The Unfolding with Olivier

Olivier Passebecq
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The Unfolding with Olivier is a podcast exploring connection, meaning, and what it means to stay human and thrive in a rapidly changing digital age. Through intimate conversations with people who have followed lives of meaning, passion, and curiosity, the podcast explores inner and outer paths of growth. We speak about life transitions, relationships, intimacy, purpose, healing, creativity, and business. Each episode invites listeners to slow down, reflect, learn, and reconnect with what feels meaningful. A place to unfold together.

  1. Aug 6

    On Belonging, Ritual, and What AI Can't Replace | Carolin Goethel

    Carolin Goethel wears many hats. Facilitator, community weaver, bridge builder and nature based guide. She co-founded the Wild Minds Collective, a trio of deep ecologists and nature guides who run retreats and vision quests. She has spent years building things from the ground up: she helped launch the UK arm of the Food Assembly, worked on a universal basic income experiment in Berlin, organised citizens assemblies to bring everyday people into the conversation about AI and has been stewarding the Church of Interbeing, a non religious Sunday community ritual in a refurbished Berlin church, since 2021 and was the Germany Activation Lead for The Week, a project mobilising courageous conversations about the climate. She trained as a rite of passage guide with the School of Lost Borders, where she learned to hold twelve day containers in which people go out on the land alone for four days and four nights, without food and without shelter, to mark a threshold in their lives. This conversation is about what technology cannot give us, why she believes the world is stuck in a domination paradigm, and what she found when she stopped looking for wisdom elsewhere and went searching for her own roots instead. Chapters 00:00 Intro01:49 What do you do?05:07 Democratising AI10:22 What she learned organising citizens assemblies15:27 Is AI something to be afraid of?20:46 Outsourcing yourself to a machine25:57 AI as an idea generator, not a replacement28:11 Other ways of organising society36:55 The stories underneath our systems41:51 Remembering that she is also indigenous44:00 Cyclical living and the seasons48:38 What are rites of passage?1:00:24 How to create a rite of passage for someone you love1:06:58 What does a facilitator actually do?1:09:23 A Sunday community ritual in Berlin1:13:41 Where it all started1:22:17 Family, roots and being a generalist1:27:02 Navigating power in groups1:32:53 Do you lose power by sharing it?1:35:09 Is there hope for the world?1:41:01 What is a vision quest?1:54:33 Guiding vision quests today Follow Carolin on Instagram @carolin_goethel and visit carolingoethel.comFollow me on Instagram @olivierpassebecq and visit olivierpassebecq.com

  2. Jun 22

    “Your Deepest Wound Is Where Your Power Lies” On Building Movements With Integrity

    Makenzie Darling spent over a decade building campaigns that reached millions of people, from anti-bullying programmes with Major League Baseball and ESPN to a global kindness campaign that touched 125 countries. She later became chief of staff inside some of the fastest growing organisations in the psychedelic and consciousness space, helping build the systems, governance and community structures that took them from a handful of people to national scale. But her own path here started somewhere much harder: she grew up the black sheep of a family marked by addiction, and within months lost both her parents, her job and her health all at once. She rebuilt everything from there, and now teaches leaders and founders how to build movements instead of businesses, with a sharp focus on power, accountability and what it actually means to lead with integrity. This conversation is about what she learned from the inside of organisations that lived up to their values, and the ones that didn't. Chapters 00:00 Intro02:04 What do you do?03:12 Karmic assignment vs purpose vs passion06:23 Psychedelic churches and the psychedelic renaissance10:53 Becoming an entheogenic minister12:10 From educational technology to movement building14:58 It ends with me17:28 The ayahuasca journey and the dam21:15 Messiah complex and the ego in plant medicine24:28 What is a movement maker?26:46 Extraction dressed as devotion28:37 Patagonia and corporate movements32:54 Power literacy and decentralisation37:59 Does power corrupt?41:30 Inside the incubator44:50 Ancestral healing and epigenetics50:28 Her mother's addiction and death51:44 Riches to rags and accessibility in healing59:51 Community, loneliness and rebuilding1:04:42 Designing for belonging1:11:07 Cultural appropriation in psychedelics1:13:58 The Enneagram1:18:10 Faith, God and reclaiming the word1:21:34 Cults vs movements1:25:35 Being let down by spiritual leaders1:32:17 Holding both the genius and the flaws1:38:06 Closing reflections Follow Makenzie on Instagram @global_movement_maker and visit globalmovementmaker.comFollow me on Instagram @olivierpassebecq and visit olivierpassebecq.com

  3. Jun 4

    Cold Water for Resilience, Creativity and Learning to See Yourself with Love | Sara Barnes

