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📖 Episode 13 Summary

In this episode, Amanda explores a powerful and unexpected story that reveals where real innovation often begins: curiosity, play, and creative thinking — before the world teaches us to be “realistic.”

The episode centers on a 14-year-old who discovered that a specific origami fold could hold up to 10,000 times its own weight — a breakthrough with real implications for emergency shelters and disaster relief. But this conversation isn’t about origami or age.

It’s about human potential before it’s constrained.

Drawing on her Stanford-based training in creativity, mindfulness, and emotional intelligence, Amanda breaks down why children are often our greatest teachers when it comes to solving complex problems — and how creativity doesn’t disappear in adulthood, but becomes shaped by belief systems, fear of failure, and attachment to outcomes.

She explores the shift from play to performance, why experimentation fuels innovation, and how environments that encourage curiosity allow ideas to evolve into real-world solutions.

Listeners are guided through a reflective inner-game exercise to uncover:

• where early beliefs still influence their decisions today
• how hesitation, overthinking, or perfectionism may be limiting experimentation
• and what idea or desire has quietly been asking for space to grow

This episode is a reminder that creativity isn’t something you wait to rediscover — it’s something you actively cultivate, strengthen, and refine through curiosity, experimentation, and trust in yourself. Innovation doesn’t start with certainty or permission; it starts with the willingness to explore what’s possible.

Referenced Resources

• A 14-year-old won $25,000 for origami. He discovered a pattern that can hold 10,000 times its own weight, he says.

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📖 Episode 12 Summary

In this episode, Amanda breaks down a surprising founder story from Slack’s early days — including the moment Stewart Butterfield publicly called out Slack’s first product and how the team responded in an unexpected way. Rather than focusing on shock value, Amanda uses the story to reveal what it teaches us about creativity, innovation, and the inner game required to build something that doesn’t exist yet.

She explores the mindset shifts that separate game changers from the crowd — how they interpret tough feedback, how they move through imperfection, and how they turn discomfort into forward momentum.

Listeners are then invited into a simple but powerful reflection exercise to identify the qualities that already make them creative — and the edges that, when strengthened, unlock their next level of potential.

This episode is a masterclass in thinking like a founder, experimenting like a creator, and reframing embarrassment as one of your greatest tools for growth.

Referenced Resources

• Business Insider feature on Slack’s early founder story

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📖 Episode 11 Summary

In this episode of Game Changer, Amanda Escobedo zooms out from the headlines to ask a deeper question: How are media narratives shaping the way you think, feel, and move through your life?

Amanda opens by revisiting the core purpose of the podcast — not to tell you what to think, but to give you tools for how to think. She breaks down a Morning Brew article on “rough work amid a rough job market,” showing how emotionally charged narratives can be built on thin or mismatched data. Using this as a case study, she teaches listeners to separate facts from tales, spot when fear is being sold as reality, and reclaim their ability to see the world more objectively.

From there, Amanda shifts into the inner game: how frustration and “brick wall” moments can actually be gateways to self-discovery and creativity. She shares how quieting external noise — especially media noise — is essential to hearing your own intuition and recognizing the signs, synchronicities, and inner nudges that are already guiding you.

The episode culminates in the powerful story of Jenny Wood, a former Google executive who left an 18-year career to pursue a more aligned path. Amanda uses Jenny’s journey — and her own layoff story — to illustrate the difference between living by external data (status, security, headlines) and living by inner knowing. Listeners are invited to reframe fear as a signal of growth, view their own career crossroads as part of the hero’s journey, and see themselves as Game Changers capable of transforming frustration into purpose, impact, and legacy.

Referenced Resources

• Morning Brew – “People open to rough work amid rough job market”
• Business Insider – “I quit Google after 18 years on the job. It was scary but I did it well — here’s how.”