Havana Cafe Sessions Podcast

In this episode, we explore vary nature of time.

So what is art for? What purpose does it serve for us as individuals and for our society? How does the experience of creating art differ from a visit to a museum to view the artwork of others? This week, Clay and Sarah discuss the purpose and role of Art in our lives.

There is ‘what happened’.  And then there is ‘the story we tell’ about what happened.  Over time, our propensity to narrate events into a story that means something creates something much larger... our own story of our life.  A story of how we became who we are, and who we are becoming. But which events do we choose to remember? Which events to we mark out as significant in our Life Story? And how does the version of the story we tell impact our own self-perception and what life we think we’re living into?   This week Clay and Sarah discuss narrative identity, the significant way we construct stories about our life.

Behind and beneath all our smaller goals sits one enormous Ultimate goal — to be Happy. Whether by purchasing the latest consumer product, doing yoga, taking a holiday or searching for our dream job, we are all trying to get there.  Happy. Happiness.  But is happiness really a goal we can strive to achieve? In this episode and in honour of the New Year, Clay and Sarah ask — should Happiness be our goal?

It’s that time of year again. Time to Celebrate and Evaluate what has happened over the previous year. And time to Invision, Create and Commit to our intentions for the coming New Year. This episode is our big end of 2017 finale with a conversation about our own personal evaluation of the past year and intentions for the new year... as well as how we all might all do a better job making clear, achievable Resolutions for 2018. Clay’s got some tips based on the concept of Well-Formed Outcomes where we should: * state goals in the positive * decide what evidence we will use to evaluate success * put in context of your overall life (where, when, how and with whom) * ensure the goal is within our realm of influence * consider what we stand to gain and what we will lose if we achieve our goal   Hope you enjoy the chat over your own cup o joe... and we’ll see you in 2018 for Season 3!

In this episode, Clay and Sarah explore The wheel of Life and how to use it to identify areas of your life you want to improve.

Movement — We’re all encouraged to exercise, to get in our 10,000 steps, to use standing desks, take walks at lunch.  We focus on the way movement impacts our health, or our weight.  But rarely do we focus on the way movement can shift our mindset, our mood, our thought-process.  And yet moving the body is often the easiest way to get ourselves out of a mental rut and ‘clear our heads’. This week Clay and Sarah discuss how moving the body can impact our mindset.

Aristotle claimed that Contemplation is the highest form of happiness. Yet as he himself admits, there is a dispute about what happiness means and how to achieve it. Some seek happiness through pleasure, some through active service or work, and some through contemplation and the search for wisdom. Was Aristotle right? This week Clay and Sarah discuss the importance of Contemplation to finding lasting happiness.

The idea of one’s Life Purpose can be tricky. Many of the supposed self-help gurus will tell us that we have one, or that we need to find one. And there are times when we believe them. Times when finding our greater purpose feels necessary. Yet other times — perhaps more often — the idea can feel like too much pressure. With so much choice of what to do with our time and our work, we are easily dragged in many directions and are left feeling a lack of any Higher Purpose directing our lives. In this week’s episode, Clay and Sarah discuss whether we have a higher purpose — and if so, whether everyone’s higher purpose is the same, or whether it is as individual as we are.   In this episode:  * Eckhart Tolle’s distinction between Inner and Outer Purpose * Areas of purpose: to serve others, to make a mark on the world, to find Truth (spiritual, scientific etc.), to be Happy, to simply Be & the potential that there is No Higher Purpose * Why some people feel clear about their higher purpose while others do not

When we post something on social media, are we sharing something about ourselves? Or is this specific technology shaping what we say and therefore think about who we are? Do we choose our identity? Or is our identity shaped and even determined by external forces like technology and social media?

There’s that old saying — Curiosity killed the cat. There are stories that warn of the dangers of curiosity, stretching back to Adam & Eve, Icarus & the sun, and Pandora’s Box. For much of western history, curiosity has been regarded as a negative, a distraction, even a poison. But when we look at the great Masters — of science, of art, of life wisdom — they all share one important trait in common. Curiosity. This week, Clay and Sarah discuss the importance of Curiosity, what it can add to our lives and why it is the trademark of the great Masters.

In 1845 Henry David Thoreau moved into a little house he built himself on Walden Pond outside Concord, Massachusetts. His experiment in simple living and renewing connections with nature has inspired people like us ever since. This week, Clay and Sarah discuss what lessons we might take away from Walden today.

Food, water, shelter - these are essentials. But a spiritual practice? Is it also an essential part of our lives? Is it a natural compulsion, responding to something within us? Or is it something we simply use to comfort ourselves in the face of inevitable death?

Many of us listening to this podcast are on a track now...we've been through school, chosen to specialise in some area and are now out in the working world. But what happens when we want a career change? Or if we leave one career and start looking for another kind of work? And what can we do to help our kids who are going to have to go through this process for themselves? Perhaps we should even ask whether 'career' is even a relevant term anymore?? This week Clay and Sarah discuss how we go about choosing our career, whether it's our first or our seventeenth...

In this episode we examine the nature of certainty and why we seek it even though it can lead to our own happiness.

Stephen Hawking says that AI will be "either the best or the worst thing ever to happen to humanity", and Elon Musk claims it is the "biggest risk we face as a civilisation". So what's so threatening about the future of Artificial Intelligence? What might happen when computers get smarter than we are?    This week, Clay and Sarah discuss what it might mean to be human with the rise of Artificial Superintelligence.

In times past, the role of a Man and the pathway of becoming a man would have been clearly defined. Hunter, warrior, provider, protector — these roles and responsibilities would have been bestowed through initiation and also would have been non-negotiable.  In this day and age, however, with the infinite range of individual choice and identity, and the blurring of gender roles, how to be a man has become less clear. This has freed men to redefine their identities, but has also led to feelings of confusion about what constitutes manhood and masculinity. This week, Clay and Sarah discuss what is Manhood in the modern world, and how we might raise our sons to become good men.

Breathing. It's the most fundamental part of life. And unlike so many aspects of our health like our diet, exercise, and sleep, it's something we don't really have to think about. Or do we? In this week's episode, Clay and Sarah discuss the health benefits of deep relaxed breathing, the repercussions of poor breathing, and why we often get something as simple as breathing so wrong.

Coming to the end of the summer, many of us will have spent some time pitching a tent and camping in a field under the stars. It's a lot of work, there are a lot of bugs, and as Clay reflecting while finding himself sitting in a camping chair in a random field, we all have nice comfortable houses with electricity, running water and various forms of entertainment.  So why do we choose to pack up all our stuff and venture out in to great outdoors to set up camp?

In this episode Clay and Sarah explore what it means to truly listen to another person and how important sound is to our daily life.