Peaceful Hugs Podcast

He Lived on the Streets by Choice. Here's What Nobody Tells You With Chad Wheeler

In this episode of the Peaceful Hugs Podcast, hosts Mark Z and Lorelei Cromer sit down with Chad Wheeler — Executive Director of Open Door in Lubbock, Texas — for a candid, deeply moving conversation about what it truly looks like to love your neighbors, especially the ones most people would rather not see. Chad traces Open Door's remarkable origin back nearly 30 years to a returned missionary named Jim Beck, who — reeling from reverse culture shock after more than a decade in Kenya — didn't start a program or a nonprofit. He simply got in line at a soup kitchen, grabbed a plate of fried chicken, and sat down with a man named Bo. That single act of table fellowship planted the seed of what is today a thriving church, community center, supportive housing program, and survivor housing initiative serving hundreds of Lubbock's most vulnerable residents every single night. Chad also pulls back the curtain on his own remarkable journey — from an affluent upbringing with no exposure to homelessness, to sleeping in the backseat of a 1995 Toyota Camry as a college student, to spending three weeks on the streets of Austin with $12, a backpack, and no phone — all to understand from the inside what the people he serves actually experience. What he found wasn't danger. It was loneliness. And that discovery has quietly shaped everything Open Door does. Chapters 00:15 Welcome & Introduction to Chad Wheeler and Open Door 03:30 How Open Door Started: Jim Beck, Bo, and a Plate of Fried Chicken 08:45 From Carpenter's Church to Community Center — 30 Years of Showing Up 13:10 Chad's Journey: Sleeping in His Car and Three Weeks on the Streets of Austin 19:20 What He Learned: Loneliness, Judgment, and People Are Just People 25:00 Housing vs. Home — Why a Roof Alone Isn't Enough 29:40 Wraparound Services: Meeting People Where They Actually Are 34:15 Faith Without Force: Open Door's Approach to God and Belonging 39:30 The Story of the Man Who Drew Satanic Art in Art Class 43:00 Survivor Housing: Jamie Wheeler's Work with Domestic Violence and Sex Trafficking Survivors 48:20 How People Find Open Door — Word of Mouth, Law Enforcement, and Everything In Between 52:10 Encampment Laws, Political Realities, and the Revolving Door 57:00 The System That Holds People Down — DUIs, Daycare, and Broken Bureaucracy 1:01:30 Funding Realities: Federal Grants, Local Donors, and Building Sustainability 1:06:45 Best Advice: Trees Can Be Planted Often — But Their Default Is to Stay 1:09:30 Book Recommendations: Compassion by Henri Nouwen & The Culture Code by Daniel Coyle 1:11:00 How to Support Open Door in Lubbock, Texas Connect with Open Door Website: https://opendoorlbk.org Consider donating, volunteering, or joining their annual Hub City Bed Run — details at opendoorlbk.org About the Peaceful Hugs Podcast The Peaceful Hugs Podcast is a space for thoughtful, real conversations about faith, culture, purpose, and the stories that shape us. Hosted by Mark Z and Lorelei Cromer, the show brings together voices from different backgrounds and generations to explore what it means to live with empathy — especially when the world feels loud, polarized, and quick to judge. At the center of it all is a simple idea: kindness matters, and we can't afford to lose it.

