Talks & Podcasts

In this wide-ranging discussion Ryan talks with Scott Britton about facing shame and how to work with it as the jumping-off point to claim freedom and spaciousness.

In this podcast Ryan talks with Michael Karnjanaprakorn about midlife transitions, letting go of externally created identities, and the role of psychedelics in self-discovery.

In this podcast Ryan talks with Todd Sullivan about talk about the resiliency and optimism required for entrepreneurs to build a company, how lonely it can be in the CEO seat when making major decisions that can seriously affect the lives of everyone around you, and about when a founder should personally exit the business to focus on the next stage of their life.

In this video, Ryan is speaking to a room full of young entrepreneurs during Demo Day held by The 100, an organization supporting entrepreneurship in West Michigan.

He shares about his early journey building VNN Sports, and how the path to success isn't always built on win after win. In fact, he explains that sometimes it's the losses that propel you onward as well.

In this podcast, Ryan discusses meditation and how it can help you find answers to some of the hard questions we’re all confronted with on a near-daily basis.

With a strong background in mindfulness and entrepreneurship, Ryan explains how when you start to look at your personality through various lenses, your personality might not stand up against any realistic scrutiny.

In this podcast, Ryan discusses entrepreneurship, meditation, and living a meaningful life. He shares the journey he’s taken building a marketing company from the ground up, and shares his experience related to knowing when to step away.

He also talks about why he believe meditation is such a powerful tool and what it really means to be an effective leader.

In this podcast, Ryan discusses why leaders fail to invest in themselves and burn out. For example, if one of your team members came to you and said they were feeling overwhelmed and overworked, needing a break, what would you do?

You would listen to what they were going through and likely give them the time they needed to sort things out, and get back on track mentally. Why not for yourself too?

In this interview, Ryan and his wife Laura are asked questions related to founding companies.

Each are founders, having started Blackbird RSVP, Sitting in a Tree, and Varsity News Network.

In this video interview, Ryan was a guest on SURGE Straight Talk with Amanda Chocko. Recorded in 2020, shortly after Ryan left VNN, he takes you along on his entire entrepreneurial journey, including the introspective journey he began after leaving it.

In this video lecture, Ryan gives a talk on the necessity of Risk to a group of people at CreativeMornings, Grand Rapids in 2016.

Risky decisions can be hard, and they don't always pay off how you'd hoped, but they're necessary if you're going to grow.

In this interview, Ryan discusses how "crushing It" has become a way of life for many startup founders.

Ryan reveals the very human costs of "crushing it," and how a founder's persona of success can make it harder to succeed.

In this podcast, Ryan discusses hitting pause in life to see if you’re running in the right direction as a founder. Ryan reflects on how he finally got off the achievement treadmill and discovered what his life was actually for, quite unlike what everyone told him it should be for.

He gives us anecdotes of how he unlearned productivity-junkie habits to tap into his most creative states, plus how he uses his personal eulogy to recalibrate if he isn’t living authentically.