Karen L. Arceneaux is a dancer, choreographer, personal trainer and fitness coach. Karen trained at the American Dance Festival in North Carolina, the Martha Graham School of Contemporary Dance and the Alvin Ailey School. Currently her Elite Physique 247 Fitness Class has taken Long Island by storm. Read more about Karen. Read more about The Passionistas Project.

Pamela Skjolsvik is an author, book preservationist and activist. Pamela has been published in several literary journals and her book, Death Becomes Us, is a humorous memoir exploring how her journey talking to people about dying helped her learn to engage more fully with the living. Read more about Pamela. Read more about The Passionistas Project.   FULL TRANSCRIPT: Passionistas: Hi. Welcome to the Passionistas Project Podcast. We're Amy and Nancy Harington and today we're talking to Pamela Skjolsvik — a writer, book preservationist and activist. Pamela has been published in several literary journals and her book "Death Becomes Us" is a humorous memoir of her journey talking to people about dying which helped her learn to engage more fully with living. So please welcome to the show Pamela Skjolsvik. Pamela: Thanks for having me. Passionistas: Thank you so much for being here. We really appreciate it. Pamela what are you most passionate about? Pamela: I have to say that I'm probably most passionate about books because books are integral to both my day job as well as my career aspirations — writing books, working in a library and also doing the book preservation. Passionistas: Tell us how that relates to your career aspirations and your day job. Pamela: I have two different jobs. I do book preservation for a man who collects rare books as well as art. And I work in a public library. So my day job involves kind of two different aspects of books. One is very solitary. I'm just dealing with a physical aspect of a book and preserving it, doing repairs on the paper or the spine, making boxes for these books to keep them preserved for future generations. And then at the library I'm working with the public, helping people find things that they're looking for. And that's probably my favorite part because I love talking to people about books or movies doing recommendations. Passionistas: Talk a little bit about your path to becoming a writer. Pamela: I really liked writing but it was kind of like a thing that I didn't feel. I could do in my family. Because I was kind of set up to be the responsible child and not do something creative. And I did that. But I love telling stories. And probably when I lived in Colorado about 2004, 2005, I joined the writing group. And I just had a lot of fun telling stories about myself, my family. And then I just tried to get that work out there and see if people were interested in reading it. And I got some early success with my writing so that spurred me to keep going. Passionistas: What inspired your first book "Death Becomes Us"? Pamela: I had a midlife crisis and I went to grad school. To become a writer. To have that validation like. To spend two years to study writing. And I didn't know what I was going to write about but we had to come up with the thesis. We had to figure it out. And I was with journalists and very serious types of writers. And I was like oh I really don't know what I wanted. You know I could write about my family or read about myself. And that's what I thought I was going to do. But then I was supposed to call my mentor and we were supposed to discuss my thesis and she didn't call me. And I had my kids up stairs. They were young at the time and so I called her number. And instead of getting her I got a funeral home. Wrong number. What? So I kept calling and I kept getting it and then she finally called me and turns out that when she was on the phone, she had a landline, that calls would get directed to a funeral home, if she was on the phone. And that morning she was on the phone talking about the death of her favorite author David Foster Wallace. So she was talking about death. And then we started talking about funeral homes and people who worked in funeral homes. And I'm like, this is kind of weird. And she's like well why don't you go find up who works in funeral homes. And that kind of started the journey of discovering death professions. Passionistas: Tell us a li