    Sara Barnes is a published author, a Level 2 Open Water Swim Coach and one of the UK's most recognised voices on cold water immersion. Based in the Lake District for nearly three decades, she has written three books, The Cold Fix (Vertebrate Publishing), The Winter of Our Lives (HarperCollins) and Where the Beck Flows, the first release on her own independent press CROOKED LAKE. She has written for Outdoor Swimmer magazine and the Outdoor Swimming Society, made three short films including the award-winning Dear Heart and Skinny, and was featured on the 2021 BBC series The Lakes with Simon Reeve. She has been swimming in cold water every single day for nine years. In 2025, she nearly died twice. Her doctors told her that cold water swimming is the reason she is still alive. In this conversation, Sara opens up about the surgery that broke her body and her identity, the moment she realised she could float when she could not walk, and how cold water became a daily practice that brought her back to herself. We talk about creativity, ageing, desire, body confidence, the loneliness of working from home, the courage to self-publish at 64, and what nearly dying twice taught her about being truly alive. This episode is a love letter to anyone who has had to rebuild themselves from the inside out, and a reminder that the most powerful transformations often begin with one small act of saying yes to your own life. In this episode: Growing up an island girl in Trinidad and swimming before she could walkThe surgery that broke her body and stripped her identityThe moment her kids drove her to the lake and she realised she could floatCold water as medicine, daily ritual and creative fuelWhy one minute per degree and other cold water rules are rubbishThe five archetypes that shaped her first bookFalling in love in a frozen ice barrel in NorwayWriting as a way of speaking to her younger selfSelf-publishing at 64 and refusing to be silenced by the industryNearly dying twice and what it taught her about lifeThe little girl called Silly Sarah and finding her voiceWhat cold water, breathwork and nature can do togetherSara on Instagram: @bumblebarnes Her books and films: sarabarnesauthor.co.uk Follow @olivierpassebecq on Instagram and visit olivierpassebecq.com

  4. May 18

    “What Growing Up in Iran Taught Me about Freedom and Desire” | Safa

    Safa grew up in Tehran in a deeply religious and restrictive culture where desire was taboo and her body never felt like her own. Today she coaches bold leaders to transform their relationship with intimacy, recognising it as the untapped key to their power, creativity and impact, and she is writing a book about it. This conversation is about what we inherit, what we carry in silence, and what becomes possible when we finally stop. Chapters 00:00 Intro 01:28 Growing up in Tehran 06:18 Quietly rebelling 08:37 Religion and the bubble 15:46 Sexuality and silence 19:56 Unwanted experiences and the body as duty 23:46 Parents as danger, society as danger 24:38 Compassion and breaking the secrecy 29:36 University, boys and falling in love 34:20 Marriage, leaving Iran and the divorce 45:33 Freedom in the Netherlands and depression 49:16 Therapy, NVC and the beginning of change 57:19 The improv breakthrough and writing a book about intimacy 1:06:11 Identity, religion and being human 1:09:23 Her parents and their dynamic 1:14:13 How we see others through our own filters 1:17:06 Iran, war and holding contradictions 1:26:37 Closing reflections Follow Safa on Instagram @safaxperienx and visit safaxperienx.com Follow me on Instagram @olivierpassebecq and visit olivierpassebecq.com

  5. May 12

    "Men Are Wired to Fail in Bed Without Knowing It !" This is How to Transform Your Intimacy | Nico Kars

    Most men have been running the same script their whole lives. They just don't know it. Nico Kars is a conscious kink facilitator and co-founder of kinkHEARTED — "from the heart, from the start." But this conversation goes somewhere much deeper than kink. ◼ Why most men are wired to fail in bed without knowing it ◼ What slowing down completely changes in intimacy ◼ The one practice that transforms most relationships ◼ How to discover what you actually want ◼ Why the goal in sex is the problem ◼ The conversations he will never get to have with the people who shaped him most Nico: @nicodepiko | kinkhearted.com Olivier: @olivierpassebecq | olivierpassebecq.com

    "Men Are Wired to Fail in Bed Without Knowing It !" This is How to Transform Your Intimacy | Nico Kars

  6. May 4

    "Attention Is a Form of Nutrition" Why Having Less Is the Only Way to Create More | Khandiz Joni Towill

    Khandiz Joni is a Chartered Environmentalist, systems designer, multidisciplinary artist and founder of REGENASYST, a pioneering set of imagination games helping organisations move beyond sustainability towards genuinely regenerative ways of being. She holds a certificate from Cambridge University's Institute for Sustainability Leadership and has spent over two decades working at the intersection of creativity, ecology and systems change.Her path here was extraordinary. From growing up on South African film sets to working on Blood Diamond at twenty-three. From pioneering eco-ethical beauty in the UK to building an agency representing eco-ethical creative talents and production. From traditional sustainability consulting to creating card-based imagination games that unlock the kind of thinking no compliance framework ever could.Think of her as a personal trainer for organisations. She can't build the muscle but she adjusts the position. And she goes in as the outsider, which turns out to be her greatest asset.In this conversation with Olivier she explores why attention is a form of nutrition and everything in society is stealing it, why constraints are the secret to creativity, and why reconnecting with your neighbour might be the most urgent thing any of us can do right now.Rigorous, human and genuinely surprising.⬩ KHANDID.STUDIO: https://khandid.studio⬩ REGENASYST: www.regenasyst.com⬩ IAM IMPACT PROJECT: www.iamimpactproject.org⬩ Instagram: @khandizolivierpassebecq.com | @olivierpassebecq

