Thought Project With Ashley Rothstein

This episode took me for a spin and was a good challenge. We took an unexpected sharp left turn into talking about politics and some controversial stuff for a good part of the episode - racism, white privilege, masculinity, and other things. My first time live on air talking about heavy topics without preparation. Something new. I brought Alex on the podcast to talk about her path with veganism. She is the co-creator and co-star of the Oscar-nominated documentary Super Size Me, and while doing the documentary, she was leading a vegan community. After being vegan for 10 years, she started to become very sick, tried to reverse her deficiencies with sea vegetables and every other thing she could possibly think of, and it didn't work. She just became more and more sick. When she announced to her community that she could no longer sustain being vegan for health reasons, all hell broke loose in the form of hate mail and intense shame toward her. She lost about half of her community. She used the experience as a reb

I jumped on the podcast today, somewhat spontaneously, to share some version of ignorance I've been uncovering in my own life around an unpleasant event that surfaces from time to time: panic attacks. I've been asking a lot of questions that seem to be leading closer to answers, which is good. Even if you don't have panic attacks, you could use this thought process to uncover ignorance around your own patterns that aren't productive. Keep asking questions. Connect with me: IG: @ashrothstein www.ashleyrothstein.com Think you would be a good fit for the podcast? Send me an email with your story. ashrothpodcast@gmail.com

Tom used his diagnosis of testicular cancer as a catalyst to change his entire life and heal his mind, body, and spirit. He chose to forego chemo and radiation and heal 100% naturally. And…it worked. For those that know me or follow me, you know I am a HUGE natural health advocate, and frankly, I am shocked every single morning that I wake up to the fact that this stuff is still not plastered on billboards everywhere. Tom is also a natural health advocate, blogger, podcaster, and calls himself a “holistic entrepreneur.” Tom reached a global audience after his story spread virally across several social media outlets. He co-hosts the popular podcast "Talking Shift with Tom & Marianlea" with TV personality, Marianela Pereyra, and contributes to several well known blogs. He has also been a featured guest on several prominent podcasts, has been a featured speaker at several events, and owns Texas' first "Green", garden-themed preschool, The Lilypad Garden School. Tom is currently writing his first book: “Awake

If you’re like me – a thinker with a brain rooted in science, logic, math, and reason, but open-minded in the sense of understanding that science doesn’t necessarily give us all of the answers for the bigger picture – at some point in your life, you probably may have wondered what the hell astrology is. Is it factual? Is any of it scientific? Who the hell writes those horoscopes for your zodiac? Are they full of sh!t? Are there any valid astrological sources out there? What research backs astrology? Where did astrology even come from? Is there more to it than mainstream media portrays?   These are all questions I had, which is why I brought Matt back on the podcast. Matt is not an astrology expert or professional astrologer, but he’s been studying astrology on his own over a decade, simply because it’s a huge passion of his. It was quite interesting to talk to him about it because he is an engineer and like me, has a very scientific and mathematical mind…he was even pretty skeptical about astrology when he fi

Want to hear a vegan and non-vegan have a civil/productive/educational conversation about food? All jokes aside… Full transparency, I was a bit apprehensive going into this episode, mainly because of the personal stance we each hold on food (from a “label” perspective). Julia is vegan, and I’m not vegan. And for some reason in this current climate, it seems to be really challenging for vegans and non-vegans to have productive, educational, open, civil conversations about food (actually, it’s more like a f#cking unicorn)…but having a productive and open conversation about food is exactly what we did in this episode. It was SO refreshing! Julia holds a degree in biology from Hamline University and a plant-based nutrition certification from Cornell University. She’s also a certified yoga teacher and currently works as a content developer for a plant-based protein company. She is in the works of applying for a masters program in health & wellness coaching from the University of Minnesota, and is the creator