Tess Cacciatore is CEO of Global Women's Empowerment Network, an organization dedicated advocacy and activism for human rights. Tess is an award-winning producer, director, writer and editor creating content that focuses on social impact. She covers important topics like human trafficking, early child marriage, domestic violence and clean water initiatives. Read more about Gwen Global. Read more about The Passionistas Project.   FULL TRANSCRIPT:   Amy and Nancy Harrington: Hi and welcome to the Passionistas Project Podcast. We're Amy and Nancy Harrington and today we're talking to Tess Cacciatore, co-founder of Global Women's Empowerment Network, which is dedicated to the advocacy and activism of human rights. Tess is an award winning producer, director, writer, and editor creating content that focuses on social impact. She covers important topics like human trafficking, early childhood marriage, domestic violence and clean water initiatives. So please welcome to the show Tess Cacciatore. Tess Cacciatore: Hello. Thank you so much for having me on. Amy and Nancy Harrington: Thank you so much for being here. We really appreciate it. What are you most passionate about? Tess Cacciatore: Well that's a loaded question because it varies as we talked about earlier today. You know my book ranges from A to Z. But I think the most important message that I'm trying to get out there right now is about people to have the courage to share our stories. Everyone has a story to share and I think it's really important. We have a hash tag revealed the hill which is all about how can we get vulnerable and share stories. And through that turn of events I'm hoping to be able to inspire self-love. I think once we have that self-love we're going to make better decisions about who we bring into our life and bring better awareness of what's happening around us and hopefully do better in our lives. Amy and Nancy Harrington: Talk a bit more about how you've translated that passion into what you do for a living.  Tess Cacciatore: Well Global Women's Empowerment Network started off as a 501 c3. I came back all the way up into the 90s where I had this vision of having an interactive multimedia platform of programming for social impact. But when you talked about virtual classroom and social impact inside of the entertainment industry back in the 90s people pretty much looked at me with my own like I had two heads. So I think the timing and the juncture of vision meets technology and the awareness that people have in the world is right now. So everything's been this small little building blocks these small stepping stones and some of them big leaps and some of them been drowning in water and coming back up around the cycles that we all have in life. But why I think it's really important about right now is because there is such turmoil going on in the world. National disasters what's happening in our world in many levels. And I think that it's really important to be able to be able to have that story to heal you know what is our individual stories how can we be compassionate for others how can we be compassionate towards ourselves. In the ‘90s, you were working in the tech industry so what did you learn during that time that sort of bridged the cultures through technology. Tess Cacciatore: So technology is really interesting I just moved to L.A. about five years previous to 1993 and a friend of mine Amy Simon said there there's this new industry that's happening and you're a great writer and a producer and maybe you can come and play in this wild wild west as we called it back then and there was very few women in industry. So I was really excited about seeing what was under the hood of what was going on what the worldwide web was what email was what all kinds of you know the inventions that were coming out. And one of the side stories that I love to share is that I was with a group of friends and this one guy had this great vision and we became a bo

Writer/producer Elle Johnson is currently an Executive Producer on the Amazon series Bosch. Previously she has worked on other TV series including CSI: Miami, Law & Order, Ghost Whisperer, Saving Grace and The Glades. Listen to this episode to find out how a New York City parole officer's daughter became a Los Angeles TV writer. Watch episodes of Bosch. Read more about The Passionistas Project. ----more---- FULL TRANSCRIPT: Passionistas: [00:00:00] Hi and welcome to the Passionistas Project Podcast. We're Amy and Nancy Harrington and if you enjoy listening to the show, please consider becoming a patron. Just a small donation of one dollar a month can help us keep the project going and you'll get rewards like buttons, access to premium content and invites to Passionistas Project events. Today we're talking to writer/producer Elle Johnson. In addition to her current role as Executive Producer on the Amazon series Bosch, Elle has worked on the TV series CSI: Miami, Law and Order, Ghost Whisperer, Saving Grace and The Glades. So please welcome to the show Elle Johnson. Elle Johnson: Thank you it's really wonderful to be here. Passionistas: What are you most passionate about? Elle Johnson: [00:00:40] This is going to sound bizarrely selfish but I am most passionate about telling my stories. I have gotten to a point in my career, in my life, where I realized that the way I best communicate with the world and also the way I best process life is through telling stories. Writing them down. I came to writing late in life, or later I wasn't one of these people who started out as a kid and knew that I just wanted to be a writer. I had to discover that for myself. And once I discovered that that was the thing that made me happiest, I just wanted to learn how to be the best writer I could be and tell stories the best way that I could. As I've written I've come to realized that I'm what I would refer to as a method writer in that I like to have an experience with something. So in order for me to write about something I feel like if I haven't already had a personal experience with it or some involvement with it, I like to go out and get that personal experience with it and kind of use that to inform my writing. And so that's enabled me to learn about everything and anything in the world that I want to and kind of insert myself into situations that I have no understanding of or no business being a part of. But suddenly I can learn about another part of the world. And to me that is I think the thing that drives me as a writer is being able to find stories that I can make my own and tell my stories. Passionistas: [00:02:19] How do you translate that into what you do for a living? Elle Johnson: [00:02:23] The great thing about being a television writer is so much of writing TV is exploring other worlds. And I primarily write cop shows. My dad was a parole officer in Manhattan for 30 years. My uncles were homicide detectives. I have a lot of law enforcement in my family and so I'm really comfortable with that world and also kind of with that character. It's a very particular personality who goes into law enforcement. I really feel like I understand that. So while I generally have ended up working on cop show. And when you do a cop show, usually what happens is you have the detectives kind of walking in and out of different worlds. Whoever the victims are, whoever the suspects are you're usually entering their world. And that's what makes it fascinating for me because it makes it, I get to enter worlds. I get to decide OK this this week I want to discover what's going on in the world of fashion or in the world of anthropologists or just whatever it is. And then you get to do kind of a deep dive and really explore that. And the best experience or one of the best experiences that I had in my career was working on a show called The Glades. And we had been approached about or asked by the network if we could find a way to do a story about N

