Jessica Beckendorf and Bob Bertsch host this exploration of personal and collective practices that empower us to work together to help each other, our families, and our communities improve our resilience and readiness.
Practicing Connection Podcast
Reflections on Connection, Collaboration, and Finding Inspiration
Co-hosts Jessica Beckendorf and Bob Bertsch, along with guests Nicola Winkel and Kristen Jowers, dis...
Find out more »Inviting Innovation Through Creative Destruction
Dr. Anne Phibbs, Founder and President of Strategic Diversity Initiatives, explores the dramatic shi...
Find out more »The Power of Listening to Cultivate Deep Respect for People
Explore how to cultivate deep respect in your personal and professional interactions using the “1-...
Find out more »The Welcome Wagon: Cultivating a Welcoming Environment
Explore "The Welcome Wagon," a practical approach to fostering inclusivity through reflection and co...
Find out more »Strengthening Military Community Connections with Amy Rodick
Amy Rodick, Director of the Office of Military Family Readiness and Policy for the Department of Def...
Find out more »Leading with Purpose: Allyship and Leadership in DEI
In this episode, Jessica is joined by Dr. Anne Phibbs, founder and president of Strategic Diversity ...
Find out more »Creating a Culture of Accountability: Strategies for DEI Success
Learn practical strategies for building accountability in DEI efforts and managing pushback.
Find out more »Harnessing Emotional Intelligence for Effective Allyship
This episode dives into a powerful tool for effective allyship: emotional intelligence. Join us as w...
Find out more »From Awareness to Action: Practicing Allyship
Explore how understanding and managing our emotions can enhance our ability to support and advocate ...
Find out more »DEI in 2024: Change, Pushback, and Hope with Dr. Anne Phibbs
Dr. Anne Phibbs, Founder and President of Strategic Diversity Initiatives, explores the dramatic shi...
Find out more »Applying Systems Thinking to Local Efforts
An exploration of the value of using a systems lens in community work, highlighting the interconnect...
Find out more »Balancing the Big Picture with the Small
A conversation exploring the concept of balancing the "big picture" with "small actions."
Find out more »Leveraging the Community Assets to Support Military Families
A conversation about how the Community Capitals Framework, a powerful tool from community developmen...
Find out more »Communicating Across Generations with Corie Weathers
A conversation about communicating across generations with Corie Weathers, author of Military Cultu...
Find out more »Empathy in Action: A Framework for Support
Explore a powerful tool designed to deepen your connection with others—empathy mapping.
Find out more »Preparing for Challenging Conversations
Learn about the “Hopes and Concerns” activity, a powerful tool for enhancing communication durin...
Find out more »How Beliefs and Values Shape Our Work
Discover the transformative power of feedback, the nuances of giving and receiving it, and gain insi...
Find out more »Improve Your Feedback with Gratitude and Vulnerability
Discover the transformative power of feedback, the nuances of giving and receiving it, and gain insi...
Find out more »Feeding Military Families with Stronghold Food Pantry CEO Monica Bassett
A conversation with Monica Bassett, founder and CEO of Stronghold Food Pantry, a resource for milita...
Find out more »Reduce Your Stress Through Core Values
Learn how values shape emotions, decisions, and relationships, providing a roadmap for reduced stres...
Find out more »Confronting Imposter Syndrome by Sharing Your Work
Jessica and Bob talk about the benefits of sharing your work with others and share a practice for ge...
Find out more »Do Less of What Drains You
Learn more about energy and engagement tracking, a practice to help align your life with the things ...
Find out more »Partnering on Early Education for Military Kids
Lisa Sapp and James Yracheta share insights into a collaboration between Malmstrom AFB and the Great...
Find out more »Making Small Adjustments
Bob Bertsch shares a practice to help us build our capacity for iteration by helping each of us get...
Find out more »Being Open to All Ideas
Bob Bertsch shares a practice that can help us be open to ideas by seeing that all ideas, even ones ...
Find out more »Finding Your Purpose as a Group
Jessica Beckendorf talks about the chaordic stepping stones and shares four questions that can help ...
Find out more »Come Back Better
Delve into the heart of community recovery and sustainability with this enlightening discussion of h...
Find out more »Being Present With Your Strengths
Jessica Beckendorf guides us through an activity from Mindfulness-Based Strengths Practice.
Find out more »Finding Balance Within Strengths
Jessica Beckendorf guides us through a practice to help us avoid using our character strengths in wa...
Find out more »Lean Into Your Strengths
We continue our conversation about character strengths and Jessica guides us through a practice for ...
