142. Filmmaker Tours 150 Small U.S. Communities: The Surprising, Positive Lessons with Sarah Yourgrau

Conspiracy of Goodness Podcast

The media seems to bombard us with stories of how bad it is “out there” and it would be easy to think that anywhere outside our particular pocket of the country is a bit frightening. But our guest today, Sarah Yourgrau, spent time in 150 small communities across America as a producer on Mike Rowe’s uplifting series: “Returning the Favor.” On this journey, she learned things that blew her away with joy. Here are some surprising stories that build a perspective we can all celebrate!

00:00 Preview

03:10 Sarah Yourgrau

• Sarah is a two time emmy award winning producer.
• Sarah has a background in theatre and anthropology.

04:51 No Mundane Moments

• The pandemic allowed us to confront our mortality.
• People started recognizing that the most fulfilling and nourishing parts of life are the everyday moments.
• Sarah produced a series called ‘Returning the Favor’.
• Returning the Favor had 145 episodes and over 450 million views.
• While filming Return the Favor, Sarah traveled the American landscape extensively.
• A big part of filming a documentary is gaining enough trust with people for them to share their stories.
• Sarah would go to these communities to build relationships in preparation for filming.
• In meeting with different communities, Sarah recognized that we have much more commonalities than we have differences.
• We don’t have enough pathways to meet each other.
• Stories are one of the best vehicles to create inroads for us to understand people we might never meet.

19:25 Community Change Agents

• Return the Favor was about identifying people in different communities who were positive change agents.
• The idea was to get the stories of the people doing good wok in their communities.
• The idea was to approach people with the idea of doing a docu series about them.
• The filming would culminate in a reveal when host Mike Rowe surprised participants with all the work that was being done to support and highlight their initiatives.

23:13 Break

26:13 Gamifying Curiosity

• Curiosity is the start point of genuine connection.
• The power of language is the greatest amplifier into each others’ personal paradigms.
• Sarah’s first goal in interacting with people is genuine connection and communication.
• We are often talking over each other and talking around each other.
• We don’t need to be threatened by someone else's world view or lived experience.
• We can have fun learning different perspectives.
• Being curious about others starts with being curious about yourself.

32:54 Assume We Know Nothing

• CEO of Ocean Alliance Dr. Iain Kerr appeared on The Conspiracy of Goodness Podcast Episode 116 and spoke about a drone flying over a whales to collect whale snot when the whale blows.
• Dr. Kerr talks about how little we know about whales based on the small glimpses we have of their lives when they surface.
• We know very little about people based on the small glimpses we have into their lives.
• Curiosity is an avenue for getting deeper views into peoples’ lives and build a reality that is much more reflective of the actual reality.

37:06 The Most Authentic Version of Me

• I am not attached to the person I was nor am I attached to the person I am, I am only attached to the most authentic version of me and that is always changing.
• Our narratives about the world have to be flexible.
• We lived in a time where all the assumptions that we thought were solid ended up shifting.
• Living is a dynamic act.
• Our world is changing based on the stories that we are telling ourselves.
• If we are intentional about absorbing more positive solution oriented news we can see our view of the world shift.
• “ We don’t see the world as it is, we see the world as we are” - Anais Nin
• Growth require change....