Clemence Gossett is the founder and co-owner of The Gourmandise School of Sweets and Savories in Santa Monica, California. Along with her partner, Sabrina Ironside, Clemence has built a school with a vision to expand the consumer’s education and experience of how to create amazing meals and treats out of locally sourced, sustainable ingredients, using the very finest techniques. Read more about Clémence and the Goumandise. Read more about The Passionistas Project. ----more---- FULL TRANSCRIPT: Passionistas: Hi and welcome to the Passionistas Project Podcast. We're Amy and Nancy Harrington. If you enjoy listening to the show please consider becoming a patron. Just a small donation of one dollar a month can help us keep the project going and you'll get rewards like buttons, access to premium content and invites to Passionistas Project events. Today we're talking with Clémence Gossett, co-founder of the Gourmandise School of Sweets and Savoryies in Santa Monica, California. Clémence and her partner, Sabrina Ironside, have built a cooking school that teaches students how to create amazing meals and treats out of locally sourced, sustainable ingredients, using the very finest techniques. So, please welcome to the show Clémence Gossett. Clémence: Thank you. Passionistas: We're so excited to have you here. Clémence: Thanks. This is fun. Passionistas: What are you most passionate about, Clémence? Clémence: I think I'm most passionate about getting people to think. Just reminding people not to take anything at face value. Whether it's related to food or policy or whatever. Just having to think beyond like, "Oh I can just pick this up because it was designed for me." That sort of thing, if it relates to food. Passionistas: How did you design this school to take advantage of that concept? Clémence: The new iteration of the school, the new space we are in, was designed by Sabrina my business partner and myself in terms of the physical layout of the space. But the school came about through a series of very sort of serendipitous occasions. There was no day where I just sat down and was like, "You know, I think of cooking school." Because that doesn't make any sense. So it sort of evolved over a decade. But the physical layout of the space was designed by Sabrina and I with the input of all of our chef instructors. Passionistas: Tell us a little bit about your background. Were you born in Paris? Clémence: I was born in Paris. I was born in Neuilly, which is like a little neighborhood in Paris. But I grew up in Paris spent. First seven years of my life there. And then we moved to the east coast of the U.S. And we finally settled right outside Washington, D.C. in Northern Virginia. I lived there until I was 18 and graduated from high school and left to go to college. And then finished college and that day it snowed on May 11th which was my graduation day. And it was like never again. So moved to LA, and I've been here 20 years. Passionistas: Did growing up in Paris influence your culinary tastes? Clémence: Most of my culinary influences come from after we left Paris. So my father's side of the family is from the south eastern part of France and right around the time when we moved to the US his parents decided to open up in retirement, n nobache — so like a little hotel and had a bar and a restaurant there. And so we would go during the summers and the winters to help them run the space during the busy season which meant like scooping a lot of ice cream — which was my favorite part doing a lot of dishes and just being around. And my grandmother ran the kitchen for the first year. And my father always cooked. He didn't really necessarily work as a professional chef but we canned at home. He would string up his sheep in the backyard and roast it on a spit. You know there was a lot of like, :We just do this in our house." And I thought it was really weird and I was super embarrassed by it. But in the end just having no fear around food