You Don't Have To Go Alone, How Therapy Helps With Jillian Garner Nakayama

In this episode of the Peaceful Hugs Podcast, hosts Mark Z and Lorelei Cromer sit down with Jillian — Licensed Social Worker, therapist, and Mark's own counselor — for one of the most open and disarmingly honest conversations the show has ever hosted. Recorded during Mental Health Awareness Month, this episode pulls no punches: Mark shares his own journey through a called-off wedding, a traumatic robbery, and the very real stigma that kept him — a 59-year-old man — from asking for help. And Jillian, making her podcast debut, brings the clinical knowledge, the warmth, and just enough push-back to make it all land. Jillian traces her path into social work back to childhood — fighting against her family's wishes, navigating her own experiences, and arriving at a simple but profound conviction: we are all human, having a human experience, just trying to deal with it in whatever way we can. She breaks down what therapy actually is versus what most people imagine it to be, why your best friend — no matter how wise or well-meaning — simply cannot do what a trained therapist can, and what treatments like EMDR are actually doing inside your body when talk alone isn't enough. The conversation gets real about forgiveness — the difference between saying sorry and actually reconciling, why so many people can't accept forgiveness even when it's offered, and how self-forgiveness is often the deepest wound of all. Mark opens up about forgiving the man who robbed him, crying at his death, and what it would have meant to look him in the eye and say the words out loud. They also dig into the workplace — how burnout, dysregulation, and unprocessed trauma show up every day in high-performing people who have no idea anything is wrong — and how Unbridled Acts' Identity Fund is quietly changing that, one company at a time. And yes — Ted Lasso comes up. Because of course it does. Takeaways You don't have to go alone. Reaching out is not weakness — it's the bravest thing you can do. Your best friend loves you, but they cannot give you an unbiased perspective. That's what therapy is for. Trauma is stored in the body. Saying "I don't think about it anymore" doesn't mean it's gone — it means it's coming out another way. If therapy is all validation and no challenge, you're not getting what you need. Find someone who will push you. You can't accept forgiveness from others until you learn to forgive yourself. Forgiveness is a process, not a moment — and asking "do you forgive me?" might be the step most of us skip. Stuffing your feelings down is not coping. Those feelings will come out — as addiction, anger, illness, or walls around your heart. Mental health isn't visible. The person who looks perfectly fine in the parking lot might be barely holding it together. Put your oxygen mask on first. You cannot pour from an empty cup. It's not always about you — and remembering that changes everything about how you respond to the people around you. High-functioning and high-performing doesn't mean okay. Your nervous system doesn't care about your productivity. The truth will set you free — but it'll tick you off first. Chapters 00:15 Welcome & Why Mental Health Month Hits Close to Home 03:00 Mark Opens Up — The Called-Off Wedding, the Robbery & Asking for Help 07:30 Meet Jillian — Her Path Into Social Work & Why Her Family Pushed Back 12:00 We're All Human — The Playbook Nobody Gave Us 15:45 Why Your Best Friend Can't Replace a Therapist 19:30 EMDR, CBT & the Treatments Most People Have Never Heard Of 24:15 When Medication Is the Bridge, Not the Destination 28:00 Forgiveness Is a Process — Saying Sorry Isn't Enough 33:30 Can You Accept Forgiveness If You Can't Forgive Yourself? 38:00 How to Know If You've Found the Right Therapist 43:15 Honesty in the Room — What Happens When You're Not 47:30 Trauma Lives in the Body — Even When You Think You're Over It 52:00 The Identity Fund — Destigmatizing Mental Health in the Workplace 57:30 Faith, Anchors & What You Hold Onto When It's 1 AM 1:02:00 It's Not Always About You — Two Pieces of Life-Changing Advice 1:04:30 Movie Recommendations: Little Black Book & Hector and the Search for Happiness 1:06:00 Closing Thoughts — Give People the Benefit of the Doubt About the Peaceful Hugs Podcast The Peaceful Hugs Podcast is a space for thoughtful, real conversations about faith, culture, purpose, and the stories that shape us. Hosted by Mark Z and Lorelei Cromer, the show brings together voices from different backgrounds and generations to explore what it means to live with empathy — especially when the world feels loud, polarized, and quick to judge. At the center of it all is a simple idea: kindness matters, and we can't afford to lose it.