Find out more »Finding Your Strengths
Jessica Beckendorf tells us more about Character Strengths and guides us through a practice to help ...
Find out more »Networks for Military Family Support with Amy Rodick
Amy Rodick, Director of the DoD Office of Military Family Readiness and Policy, talks about the info...
Find out more »Holding Space for New Possibilities
In this episode, Bob Bertsch shares a practice for letting go of something in order to let something...
Find out more »Holding Space for Grief
In this episode, Kristen Jowers shares two practices to help us prepare to hold space for someone ex...
Find out more »Holding Space for Difference
In this episode, Jessica Beckendorf shares two practices for building curiosity, which is necessary ...
Find out more »Watch for Opportunities to Think Big
Jessica and Bob talk about watching for opportunities to think big - one of the eight ways of cultiv...
Find out more »Notice Offers & See Them as Gifts
Practitioner Shannon Hughes of Enlivened Studios shares "Notice Offers and See Them as Gifts" a prac...
Find out more »Make Your Partner Look Good
Practitioner Shannon Hughes of Enlivened Studios shares "Make Your Partner Look Good" a practice fro...
Find out more »Yes, And vs. Yeah, But
Practitioner Shannon Hughes of Enlivened Studios shares "Yes,and," a practice from applied improvisa...
Find out more »Giving and Receiving Feedback
Discover the transformative power of feedback, the nuances of giving and receiving it, and gain insi...
Find out more »Regulating Your Emotions
An exploration of the profound impact of emotion regulation on health, well-being, and relationships...
Find out more »Determining Your Values
Learn how values shape emotions, decisions, and relationships, providing a roadmap for reduced stres...
Find out more »Empathetic Listening
Discover why empathetic listening goes beyond the basics of active listening and how it can transfor...
Find out more »An Ecosystem of Military Family Support with Nicola Winkel
A conversation about building an ecosystem of support and addressing issues upstream with Nicola Win...
Find out more »Learning From Each Other
Bob shares a practice to help us take control of our learning and begin to build a knowledge network...
Find out more »Asking Powerful Questions
Jessica shares a practice to help us engage people in the meaningful conversations we need to have i...
Find out more »Listening for Strengths and Values
Jessica talks about the listening practice, Strength Spotting, and guides us through how to do it.
Find out more »Invest Time in Leisure, Learning and Yourself
Jessica and Bob talk about investing time in leisure, in learning, and in yourself - one of the eigh...
Find out more »Share Your Work
Jessica and Bob talk about the benefits of sharing your work with others and share a practice for ge...
Find out more »Fostering Connection in Meetings
Jessica and Bob talk about why generosity is important in collaboration and share a practice for ref...
Find out more »Practicing Generosity
Jessica and Bob talk about why generosity is important in collaboration and share a practice for ref...
Find out more »Reflections on Seeking Balance
Four of our guests from this year return to share their year-end reflections on seeking balance.
Find out more »Energy & Engagement Tracking
Learn more about energy and engagement tracking, a practice to help align your life with the things ...
Find out more »Grounding Chair Meditation
Join us in a grounding chair meditation, a practice that can help reduce stress levels in the moment...
Find out more »What Lights You Up?
Learn how to use the question, "What Lights You Up?" to begin to find a sense of purpose. Research s...
Find out more »Using the Feeling Wheel to Know Your Emotions
In this practicast, Practicing Connection co-host, Jessica Beckendorf, guides us through how to use ...
Find out more »Burnout and Resilience in Service Providers
In this episode (Season 4, Episode 10) co-hosts Jessica Beckendorf and Bob Bertsch talk about burnou...
Find out more »Applying Technology to Community and Community to Technology
In this episode (Season 4, Episode 9), co-hosts Jessica Beckendorf and Bob Bertsch talk about how to...
Find out more »Starting a Food Pantry for Military Families with Monica Bassett
A conversation with Monica Bassett, founder and CEO of Stronghold Food Pantry, a resource for milita...
Find out more »Adapt, Flex and Be Resilient
Tips on about how to adapt, flex and be resilient - one of the eight ways of cultivating community r...
Find out more »Hawaii’s Food Security Collaboration for Military Families
The Food Security Hawaii Working Group is an amazing cross-sector collaboration to address food secu...
Find out more »Making Intentional and Deeper Connections
In this episode (Season 4, Episode 5), co-hosts Jessica Beckendorf and Bob Bertsch talk about making...