Erica Wright is the founder of U FIRST, INC., a charitable organization dedicated to serving the homeless with the basic necessities in efforts to restore their dignity and help them to lead a healthy and whole life. For more about Erica and U First. Read more about The Passionistas Project.   FULL TRANSCRIPT: Pop Culture Passionistas: [00:00:00] Hi and welcome to The Passionistas Project Podcast. We're Amy and Nancy Harrington and today we're talking to Erica Wright founder of the nonprofit organization U First Inc., a charitable organization dedicated to serving the homeless with the basic necessities in an effort to restore their dignity to lead a healthy and whole life. So please welcome to the show Erica Wright. Erica Wright: [00:00:21] Hi. Thank you guys so much for having me. I am just excited to be here, excited to talk about what we're doing with U First and our journey of homeless love. Pop Culture Passionistas: [00:00:29] What are you most passionate about? Erica Wright: [00:00:32] Right now, I'm definitely passionate about helping the homeless community bringing dignity back to their lives. I've experienced being homeless myself and I know what it feels like to meet someone. Sometimes your ego will allow you not to want to reach out to people. And so I just had a great group of people around me supporting me who pour it back into me even in the time of need. And s o the spirit has never left me. And even at a young age I've always felt like we could always do more because of the things that we have and so it's just been a passion of mine and to just give back to those in need. Pop Culture Passionistas: [00:01:04] How does that translate into what you do for a living? Erica Wright: [00:01:07] We do so many things that you U First. The passion is just not for our homeless community but as for those who are in need. So, it could be our children, who are in need with school supplies. Food. But my passion of helping the homeless community by keeping them clean is to put together these love acts we call them and they're just simple necessities of life like a washcloth, toothbrush, toothpaste, the things that we take for granted. And so it packaging these items and giving those to the people in need whether they're in shelters or under the bridge. I have a phrase of I believe everyone has a seat at the table. So Why not be able to get up in the morning and feel that love and sense of belonging, just from a small kit like a love bag. And that's truly my passion to do that. Put a smile on someone's face. Pop Culture Passionistas: [00:01:52] How did that journey start? What was the seed of the idea to start doing this and how did it develop? Erica Wright: [00:01:56] About 10 years ago, I saw this lady under the bridge, literally using a bottle of water to wash her hair. And It was cool that morning and I could see the steam coming from her head and it never left my spirit. I went through a bad breakup and I knew that I had a purpose and a passion and I needed to birth something. And so, August the 7th, 2014, I woke up from a dream and God had given me a vision. And I was like Paul, I just wrote out all of the things that were going to come forth with helping people and the name U First came about. And so, I didn't know what it was going to look like I didn't have any money and didn't have any credit and I had a blueprint. So, I heard this whisper, truly from God to use social media. And so what I would do, I spoke at Sunday school about my passion and my dream and my vision and two ladies from Sunday school started bringing hygiene items for the love bags. So I was able to put the kits together and that's how it started. So once people started getting engaged, with it I post it on social media and I would say, "Hey thank you Miss Jackson for donating two tubes of the toothpaste." And It just became contagious people from all over the place, I mean different states would just send items. And it's just been it's be