She Asked God Why. He Taught Her How with Patty Stewart

In this episode of the Peaceful Hugs Podcast, hosts Mark Z and Lorelei Cromer sit down with Patty Stewart — missionary kid, pastor's wife, nurse, musician, and author of No More Pat Answers: Living in the Not Knowing — for one of the most quietly powerful conversations the show has ever had. Patty's story spans continents, decades, and depths of suffering most people will never know — and yet she tells it with a warmth and honesty that makes you feel like you're sitting across the table from a dear friend. Born in 1948 in Mashhad, Iran — smuggled in unknowingly by her missionary parents before she even existed on paper  Patty grew up on a compound near the Afghan border surrounded by fruit trees, tire swings, donkeys, and a community of faith that felt like one big extended family. It was also where she first encountered the kind of poverty that breaks a child's heart and plants a seed that never quite leaves. She met her future husband Tat when she was two weeks old and he was two years old. It was not, she jokes, love at first sight. After returning to the U.S. in 1964 and building a life, a marriage, and a young family, Patty found herself pulled back — not by her own desire, but by a letter, a prayer, and a quiet but unmistakable shift in her heart. She and Tat returned to a post-revolution Iran that looked nothing like the one they'd known, raising two blonde children in a culture that stopped to stare, teaching a Sunday school class in two languages, and ministering to women who were quietly falling apart far from home. Then came the newspaper. Their photos. The word "spies." And seven days to get out of the country — driving through darkened alleys with no headlights, two half-asleep children in the back of a Land Rover, not knowing if they'd make it to the airport alive. But the hardest chapters, Patty says, came later. A traumatic brain injury in 2012 that left her at 93 pounds, unable to move, staring at a knife in the dark. Anxiety so severe that no medication, no therapy, nothing could touch it. Years of waiting, asking God why — and slowly, painstakingly, learning to stop asking why and start asking how. Her book, No More Pat Answers, is the culmination of that journey: a raw, honest, deeply personal account of what faith actually looks like when the darkness won't lift and the answers don't come. The conversation also turns to Iran today — and Patty shares what happened when she posted about her book in Farsi on Instagram and half a million Iranians responded. Chapters 00:15 Welcome & Introduction to Patty Stewart 02:30 Smuggled Into Iran Before She Was Born — Life in Mashhad 07:00 Growing Up on the Compound: Fruit Trees, Tire Swings & a Heart for the Poor 11:20 Meeting Tat at Two Weeks Old & Coming Back to America in 1964 14:45 The Letter That Changed Everything — God Shifts Patty's Heart to Return 19:30 Waiting Out the Revolution: Six Months in New Jersey, Then Back to a Different Iran 24:00 Raising Blonde Kids in Post-Revolution Tehran & Ministry to Expatriate Women 29:15 Teaching Sunday School in Two Languages (and One Kid Who Ate the Elmer's Glue) 33:00 The Iranian Children's TV Show That Told Kids to Bomb Americans 35:30 Illness, Breakdown & the Order to Leave in 10 Days 39:45 Fleeing Under Cover of Darkness — The Airport Story 46:00 "Party of Stuart, Please Step Out of Line" — First Class Out of Iran 49:30 The TBI, 93 Pounds & Learning to Live One More Day 55:00 Anxiety So Severe She Looked at a Knife in the Dark 59:30 From "Why" to "How" — The Question That Changes Everything 1:03:00 Half a Million Iranians on Instagram & What They Said About Her Book 1:07:15 The Prince of Persia — Spiritual Warfare and the Battle Over Iran 1:11:00 Western Comfort vs. What the Iranian People Are Enduring Today 1:14:30 Best Life Advice: Just Wait One More Day 1:16:00 Book Recommendation: The Normal Christian Life by Watchman Nee 1:17:30 About No More Pat Answers: Living in the Not Knowing Get Patty's Book No More Pat Answers: Living in the Not Knowing — available on Amazon About the Peaceful Hugs Podcast The Peaceful Hugs Podcast is a space for thoughtful, real conversations about faith, culture, purpose, and the stories that shape us. Hosted by Mark Zahringer and Lorelei Cromer, the show brings together voices from different backgrounds and generations to explore what it means to live with empathy — especially when the world feels loud, polarized, and quick to judge. At the center of it all is a simple idea: kindness matters, and we can't afford to lose it. 🎙️ Watch on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@PeacefulHugsPodcast

Hand Up, Not Handout: Transforming Malawi with Temwa Wright

In this episode of the Peaceful Hugs Podcast, hosts Mark Zahringer and Lorelei Cromer sit down with Temwa Wright — Executive Director of Pamoza International — for a moving and deeply inspiring conversation about faith, service, radical generosity, and what it truly means to help people help themselves. Temwa shares the remarkable story of how Pamoza came to be, from her father Dr. Mike Mtika's sociology students being so transformed by a trip to rural Malawi that they moved there after graduation, to Temwa stepping away from a comfortable career to take the helm of the organization in 2013 — a total walk of faith with three children and a family to provide for. She also recounts the unexpected, God-orchestrated chain of events that first connected her with Mark and Peaceful Hugs, and why she believes divine intervention is behind every meaningful partnership. The conversation digs into what sustainable, community-driven development actually looks like — from village banks and demonstration farms to adult literacy centers born out of one woman's courageous request — and why handing out Bibles to a community where 60% of adults can't read is a powerful lesson in listening before acting. Temwa also reflects on the unique impact of seeing someone who looks like you show up to help, and why representation in mission work matters more than most Westerners realize. Takeaways If you want to go fast, go alone — if you want to go far, go Pamoza, together. Sustainable development starts with listening, not assuming you already know what people need. A hand up, not a handout: empowering communities to meet their own needs outlasts any program or donor. $800 a year can send a young man to college — and one donor's "yes" can ripple into a career of service that impacts thousands. Representation in mission work changes what people believe is possible for themselves. Radical generosity isn't just about giving — it's about inspiring others to multiply that generosity forward. Well-intentioned help without community input can do more harm than good. Progress over perfection: don't let the pursuit of ideal outcomes stop meaningful forward movement. God works in the background, even when — especially when — you can't see it. True transformation is holistic: you can't address one need and ignore the rest. Chapters 00:15 Welcome & How Mark and Temwa Met — A God Story 05:30 What Pamoza Means and the Proverb Behind It 09:45 How Pamoza Started: A Sociology Professor and 13 Students 14:20 Three White Women, Rural Malawi, and Killing Snakes 18:50 Temwa Steps Into the Executive Director Role — A Walk of Faith 23:10 Oil and Water: Working Alongside Her Father to Carry His Legacy 27:35 The CHIEF Approach: Five Areas of Holistic Transformation 32:00 Thomas's Story: $800, a Suicide, and a Programs Manager Born 37:45 Distributing 1,100 Bibles — and the Humbling Lesson That Followed 43:00 Ovaline's Request: Adult Literacy and Listening to Real Needs 47:20 Hand Up, Not Handout: The School Breakfast Program Story 52:10 When Another Organization Came In and Gave It All Away 55:30 How to Get Involved with Pamoza International 58:45 Final Reflections: Best Advice and What Everyone Should Read Connect with Pamoza International Website: https://pamoza.org/ Sign up for updates, prayer requests, and volunteer opportunities at pamoza.org About the Peaceful Hugs Podcast The Peaceful Hugs Podcast is a space for thoughtful, real conversations about faith, culture, purpose, and the stories that shape us. Hosted by Mark Zeringer and Lorelei Cromer, the show brings together voices from different backgrounds and generations to explore what it means to live with empathy — especially when the world feels loud, polarized, and quick to judge. At the center of it all is a simple idea: kindness matters, and we can't afford to lose it.