  7. Apr 12

    "I Ticked All the Boxes and Was Deeply Unhappy" What Nature and the Seasons Can Teach You - Simon J Lamb

    What happens when you build the perfect life and feel completely empty inside? Simon J Lamb had the flat, the relationship, the well-paid job. He had done everything right. And he was experiencing the worst depression of his life. This conversation traces his journey back to aliveness. Through a seven day silent retreat where he discovered that depression is just anger without enthusiasm. Through a chance encounter with an 80 year old wanderer at the end of the Camino de Santiago who stopped one in 500 pilgrims. And through an ancient Chinese movement practice that changed how he makes every decision. Expect to learn: ▪️ Why the body knows what the mind refuses to admit ▪️ What depression is actually trying to tell you ▪️ How the seasons can become a map for your inner life ▪️ What 5,000 years of Qigong practice understands about human energy ▪️ Why belonging is the thing most of us are quietly starving for ▪️ How cold water and ritual can rebuild a community of men Simon J Lamb is a Qigong teacher, breathwork and nature connection facilitator, and leader of Icebreakers, a UK charity supporting men's mental health through cold water rituals. Find Simon: Instagram: @simon_j_lamb Website: simonjlamb.com The Unfolding with Olivier explores connection, meaning and staying human in the digital age. New episodes every week. Follow @olivierpassebecq on Instagram and visit olivierpassebecq.com

  8. Apr 6

    "You're Not Meant to Be Just One Thing" Rethinking Fashion, Sustainability, and AI - Boryana Uzunova

    Boryana Uzunova is a serial entrepreneur, sustainable fashion pioneer, Forbes 30 Under 30, TEDx speaker, and founder of The Nold — a circular fashion marketplace challenging how the world buys and sells clothes. She has partnered with Farfetch on an environmental impact tool still active on their platform, competed in the Harvard startup finals, and closed her biggest funding round hours after giving birth. From a child who stuttered and couldn't say a sentence out loud, to an international model in Tokyo at 15, to running nightclubs events in Hong Kong, to graduating top of her class at one of Asia's most competitive universities, to building multiple tech startups at the intersection of fashion and sustainability, to becoming a mother while closing her biggest funding round, to now using AI to rebuild the way fashion works from the ground up — Boryana's path is unlike anything you have heard before. The fashion industry is the second biggest polluter on the planet. And almost everything being done about it is making things worse. Boryana has spent over a decade trying to fix it. She has been inside the machine. She knows where it breaks. And she is not being polite about it. In this episode you will learn: ▶ The lesson of someone who built three companies, graduated top of her class, and still felt like an impostor ▶ Why the more you achieve, the less confident you may feel and why that might actually be a sign of growth ▶ The power of staying curious when the world tells you to stay in your lane ▶ What happens when you stop trying to be the perfect mother and start being the real one ▶ Why there is no system currently in place that incentivizes companies to be truly green and what one woman is doing about it ▶ The counterintuitive truth about polyester that will change how you think about sustainable fashion ▶ Why Shein and Temu might actually be better for the planet than the big brands you think are more ethical ▶ Why secondhand marketplaces like Vinted may actually be making fast fashion worse ▶ How she built a circular fashion marketplace from a wardrobe clear-out into a funded business This conversation is for anyone who wants to understand sustainability and business better, and find inspiration in the outstanding journey of someone who dares to challenge the status quo. What makes it different is that Boryana and I have known each other for nearly two decades. We met when she was 15 and I was working in Hong Kong. I watched her become who she is. Which means this is not just an interview. It is two old friends finally sitting down to talk about everything that matters. Find Boryana at @boryana.uzunova and thenold.com. Follow The Unfolding with Olivier at @olivierpassebecq and olivierpassebecq.com. If this conversation meant something to you, subscribing to The Unfolding with Olivier is the best way to make sure you never miss what is coming next and to support him in continuing this journey of Unfolding. Thank you !

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About

The Unfolding with Olivier is a podcast exploring connection, meaning, and what it means to stay human and thrive in a rapidly changing digital age. Through intimate conversations with people who have followed lives of meaning, passion, and curiosity, the podcast explores inner and outer paths of growth. We speak about life transitions, relationships, intimacy, purpose, healing, creativity, and business. Each episode invites listeners to slow down, reflect, learn, and reconnect with what feels meaningful. A place to unfold together.

Information

  • Creator
    Olivier Passebecq
  • Years Active
    2026
  • Episodes
    15
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © Olivier Passebecq
  • Show Website
    The Unfolding with Olivier