Cass Midgley interviews Andy Chaleff, author of "The Last Letter." We interview people you don’t know, about a subject no one wants to talk about. We hope to encourage people in the process of deconstructing their faith and help curb the loneliness that accompanies it. We think the world is a better place when more people live by sight, not by faith. Please subscribe to our podcast, and leave a review wherever you listen to podcasts. Also, we offer these podcasts freely. And your support truly makes a difference. You can support us monetarily in two easy ways: you can pledge a monthly donation through Patreon. that’s www.patreon.com/eapodcast,  or leave a lump-sum donation through PayPal at our website, www.everyonesagnostic.com.  We taped this conversation on Sept 29th, 2018.  The intro music is by Dave Weckl called "Just Groove Me" The segue music on this episode is "The Living Years" by Mike and the Mechanics. Thanks for listening and be a Yes-Sayer to what is. http://www.thelastletter.com/  https://www.meaningfulrelations.com/ https://www.instagram.com/inspirevulnerability/ Andy Chaleff is a private mentor and advisor to a handful of high-profile business leaders. He has been behind the scenes of many of the disruptions in mindfulness and education today. eMindful, InnerExplorer, SOLE and The Cleveland Municipality School District are just a few of the clients that he has helped guide to success.His approach is unconventional. He lives with clients for a week at a time and touches all aspects of their lives, from child rearing to office intrigue, childhood trauma to facing death. His clients see him less as a business coach and more as a guide and partner in a lifelong journey.Andy’s work is a byproduct of his own life story. He left the U.S. at age twenty to escape the sadness of his mother’s death, traveling the world. After backpacking for years, he finally set roots in Austria, where he helped to take an IT company public in 1997. He has visited over sixty countries and lived in seven of them around the world. In spite of his business success, Andy felt empty inside. In 2005 he sold everything he owned to embark on a radical life do-over. After experiencing profound inner transformation, he founded a coaching business with his dear friend and mentor, Cees de Bruin. Their company, Meaningful Relations, helped thousands of people in more than twenty countries.Andy is a walking paradox. He is as loving as he is provocative, and his mentoring style is equal parts unsettling and comforting, irreverent and compassionate. His mother affectionately called him, “My little shit-stirrer.”Andy founded the non-profit, The Last Letter, which goes by the same name as the book that he published, inviting individuals to share their feelings in letters to loved ones. His life's work is helping people connect with themselves and others through vulnerability and self-awareness. He helps people transform their most feared and painful emotions into their greatest source of motivation and connection.When he is not consulting clients, he serves as the Director at Amsterdam’s Welvaren Training Center. He enjoys Amsterdam and bores people with the history of the city whenever he has the chance. Andy lives between Amsterdam and London, with a few months of the year spent in the US. My conversation with Andy made me think of two movies, both of which illustrate the beauty of naivete. Naivete is an ignorance of norms of some kind--cultural, social, religious, political, logical, etc. Naivete can be bad or good for us depending on that which we're ignoring AND the amount of agency that is intact while acting on our ignorances. In other words, whether they are chosen by us, or we've fallen prey to them. Andy is the former. He's fully aware of how the world works, the norms of culture, society, logic, etc. And has seemingly chosen to transcend them and live his own life, follow his own gut, march to his own drum. In this sense it can't really be c