How Chess Built A Life Worth: With James Canty III

In this episode of the Peaceful Hugs Podcast, hosts Mark Zahringer and Lorelei Cromer sit down with James Canty III — FIDE Master, chess boxing world champion, streamer, coach, and entrepreneur — for an energizing conversation about resilience, reinvention, and what chess can teach you about life. James shares the journey that took him from the chess clubs of Detroit — where his father used the game to keep him off dangerous streets — to winning a world championship in Serbia against a 260-pound opponent with 20 years of boxing experience. Along the way, he opens up about breaking stereotypes, building a brand from scratch, and why he believes chess is one of the most powerful tools for shaping young minds. The conversation explores what it really takes to master something — the obsession, the sacrifice, the years of losing before winning — and how those same principles apply to boxing, trading, coaching, and life. James also reflects on what it means to be a Black chess master in a game that doesn't always look like him, and why he's committed to changing that. Takeaways Mastery in anything requires obsession, passion, and the willingness to lose — repeatedly — before you win. Chess is a game of life: every move matters, and strategy applies far beyond the board. Breaking stereotypes starts with showing up and being undeniably yourself. Income through a passion takes creativity — playing tournaments alone won't pay the bills, but streaming, coaching, and content can. The FIDE rating system is the only one that matters globally — and most American kids in under-resourced cities never learn that. Representation changes what young people believe is possible for themselves. Chess and boxing aren't opposites — both demand discipline, pattern recognition, and emotional control under pressure. Teaching is learning twice: coaching others deepens your own mastery. You never know who's watching your content — or how much they need it. Trust God, stay faithful, and show up — even when the path isn't clear. Chapters 00:15 Welcome & Introduction to James Canty III 02:30 Growing Up in Detroit: Chess as a Lifeline 06:55 All the Kingsmen Chess Club and Learning to Lose 10:37 The Moment It Clicked: Summer Mornings with Dad 14:20 Going Undefeated at Nationals — From Bench to Best on the Team 17:45 The Military, the Bills, and Putting Chess on Hold 21:03 The Millionaire Chess Open: Selling the Xbox to Chase $40K 25:25 Knight H4 — The Most Expensive Move Never Made 29:50 Building a Brand: Streaming, YouTube, and Making Chess Cool 34:05 FIDE Master, Funding, and the Pathways Nobody Told Him About 38:27 Chess Boxing: Brains, Brawn, and a World Title in Serbia 44:42 Fighting a 260-Pound Kazakhstani with 20 Years of Boxing Experience 49:15 What's Next: The Grand Master Title and Life Beyond the Ring 53:30 Coaching the Next Generation — Chess, Boxing, and Trading Connect with James Canty III Instagram: @jamescantythethird Twitch & YouTube: James Canty III About the Peaceful Hugs Podcast The Peaceful Hugs Podcast is a space for thoughtful, real conversations about faith, culture, purpose, and the stories that shape us. Hosted by Mark Zeringer and Lorelei Cromer, the show brings together voices from different backgrounds and generations to explore what it means to live with empathy — especially when the world feels loud, polarized, and quick to judge. At the center of it all is a simple idea: kindness matters, and we can't afford to lose it. 57:55 Final Reflections: Best Advice and Books Everyone Should Read