On the 148th episode of What is a Good Life?, I welcome Leigh Marz, a collaboration and leadership coach for major universities, corporations, and federal agencies. She has led training programs to promote an experimental mindset among teams at NASA and a decade-long cross-sector collaboration to reduce toxic chemicals in products, in partnership with Green Science Policy Institute, Harvard University, IKEA, Google, and Kaiser Permanente. Leigh coauthored Golden: The Power of Silence in a World of Noise and cofounded Astrea Strategies, helping leaders bridge contemplation and action. 

In this conversation we explore silence as a living presence—how inquiry, pauses, and shared quiet unlock better thinking, connection, and wellbeing. We cover mapping noise (auditory, informational, internal), flow states, and why slowing down in groups (even at work) sparks novel solutions. 

This episode invites listeners to rediscover silence as a living teacher — one that reveals what truly matters when we’re quiet enough to hear it.

For more of Leigh's work:
Link to the book: Golden: The Power of Silence in a World of Noise
Astrea Strategies: https://astreastrategies.com/
Her website: https://leighmarz.com/

Contact me at mark@whatisagood.life if you'd like to explore your own lines of self-inquiry through 1-on-1 coaching, my 5-week group courses, or to discuss team coaching to stimulate greater trust, communication, and connection, amongst your leadership teams.

- For the What is a Good Life? podcast's YouTube page: https://www.youtube.com/@whatisagoodlife/videos
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- My LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-mccartney-14b0161b4/

00:03 – Intro & why start with questions

04:03 – Origins of the silence inquiry & HBR article

09:00 – “What’s the deepest silence you’ve known?” 

12:41 – Freedom moment: “Silence teems with life” 

16:41 – Quiet together: practices beyond meditation

24:44 – Mapping noise: auditory, informational, internal

29:33 – Antidote: signals you need silence & “positive distractions”

35:00 – Designing retreats for novel thinking 

38:21 – “Slow down, there isn’t much time.”

46:13 – Silence & the nervous system
52:00 - How the inquiry into silence has shaped Leigh

58:12 – Leigh’s response to “What is a good life?”