Beyond 80%

In the finale of the Waking Up season, Ryan sits down solo to connect the dots across four very different conversations: Scott & Heidi, Marc Defant, D. Paul, and Chris Baron and finds the same thread running under all of them: we've forgotten how to connect with each other. Weaving in the data behind America's loneliness epidemic, Ryan makes the case that the season's inner work was never the destination; it was preparation. Wa...

Food has become something we rush through, outsource, and barely think about.

But what if food isn't just nutrition? What if it's one of the deepest expressions of being human?

In this episode, Ryan sits down with chef, educator, and father Aran Goldstein to explore why cooking is about so much more than what's on your plate. Together they unpack how modern life has disconnected us from food, why convenience has quietly replaced cu...

What happens when someone's spiritual experiences don't fit neatly inside a single belief system?

In this episode of Beyond 80%, Ryan sits down with D. Paul—a Navy veteran, Native American holy man, author, and spiritual investigator—to explore a lifetime of experiences that challenged conventional ideas about faith, consciousness, and the unseen world.

D. Paul shares stories of childhood encounters, out-of-body experie...

Why do so many couples end up feeling more like roommates than partners?

In this episode of Beyond 80%, Ryan sits down with marriage experts Heidi and Scott Hastings to explore the hidden patterns, assumptions, and relationship "scripts" that shape how couples interact—often without realizing it.

Drawing from decades of marriage, clinical experience, medical expertise, and research on resilience in relationships, Heidi and Sc...

What happens when evolutionary biology collides with modern cultural narratives?

In this episode of Beyond 80%, Ryan sits down with geologist, researcher, and author Marc Defant to explore one of today's most controversial conversations: the relationship between biology, culture, feminism, and human behavior.

Drawing from evolutionary psychology, Marc argues that many of the differences between men and women have deep biological ro...

What happens when curiosity becomes your way of moving through the world?

In this episode of Beyond 80%, Ryan sits down with filmmaker, science communicator, and adventurer Chris Baron. From living inside a cave for a week and rappelling into an active volcano to filming wildlife across Africa and producing documentaries for National Geographic, Disney+, PBS, and the BBC, Chris has spent his career chasing questions most people nev...

As the Waking Up season enters its final chapter, this short episode introduces the themes that connect the last four conversations: love, meaning, and the search for a bigger picture.

Throughout this season, we've explored the stories, assumptions, fears, and identities that shape how we experience reality. But once we begin questioning those patterns, a new question emerges: What are we waking up to?

In this episode, Ryan reflect...

What happens when the story society tells no longer matches the reality people are living?

In this solo episode, Ryan reflects on three recent conversations with Damon Cassidy, Doug Cardell, and Diana Colleen, exploring the growing gap between cultural narratives and everyday experience.

From stagnant wages and rising housing costs to generational tension and the psychology of extreme wealth, this episode examines the emotional and...

In this episode of Beyond 80%, Ryan sits down with psychologist and creator of the Divine Intelligence Process, Dr. Jayne Gardner, to explore how childhood experiences, attachment patterns, and emotional memories shape the subconscious beliefs people carry into adulthood. Together, they unpack the neuroscience behind limiting beliefs, why emotions can override logic, how the body stores unresolved experiences, and what it actually ...

In this episode of Beyond 80%, host Ryan Olexson sits down with author Diana Colleen to explore the ideas behind her debut novel They Could Be Saviors — a near-future speculative fiction that asks: what if the only way to save the planet is to kidnap the billionaires destroying it? Diana shares the personal story behind the book, from growing up in poverty and eating out of dumpsters, to a suicidal period that led her to medi...

In this episode of Beyond 80%, host Ryan Olexson sits down with economist and author Doug Cardell to break down one of the most misunderstood and emotionally charged topics in modern political conversation: socialism. Doug, who earned a PhD in economics specifically to understand why socialism fails, walks Ryan through the actual definition of socialism, why it gets confused with the Nordic model, what true socialist countries look...

In this episode of Beyond 80%, host Ryan Olexson sits down with 26-year-old content creator and YouTuber Damon Cassidy to explore one of the most overlooked forces shaping modern life: how work became the primary source of our identity—and what that's costing us. Damon shares the story of how a banking job, an 11-cent raise, and a front-row seat to financial collapse pushed him to quit and build a platform dedicated to tellin...

This season of Beyond 80% is about what it feels like to start waking up, slowly realizing who you are, questioning the systems you were handed, and noticing the quiet tension that something about the way we’re living doesn’t quite fit. This season moves through three core themes—identity, systems, and meaning—with space in between to slow down, reflect, and make sense of it all.

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We have more access to information, tools, and frameworks than ever before.

More ways to improve, fix, optimize, and understand ourselves.

And yet—most people still feel stuck.

In this first stretch of the season, the conversation wasn’t really about adding more. It was about noticing where we’ve been looking for answers in the first place—and how often we’ve been taught to look outward for things that...

Most people move through life assuming their reality is something happening to them.

Something outside of them. Something to react to, manage, or control.

But what if your inner world plays a much bigger role than you’ve been taught?

In this conversation, Dylan Borland explores the idea that your thoughts, beliefs, and attention actively shape the reality you experience. Drawing from a range of spiritual and philosophical tra...

Most of us were never taught how to understand what we feel.

Instead, we learned to push emotions down, ignore them, or try to get rid of them as quickly as possible. But what if that entire approach is backwards?

In this conversation, Dr. Jennifer Veilleux breaks down the idea that emotions aren’t problems—they’re messages. Signals from your mind and body pointing to what matters, what needs attention, and what y...

Most of us are living inside a voice we didn’t choose.

It’s the one that tells you you’re not ready, not good enough, or that something isn’t going to work—and for most people, it’s been running for so long they don’t even question it.

In this conversation, David Alan Brown shares how self-talk shapes the way we see ourselves, the decisions we make, and ultimately the lives we build. After ...

This season of Beyond 80% is about what it feels like to start waking up—slowly realizing who you are, questioning the systems you were handed, and noticing the quiet tension that something about the way we’re living doesn’t quite fit.

After last season’s exploration of near-death experiences and consciousness, this season brings the conversation closer to everyday life. Through conversations with scientists...

We’ll be back with regular Beyond 80% episodes in April. 

In the meantime, this final episode of the Beyond the Brain series steps back to reflect on the journey we’ve taken together.

Across eight episodes, we explored near-death experiences, neuroscience, philosophy, and firsthand accounts from people who have been to the edge of death. From scientific research to spiritual interpretations, the series examined mul...