A New Normal
What do you do when a pandemic brings life as you know it to a screeching halt? Call your friends and start a podcast. Join hosts Kelley Lynch and Cindy Sealls in Washington, DC and Obaidul Fattah Tanvir in Bangladesh as they step outside their comfort zones and embark on a project to live more in line with at least a few of their loftier ideals by cultivating connection, community and conversation in their own backyards one episode at a time.
Episodes
24 episodes
Stories matter: The Invisible War
This time on the podcast, the story of an invisible war. Shots are fired. Injuries sustained. But how do you fight an enemy you can't see — one that may not even exist?
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Season 2
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Episode 9
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56:59
Stories matter: The Elephant Whisperer
An armchair safari to a place where humans and elephants are engaged in a deadly conflict over resources — and the one man who can communicate with both sides. -----Much of the music in this episode is from the Free Music Ar...
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Season 2
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Episode 8
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1:10:15
History matters: not Gone With the Wind
Confederate soldiers never reached the US Capitol during the Civil War, but the "Confederate flag" (which was actually the battle flag of the Army of Northern Virginia) finally arrived in the building on January 6. Join us for a deep dive into ...
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Season 2
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Episode 7
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56:07
History matters: heroes or traitors?
The divisions that have taken hold of the country are playing out not only in our public lives, but also in some of our closest relationships. What drives the tensions are our very different answers to that perennial question: What...
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Season 2
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Episode 5
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51:06
Plan Be: embracing "radical hospitality" with Mike Gray
Is Santa real? You bet. These days he goes by the name Mike Gray, a retired jack of all trades who lives not at the North Pole, but in a recycled house in the Arizona desert—when he’s not with the Lakota on Pine Ridge or the Seri people in Mexi...
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Season 2
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Episode 4
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54:35
Plan Be: warrior turned potter Matt Marasch
In the first of our “be the change” stories — stories about people who are being the change they want to see in their own communities — we talk with Matt Marasch, former infantry paratrooper and green beret turned potter and healer.
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Season 2
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Episode 4
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23:24
Transcending Tribalism
This has been a time of trauma — for some of us it started four years ago, for others just last week. It's tempting to think the answers to our pain lie in retreating further into tribalism. But if there’s one thing this election made pa...
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Season 2
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Episode 3
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49:38
Country over party: this is what democracy looks like
Today, as voters head to the polls in record numbers and with concerns around the election at a fever pitch, we’re talking about a topic that has us alternately feeling like Chicken Little and Pollyanna. But we’re not alone. Everywhere y...
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Season 2
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Episode 2
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1:08:31
Let's get it started with Baratunde
There's nobody better to kick off our new season — and "Plan Be" — than the man who helped inspire it: Citizen Baratunde, Executive Producer and Host of the hit podcast How to Citizen with Ba...
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Season 2
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Episode 1
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57:16
Season 2 trailer: Plan Be
As the pandemic drags on and the American project feels like it’s spiralling out of control, hope can feel hard to come by. What’s an ordinary person to do? Especially if you're more comfortable ghosting family members with different pol...
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Season 2
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11:48
The Gini* is out of the bottle
Early on during the pandemic there was a popular refrain: "We're all in this together." Sadly, time has shown that to be a fiction. The recession ended for the haves months ago. Meanwhile, it's gotten harder and harder for many of us to ...
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Season 1
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Episode 13
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57:31
Don't rock the boat (feat. Archie Bunker)
What do All in the Family, the Brady Bunch and our all too apparent political divisions have in common? Join us as we cast (real) political commentary aside (we were no good at that anyway) and resurrect the sitcoms and TV dramas of the ...
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Season 1
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Episode 12
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23:24
History lessons from the great divide
Enough already! As if a pandemic, looming economic disaster, racial and civil unrest, and political division weren’t enough, there is talk in some circles about a second civil war. Clearly we're in uncharted territory. Is it possible tha...
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Season 1
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Episode 11
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1:02:42
Pivot!!!
It's a surreal time. Millions are unemployed and, for others, work has changed in ways they never imagined. This week we talk with career and leadership coach Karen Gulliford about managing change, what it takes to lead during a pandemic...
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Season 1
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Episode 10
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1:04:49
Risky business
Mortgages, the economy and capitalism, oh my. In this wide ranging conversation, our guest, economist Shuaib Hassan, talks about (among other things) immigrating to the US from Afghanistan when he was 11, what makes capitalism great (and...
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Season 1
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Episode 9
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1:23:33
Truth and consequences
Is there one (bitter) pill that, consumed regularly, could save us from COVID-19? As cases surge across the country, our guest, hospital pharmacist Samira Duja, reflects on the challenges of keeping up with the demand for medicine in her...
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Season 1
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Episode 8
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54:23
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Education on the line
For many of the world's 1.2 billion children who are out of school due to the pandemic, continuing their education is not a matter of how or even when—but if. Kelley talks with Education Specialist Alberto Begue about the impact the cris...
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Season 1
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Episode 7
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53:11
Visit Ethiopia... later
What's the future of tourism in a post-COVID-19 world? How do you do it sustainably, so that it benefits local communities without leaving a massive carbon footprint? Kelley talks with Mark Chapman, whose community tourism organization, ...
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Season 1
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Episode 6
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45:18
WTF (Wear That Facemask)
What's it like to collect news footage in a brothel while wearing full PPE in 93ºF (34ºC) heat and 90% humidity? During the pandemic, Bangladeshi video-journalist Salman Saeed has been taking on the near impossible to bring the news you ...
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Season 1
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Episode 5
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38:01
American dreaming
America is battling two deadly pandemics. Is this a moment for hope or despair? Kelley asks her two co-hosts and close friends, Cindy and Tanvir—both from cultures with a history of white oppression, but on opposite sides of the planet—t...
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Season 1
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Episode 4
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38:40
Don't stand so close to me
How are companies using the pandemic as an opportunity to re-imagine the way we work? Marie Woods, Director of Operations for a global law firm based in Washington, DC, talks about how her firm has shifted operations and how this shift m...
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Season 1
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Episode 3
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55:29
A little cross-contamination
Why do African Americans make up just 47% of the population of Washington, DC but account for 80% of DC's deaths from COVID-19? We’ve been told that it boils down to factors like genetics and diet. But today’s guest, Maurice Cook, Founde...
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Season 1
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Episode 2
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49:15
That holy [expletive] moment
Who do you call when you suspect that life as we know it may have reached a point of no return? Kelley talks with Laurie Mazur, Resilience Editor at Island Press. Laurie has been writing and thinking about scary things since the 80s. She...
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Season 1
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Episode 1
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33:54
Season 1 trailer: Welcome to A New Normal
What do you do when a pandemic brings life as you know it to a screeching halt? In quarantine, with travel on hold, photographer and storyteller Kelley Lynch, finds a new normal at home and ropes her two best friends—one in Washington, D...
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Season 1
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4:56