When we were deciding on a central theme/topic for the episode, David approached me with a passion of talking about how addiction, in his words, is “a$$ backwards” in this country. We talked about things like the Rat Park Experiment, which is super interesting and will probably blow your mind (it certainly did when I learned about it), the misinformation around addiction being deemed merely a chemical dependency instead of focusing on the true deep-rooted issue a lot of addicts face which is the inability to bond or connect with others, decriminalization vs. legalization and what other countries are doing around addiction, propaganda that is initiated by addiction centers and spread for profit (trippppy!), and we also talked about David’s personal experience with overcoming his addiction to binge drinking by taking the knowledge and awareness he gained from some experimentation with psychedelics, along with a concept that I LOVED…something he calls “radical self responsibility.”   David walked me through his

Dan Vadnais holds a degree in both psychology and philosophy and is the co-founder of a rapidly growing spiritual health company called AscZend. Dan worked directly with Wim Hof on proper breathing techniques. He holds a certification in personal training and calls himself a “personal trainer turned spiritual leader.” Dan was breaking records in eating competitions...to now living a life where he basically adheres to OMAD (a variation of intermittent fasting that consists of eating One Meal A Day). From eating competitions to fasting...quite an intriguing switch. He attributes this "life 180" to his discovery of fasting and a mucus-less diet.   We bounced around a lot during this episode. We started off with his recent retreat in Peru where he compared his San Pedro ceremonies to previous Ayahuasca ceremonies with a captivating metaphor: “Mother Ayahuasca as being a link to the cosmos, and San Pedro being a link to mother earth and nature.” We also talked about fasting, autophagy and how it heals the body, th

As an Emmy-nominated entertainment personality, Nicki has always loved the entertainment industry, but she grew sick of ‘reporting’ on other people’s lives instead of living her own. Working for E! was the industry dream, but she had even bigger dreams herself. In a world that is so damn serious, I think a lot of people are on a path of reverse engineering and figuring out how to be playful again, so I brought Nicki on the podcast to share her love for comedy and talk about how she does her best to overcome judgment when she puts out controversial parodies and spoof videos (which are awesome by the way – check them out!). 2018 was a transformational year for her - tackling her fears and “grabbing life by the balls and giving less f#cks.” She did her first stand up comedy gig and actually up and left her job as a bartender simply because she believes in positive affirmations/self talk and “didn’t want to start out 2019 as a bartender.” Bada$$. So now, like many of us, she has a blank slate and is trying to fi

Based on a structural defect with the way that Anthony Hernandez’s vagus nerve connects to his heart, he lives with the fact that his heart can stop at any moment of any day…take a second to sit in that. As a model/actor for 15+ years, he thought he “had it all” – until an unforeseen event struck him out of the blue. A transformative period (consisting of put his life on pause, heading out to the mountains to meditate like a monk, and diving within himself to find answers) coupled with a 4g psilocybin mushroom experience provided for an amazing story that frankly, I’m still processing myself. If you’re someone like me who has any weird phobias around loss of control or fears of death, this is a good one for you. Anthony walks us through his story and the psychedelic experience that changed his life. Listen to this Harley-riding, longboarding surfer/boxer/painter (aka, artist at heart) that despite an insane amount of hardship and a life-changing medical condition that he lives alongside daily, finds a wa

Matt McDannel has a Masters Degree in Electrical Engineering, and holds extensive experience and knowledge around intermittent and prolonged fasting. Matt coached me through my first 72-hour fast and provided some extremely useful information that changed my life when it comes my relationship/awareness around my addiction to food. Not only is he a seasoned faster, he also calls himself a jack of all trades in metaphysics – from manifestation and astrology to becoming the best version of yourself. While this episode is focused on fasting, we get into a lot of other cool stuff, and I personally enjoyed the segment on the interconnectedness between fasting and spirituality. Hearing Matt explain how you can be both grounded and elevated at the same time is a concept I hadn’t grasped before, but intrigued me! Watch this podcast: https://youtu.be/-Syh9mKXs7Y P.S. I had some issues with my audio interface, so my voice sounds a bit robotic. Still working out the kinks. Connect with me: IG: @ashrothstein www.ashleyrot

Impromptu 'solocast'...full podcast coming January 2019!