  Susan X Jane is a diversity educator, speaker and trainer. Susan is a former professor and youth worker, who now consults with organizations looking to make sense of our current cultural shift. ----more---- Learn more about Susan. Learn more about The Passionistas Project. Listen to Susan's Bonus Material: Susan X Jane on BeyonceSusan X Jane on Kanye WestSusan X Jane On the 2018 MidtermsSusan X Jane on Her Pop Culture Icon   FULL TRANSCRIPT: Passionistas: [00:00:00] Hi and welcome to the Passionistas Project Podcast. We're Amy and Nancy Harington. If you enjoy listening to the show please consider becoming a patron. Just a small donation of one dollar a month can help us keep the project going and you'll get rewards like buttons access to premium content and invites to Passionistas. Project events. Today we're talking to Susan X Jane — a diversity educator speaker and trainer. Susan is a former professor and youth worker who now consults with organizations looking to make sense of our current cultural shift. So please welcome to the show Susan X Jane. Susan X Jane: [00:00:35] Hi. Thank you for having me. Passionistas: [00:00:38] Susan, what's the one thing you're most passionate about? Susan X Jane: [00:00:41] Definitely diversity and inclusion. Really thinking about race. I care about all kinds of diversity and social justice. I think that we all have to get together. But my particular interest really lies around race and also the way that race is represented. How we talk about it. The stories that we tell about it and how those stories shape what we think race is and how we experience it. Passionistas: [00:01:08] How does that translate into what you do for a living? Susan X Jane: [00:01:11] It is kind of an odd niche thing to do for a living. So I think that I've always just kind of found places where people were interested in doing the work to really think about identity and to think about race. But I have to be honest it used to be like you're wandering in the wilderness and I was the only person it felt like that really cared a lot about this. There wasn't a lot of focus. I remember a lot of times going to people to try to say, "Hey it would really be great if you guys talked about race." And people saying, "Oh those issues are really done. We don't have to do that anymore." But we all now know that we've got to talk about race. But still I find that it's a awkward and uncomfortable conversation. And it's such a kind of amorphous idea that I think people really are often intimidated by how to like touch it so teaching education. And now that everybody is really saying well, "What does this mean for me?" I think working with the organizations to step in and to bring my expertise to help answer that question. Passionistas: [00:02:15] What inspired you to start to do this for a living? Susan X Jane: [00:02:19] I always joke that I started doing race work when I was in utero. So before I was born. I am biracial and I'm also a trans racial adoptee. Which means that I am a person of color who was adopted by a white family. And this happened — I'm going to age myself here — but this happened in '69 and it was kind of like that NICHD right in between civil rights kind of like coming to some fruition and busing. So it was a moment kind of fraught with some racial tension and so because of the way adoption was I don't know what the story was. But I imagine there were probably some conversations about race involved in my adoption process. And certainly from my parents and those conversations about race were from the very beginning. So I think that I have always been a person that has been standing on this kind of racial line in America. And so it's really been an interesting process. I grew up in an all white community and then I went to college and came out of the house and started thinking about this stuff and it really was very curious to me. I think being free from having family that are centered in one side or an

Erin Penner, is the founder of the an outdoor, exploration-based preschool, ILA — Inspired Little Activists. She is also an elected official on the Hollywood United Neighborhood Council and an advocate for the LGBT community and the unhoused population in Los Angeles. ----more---- Learn more about ILAAdventureSchool.org. Learn more about The Passionistas Project. FULL TRANSCRIPT: Passionistas: [00:00:00] Hi and welcome to the Passionistas Project Podcast. We're Amy and Nancy Harrington and if you enjoy listening to the show please consider becoming a patron. Just a small donation of one dollar a month can help us keep the project going. And you'll get rewards — like buttons, access to premium content and invites to Passionistas Project events. Today we're talking to Erin Penner — the founder of an outdoor, exploration-based school ILA, which stands for Inspired Little Activists. Erin is also an elected official on the Hollywood United Neighborhood Council and she's an advocate for the LGBT community and the unhoused population in Los Angeles. So please welcome to the show. Erin Penner. Passionistas: What are you most passionate about. Erin Penner: [00:00:40] I'm most passionate about giving a voice to people that aren't being heard. And giving them a platform to really say what they need and speak what's on their mind and whether it's working with the homeless or with children it's just giving them a voice. Passionistas: [00:00:55] So how does that translate into what you do for a living? Erin Penner: [00:00:59] I started my own nonprofit organization that teaches kids how to take ownership of L.A. So they clean Griffith Park and they clean the beach and they feed the homeless and they're on the metro twice a month and they go all over the city and they really are advocates for the city and for people in need and for themselves. So gives them quite a voice.  Passionistas: [00:01:21] Talk a little bit about your path to starting the preschool. Erin Penner: [00:01:24] When I came here 12 years ago I had my teaching degree from Wheelock College in Boston. And back then I mean you could get... You could work in TV without even thinking about it. The jobs were like a dime a dozen. So I jumped into TV but also nannied to because my passion was working with kids. So I was Nannying for quite some time. And one of the children's preschool teachers grabbed me and she had her own school out here in L.A. that she had started. And I was working one on one with her for years and she branched out and the school moved to Griffith Park and became entirely outside. But she had a child two years ago and I kind of took it over rebranded it and added my own little flair to it. And that's where I am now. Passionistas: [00:02:13] And what's the flair that you added? Erin Penner: [00:02:15] I made it very much an activism school and it's actually called Inspired Little Activists. And what she was doing is very nature driven and this still is. But nature's not necessarily my passion. I enjoy being outside very much but I'm not really put your hiking boots on every single day kind of person even though we do do that. But I added my own let's grab a backpack get on the metro and go meet Mayor Garcetti and stuff like that. So it's kind of both. Passionistas: [00:02:47] So give us examples of some other kinds of things you do. Erin Penner: [00:02:50] We constantly learn about leaders, world leaders, leaders in the community, whether it's just someone in town or Billie Jean King or stuff like that. But we also have... It's really important to me that they know their community and you can teach their own parents about their communities. So the fire department will stop by and police will stop by my friends and nurse. He'll stop by and it's just very much just being a part of the world they live in. So we do that. They constantly have visitors and then like this week it's Day the Dead, so we're going to an art gallery downtown — Self Help Graphic

