its contribution to our relationship with ourself and others. By the end of today’s episode, you will have a better understanding of what humility is and how to cultivate it in your life.

1:50 Chantal’s introduction

3:30 Chantal’s path as an ally

7:55 Rewarding and challenging aspects of Chantal’s work

9:18 Chantal’s advice for people wanting to get involved in non-profit work

10:19 The impact Chantal’s work has had on her

11:37 Introduction to Dr. Kesebir

12:55 What is humility?

19:05 Humility and Resilience

20:40 What is happiness?

21:25 Humility’s relationship with self-esteem and happiness

25:10 Humility’s impact on interconnectedness with others

28:35 How parents and schools can nurture humility in children

34:30 Ways adults can foster humility

37:50 Not all values are created equal

38:40 Benefits of humility on well being

41:48 Experience of Awe

43:50 Recommended resources

Resources:

Dr. Pelin Kesebir

https://centerhealthyminds.org/about/people/pelin-kesebir

App : The Healthy Mindset

In  this trailer, Marilyn Fitzpatrick, host of Hero Next Door, takes the opportunity to present the purpose of this podcast and introduce herself.

Marilyn is a professor amereta of counseling psychology at the McGill University. She's been a therapist for 35+ years, and she's deeply interested in how people clarify their values, how they access them and how they act on them to create fulfilling lives.  

Our episode today features, Jessica Tweed. Jessica started Oscar’s Enemies, a volunteer based initiative to pick up litter and beautify Tacoma, Washington. 

Following Jessica’s story, we will speak to Dr. Marina Krcmar, an expert in the area of media’s impact on moral reasoning in children and adolescents. Our discussion with Dr. Krcmar will explore how children and adolescents develop prosocial behaviours, such as those Jessica exhibits through her initiative.

2:12 Who is Jessica?

3:57 How Oscar’s enemies began

6:06 Impact of Oscar’s enemies

8:58 What is moral reasoning and how does it develop?

13:09 Impact of children's engagement with media

14:55 Perspective taking

20:34 How to encourage perspective taking in children

30:20 How to encourage perspective taking during adolescence.

34:51 Monitoring media consumption

36:05 Recommendations for parents and teachers

38:53 Effects of media violence

40:57 Perspective taking as adults

Resources:

Marina Krckmar

https://news.wfu.edu/expert-profiles/marina-krcmar/

Oscar’s Enemies

http://nenc.org/oscars-enemies-litter-warriors-unite/

Instagram : @oscarsenemies