Find out more »Practicing Depolarization with Randy Lioz
In this episode (Season 4, Episode 4), we welcome guest Randy Lioz to talk about the challenges pola...
Find out more »Grounding Yourself in Your Strengths and Values
In this episode (Season 4, Episode 3), co-hosts Jessica Beckendorf and Bob Bertsch talk grounding yo...
Find out more »Supporting Military Families with LGBTQ+ Youth with Cathy Marcello
In this episode (Season 4, Episode 2), co-hosts Jessica Beckendorf and Bob Bertsch talk with Cathy M...
Find out more »Building Capacity in Military-connected Schools with Dr. Ron Avi Astor
In this episode (Season 4, Episode 1), Jessica Beckendorf shares highlights from her conversation wi...
Find out more »Replay of Working Out Loud
In this episode, hosts Jessica Beckendorf and Bob Bertsch explore john Stepper's Working Out Loud fr...
Find out more »Coming to Reflection “On Slant”
In this episode, we share the year-end reflections of some of our past collaborators. Inspired by ou...
Find out more »Replay of Social Justice and Family Well-being
For this episode, we talked to Shawn Trenell O'Neal, author of the upcoming MFRA course, "Introducti...
Find out more »Bjørn Peterson – Clarity, Courage and Creativity, Part 2
In this episode, we talked to Bjørn Peterson about bringing clarity, courage and creativity to our ...
Find out more »Bjørn Peterson – Clarity, Courage and Creativity, Part 1
In this episode, we talked to Bjørn Peterson about bringing clarity, courage and creativity to our ...
Find out more »What is Practicing Connection?
In this episode, Jessica and Bob discuss the concept of "practicing connection" and the podcast and ...
Find out more »Heather Plett: On Holding Space and Mutual Liberation
In this episode, we talked to Heather Plett about what it means to practice "holding space" for ou...
Find out more »Replay of Collaboration
In this episode, we explore different perspectives on collaboration. Is there a mindset that leads t...
Find out more »Practicing Informal Leadership with Lauren O’Donnell
Our guest for this episode is Lauren O'Donnell (LinkedIn), a consultant with extensive experience ...
Find out more »Social Justice and Military Families
For this episode, we talked to the authors of the upcoming MFRA course, "Social Justice and Military...
Find out more »Recognizing and Responding to Inequity with Allison DeMarco
For this episode, we talked to Allison DeMarco, author of the upcoming MFRA course, "What Can Family...
Find out more »Social Justice and Family Well-being with Shawn Trenell O’Neal
For this episode, we talked to Shawn Trenell O'Neal, author of the upcoming MFRA course, "Introducti...
Find out more »Questions for Reflection
For our final episode of Season 2, we asked two of our guests from the past year to share one of the...
Find out more »Why Knowing Yourself Matters, Pt. 2
In this episode, we continue our discussion self-knowledge with Teresa Curtis and Jessica Jane Spayd...
Find out more »Why Knowing Yourself Matters
In this episode (Season 4, Episode 1), Jessica Beckendorf shares highlights from her conversation wi...
Find out more »Replay of Practicing Reflection
In this episode, we share some of the questions we find most helpful for reflection and our answers ...
Find out more »Warm Collaboration
In this episode, we explore the concept of warm collaboration. In Nora Bateson and Mamphela Ramphele...
Find out more »How Networks Can Help Reduce Stress
In this episode, Naava Frank and Ziva Mann, authors of the article "How to Reduce Stress and Increas...
Find out more »Celebrating (or at least dealing with) Failure
In this episode, Jessica and Bob discuss the idea of "celebrating failure." While we know a healthy ...
Find out more »Practicing Reflection
SUBSCRIBE NOW About this episode (Season 1, Episode 6) In this episode, Jessica and Bob take some ti...
Find out more »VUCA and VUCA Prime
SUBSCRIBE NOW About this episode (Season 1, Episode 5) In this episode, Karen Pedersen, Dean for Glo...
Find out more »Working Out Loud
SUBSCRIBE NOW Listen now: About this episode (Season 1, Episode 4) In this episode, hosts Jessica Be...
Find out more »Community Resilience
SUBSCRIBE NOW Listen now: About this episode: (Season 1, Episode 3) In this episode, hosts Jessica B...
Find out more »Collaboration
SUBSCRIBE NOW Listen now: About this episode: (Season 1, Episode 2) In this episode, hosts Jessica B...
Find out more »Transformational Relationships
SUBSCRIBE NOW Listen now: About this episode: (Season 1, Episode 1) In this episode, hosts Jessica B...
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