Joan Baker is a voice-over artist, teacher and coach. She is also the author of Secrets of Voice-Over Success. And along with her husband, Rudy Gaskins, she is the co-founder of the Society of Voice Arts and Sciences. SOVAS is a non-profit organization created to enhance opportunities for gainful employment across all aspects of the voice-over industry and its related fields. Learn more about Joan and SOVAS. Learn more about The Passionistas Project. Listen to Joan's Bonus Material:BONUS: Joan Baker on the challenges of doing voice overBONUS: Joan Baker on almost introducing ObamaBONUS: Joan Baker the Voice Arts Awards and That's Voice Over BONUS: Joan Baker on her mantrasBONUS: Joan Baker on Josephine BakerBONUS: Joan Baker on her pop culture icons

Ramona Harvey left the field of consumer research to focus on helping people identify their unique path and their true purpose in life. She has recently designed a workshop to help people navigate the Path of Happiness. To learn more about Ramona and the Path of Happiness, visit SFStoryTeller.com. To learn more about the Passionistas Project visit our website.   Listen to Ramona's Bonus Material:BONUS: Ramona Harvey on her advice to someone seeking happinessBONUS: Ramona Harvey on reaching the full bloom of happinessBONUS: Ramona Harvey on studying the science of happinessBONUS: Ramona Harvey on her pop culture icon

Sarah Boyd is the founder and creative force behind SIMPLY, a beauty and fashion brand consultant agency. Simply’s flagship conferences and monthly sessions, bring together fashion, beauty and entrepreneurial mavens to network, inspire and learn from one another. To learn more about Sarah visit Simply-Inc.com. To learn more about the Passionistas Project visit our website.    

Jessie Jacobson is a lecturer, musician, former Marriage & Family Therapist and a contributor to Queer Wise, an LGBT writer’s collective and spoken word performance group in Los Angeles. To find out more about Queer Wise, visit QueerWise.net  Read more about The Passionistas Project at The Passionistas Project Podcast. Listen to Jessie's Bonus Material:BONUS: Jessie Jacobson on Her Pop Culture IconsBONUS: Jessie Jacobson on Her Professional Mentors BONUS: Jessie Jacobson on Dealing with Creative BlockBONUS: Jessie Jacobson on Her Mantra

Elise Darma is the founder of the international marketing agency Canupy and full-time traveling entrepreneur. She offers online courses and one-on-one coaching to other aspiring Instagram influencers and "travelpreneurs" who seek freedom from their 9 to 5 jobs. To find our more about Elise visit EliseDarma.com. Read more about The Passionistas Project at The Passionistas Project Podcast. Listen to Elise's Bonus Material:BONUS: Elise Darma on Her Cultural InfluencesBONUS: Elise Darma on Her Pop Culture Icon

Stacey Newman Weldon, owner of Adventure Wednesdays, started taking herself on adventures to get out of a rut. This set her on a path that included little adventures like trying a new food, to big ones like attending Burning Man at the age of 50. Now she shares her knowledge through a course called The Adventure Solution. To find our more about Stacey visit Adventure Wednesdays. Read more about The Passionistas Project at The Passionistas Project Podcast.    

