This week's show is with Shaaba Lotun and Jamie Raines. They've been together for 5 years, Jamie is transgender and since the beginning of his transition has documented his transition online. Together, they try and raise awareness of transgender issues, in the hope to help the LGBT+ community as a whole. They have recently set up a social enterprise, This Is Me., to continue supporting the LGBT+ community from a more official platform. Shaaba and Jamie both believe that gender identity and happiness are greatly linked, but that it is an incredibly complex relationship and topic that needs further exploration.

In this show we talked about what gender is really about - what's conditioned, what's innate and what we can explored.

What you'll learn from this episode:

• Your beliefs around gender might be more made up than you realise. There's a spectrum of ways that we can identify and express ourselves!
• Most of us have been conditioned to express our gender in ways that society deems as acceptable - it's interesting to explore which of those you find useful and which ones you'd like to explore beyond.
• You are free to be yourself. :-)

This week's show is with Michelle Atkin. Michelle is a mother to seven children, who she is immensely proud of. She has had an interesting and unconventional upbringing which she enjoys sharing with others in the hope that it others can feel less alone in the world.   In her professional capacity, Michelle works primarily with woman to support them to develop connections. This often starts with a  connection back to themselves in order to feel and understand their purpose in life at that moment.  Michelle has supported women in their parenting roles, having had a social enterprise for several years that became known nationally and internationally through various speaking opportunities. Michelle's passion is to build connections with, by and for people through simple and caring conversations.  She believes that underneath all the anxiety and pressures that we often feel and see, that we are all OK.

Michelle was raised in a cult and has spent the last 25 years recovering from and learning from it. In this show,  we explored the rather surprising topic of what we can learn from cults about connection!

What you'll learn from this episode:

• The desire for connection and being part of a tribe is primal, it's part of being human. It's no wonder that joining cults can be so appealing when they're giving people something that's so lacking in this modern world.
• There's an instant and effortless connection that we all had as children - pure presence - that's something that's still possible for us as adults, even though it's uncommon in today's world.
• The fear of being disconnected holds us back from leaving unhealthy situations - but on the other side of that leap of faith, there's always the opportunity for connection. That's because connection is innate.
• We are all connected all the time, we just lose the awareness of it.

This week's show is with Floris Koot. Floris Koot (58) is a 'Play Engineer' active in many fields. He co-founded a revolutionary school (Knowmads), developed a sport that breaks all the conventions (Switchball) and invented a piano method (learn to play freely in 15 minutes)! He trains a facilitates innovative processes.

He believes 'we' only win when everyone wins. Globally many people and organizations seek to work so that the whole will flourish through their activity. Floris contributes to this Gentle Revolution happening. He helps individuals and organisations to become more purpose driven, free and playful.

In this show, we explored the power of play - what exactly it is, why it's important and what are the benefits of us playing more. :-)

What you'll learn from this episode:

• Play frees us up to explore outside boundaries, breaks through patterns, think creatively and without focus on ticking boxes the 'right way'.
• We all can learn fast and effectively through play - in fact, Floris said, it's how nature has designed for us to learn.
• Play connects us  - it allows us to bring our full selves, our presence, to another person or situation and allows us to communicate beyond the bounds of defined roles and expectations.

This week's show is with Mamoon Yusaf is a Thought Leader, Peace Activist, and Transformational Coach of the Muslim community.

He is the star of the popular TV shows, ‘The Quran Coach’ and ‘Taqwa Transformation’, where he changes people’s lives through his powerful message of the Truth of the Inside-Out paradigm.

He’s the creator of the Quran For Busy People blog & podcast which has a current subscription base of over 10,000 people, from all parts of the world. His wildly popular training programs include: Instant Ihsan; Meet Him & Marry Him; Quran For Busy People; Effortless Transformation; and many more.

He’s the co-founder of IMPACT (the International Membership of Professional Advisors, Coaches & Trainers) and has delivered coaching programs on behalf of some of the biggest names in the personal development industry.

What you’ll learn from this episode:

• Mamoom said that the word 'If' is in the show title only because we don't understand what Islam is really about. It is a religion of peace. Islam means submission or surrender – however, it was derived from the root word “salam”. From this root word, you can also derive the words peace and safety.
• Terrorists are cherry picking the verses that justify why they're killing people. Those verses don't make sense in context of the parts of the Quran or the Quran as a whole.
• Terrorists have 'disease in their hearts', a state of mental dis-ease. They're doing what they're doing because they are at war with themselves, the world and God. This seems to me to be true for anyone who is behaving in ways that look horrible.
• How can we help change things for the better? By being at peace with ourselves and the world. And by understanding that describing terrorism as Islamic terrorism we are allowing Isis - and their warped definition of Islam - win.