Dealing with the Fs (Fear and Failure)

The Academic Life

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In this episode you’ll hear about: board games, Edge House, how to rethink “failure” with the replacement word “successandfailure”, facing our fears by asking for what we need, and a discussion of the book How to Human.

Our guest is: Alice Connor, the author of How to Human: An Incomplete Manual for Living in a Messed-Up World. She is an Episcopal priest, a college chaplain, and runs Edge House. Alice is a certified enneagram teacher and a stellar pie-maker. She lives for challenging conversations and has a high tolerance for awkwardness. She lives with her husband, two kids and a dog.

Your host is: Dr. Christina Gessler, a historian of women, gender, and sexuality. She specializes in decoding diaries written by rural women in the 19th century. Her favorite board game is a version of Sorry! she invented with her dad long ago [directions provided in this episode.]. Christina seeks the extraordinary in the ordinary, writes poems about small relatable moments, and takes many photos in nature.

Listeners to this episode might be interested in:

• Enneagram Transformations by Don Riso
• The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell
• “The Importance of Stupidity in Scientific Research” in Journal of Cell Science by Martin A Schwartz
• “The Guest House” poem by Rumi
• Brene Brown’s TED Talk on vulnerability (not the one on shame)
• The How To Human Study Guide (free download, on Fortress Press website)

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