Annette Corsino-Blair is the owner of The Knitting Tree L.A. and the Branch Gallery. Annette is known not only for the great selection of yarns in her store but for fostering a growing community of knitting enthusiasts. Find out more about her at TheKnittingTreeLA.com. Read more about The Passionistas Project at The Passionistas Project Podcast.

Linda Goetz is an actor, co-founder of the Newton Nomadic Theater, teacher at Newton Theater Company and writer and director of two web series Brillig and Adder Mountain. Watch Adder Mountain here and Check out Brillig on YouTube. Read more about The Passionistas Project at The Passionistas Project Podcast.

Shaz Bennett was one of eight women selected into the prestigious AFI Directing Workshop for Women and winner of the New York Women in Film & Television's Nancy Malone Award. Most recently she directed an episode of the critically acclaimed drama series Queen Sugar on OWN — the Oprah Winfrey Network. Find out more about Queen Sugar at OWN. Read more about The Passionistas Project at The Passionistas Project Podcast. Listen to Shaz's Bonus Material:BONUS: Shaz Bennett on her Summer in Alaska

DeMane Davis, producing director of the critically acclaimed drama series Queen Sugar on OWN — the Oprah Winfrey Network, starts each day greeting her crew one by one and speaks about her feelings of pure gratitude for doing the job she loves. Don't miss it! Find out more about Queen Sugar at OWN. Read more about The Passionistas Project at The Passionistas Project Podcast. Listen to DeMane's Bonus Material:BONUS: DeMane Davis on Her Pop Culture IconBONUS: DeMane Davis on the Rewards of Being a DirectorBONUS: DeMane Davis on the Queen Sugar Director's Camaraderie  

Daina Trout is co-founder and CEO of the fermented drink Health-Ade Kombucha. She not only has words of wisdom about starting your own company but also about her philosophy of "you do you." Find out more about Daina and Health-Ade Kombucha at Health-Ade.com Read more about The Passionistas Project at The Passionistas Project Podcast.

Erika De La Cruz is a TV personality, inspirational speaker in the #Girlboss movement, author of Passionistas, Tips Tales & Tweetables from Women Pursuing Their Dreams and creator of the Personal Development Conference: Passion to Paycheck. Find out more about Erika at campaign at ErikaDeLaCruz.com. Read more about The Passionistas Project at The Passionistas Project Podcast.

Liz Lachman is an Emmy-winning composer, has written and directed several award-winning short films, co-wrote Susan Feniger’s STREET Cookbook, created the series Destiny for Kingworld, and made two spoof videos with Marie Osmond. Her latest film Pin-Up won 6 Indiefest Film Awards. Watch for it at a film fest near you. Find out more about Liz at LizLachman.com. Read more about The Passionistas Project at The Passionistas Project Podcast.

Laura joined the Boston Ballet in its inaugural season and was a principal dancer with the company for 25 years. Her long and varied career included dancing with Rudolph Nureyev and Margot Fonteyn. Her recent memoir Boston Ballerina is now available on Amazon.

Jess Phoenix is a volcanologist, geologist and the executive director and co-founder of the nonprofit environmental organization Blueprint Earth. As if that weren’t enough she’s now a Democratic candidate for the U.S. House of Representatives in California's 25th Congressional District. Find out more about her campaign at Jess2018.com. Read more about The Passionistas Project at The Passionistas Project.

Sashee Chandran is the innovator behind the premium beverage line Tea Drops. On this episode of The Passionistas Project she discusses leaving her marketing job at eBay and turning her childhood passion into a fun and approachable new school of tea. Learn more about Sashee and TeaDrops. Learn more about The Passionistas Project. Listen to Sashee's Bonus Material:BONUS: Sashee Chandran Her Pop Culture Icon

Through her own journey of self-discovery, Melody Godfred of Fred + Far found a way to remind all women to make a pinky promise to choose themselves each and every day by wearing a Self-Love Pinky Ring. Don't miss this inspiring episode. Learn more about the Passionists Project at our website. Learn more about the Pink Ring at Fred + Far. Listen to Melody's Bonus Material:BONUS: Melody Godfred Her Pop Culture IconBONUS: Melody Godfred on Her Book "The Agency"