This is a re-release of Season 7 episode 9 with Gretchen Miura.

Gretchen and Sarah run Lighthouse Circle together, and cohort 6 is now open. You can read more here - https://www.sarahfuruya.com/grief-support-lighthouse-circle-2025

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Listen to Sarah and Gretchen talk about Gretchen’s life story and how following Dragons became a golden thread in her story. We touch on grief and how it weaves into full life story. It is part of the fullness of a life lived and expressed. Below is the original podcast that prompted the whole Lighthouse Circle as we spent the entire conversation talking about Gretchen’s loss, when she was 5 and her big brother, Chris was 17.

Gretchen is outstandingly generous in her storytelling and we uncover a string of coincidences that led to this being called the ‘Legend of Dragons’.

This is a re-release of Season Three Episode One of the Legends Podcast with Gretchen Miura & Sarah Furuya.

This was the genesis of the Lighthouse Circle Grief Support group. We are now open for Cohort 6 - https://www.sarahfuruya.com/grief-support-lighthouse-circle-2025

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Introducing Gretchen Miura Legend of Healing. Gretchen is a mindfulness teacher, avid maker and mother of four. Originally from New Jersey in America, Gretchen lives in northern Japan on the Oga peninsula where she and her husband run a Zen temple. She hosts mindfulness retreats, classes and workshops in English, as well as traditional ceremonies and activities for the local community. She sells her handmade bento bags, face masks and accessories at her online shop SORAbento. She is living a life focused on creativity, belonging and connection.

This episode is dedicated to Chris.

When Gretchen was 5, her 17 year old brother died in a car accident. This is the backdrop of her life since then. In this conversation Gretchen takes us on the journey of Chris, his death , her family, religion, and her path to acknowledging, dealing with and healing the suffering attached to her loss. And in fact the family loss.

We talk about Catholicism, Buddhism and try and tease apart the humanity of grief and loss, of joy and living. How her 4 children taught her so much about her brother, through the tenderness of the relationship of her youngest daughter and oldest son.

Gretchen and her temple and family are quite well known and she has appeared in an NHK documentary about her temple and the people around it. She is something of a celebrity in the area!

This is a deep and rich conversation that goes into the depth of grief, the rituals surrounding death. All the way to the end more and more learnings come out between us and we will have a part 2 later in the year because we didn’t even touch on Gretchen’s hilarious journey to being the parent of 4 and married to a Zen priest in a remote peninsula in Northern Japan!

- The surprising joy the has come from meeting her grief

- Having authority over the suffering

- The first and second arrows of loss

- That’s all there is! Hear her thoughts on enlightenment

- Facing and dealing with grief creates fertile ground for magical experiences

- Grief, love, life and ritual

- How her children brought her closer to connecting to her brother

- How faith brought the family through Chris’ death yet she struggled to connect with that same faith

- How she connects and can continue to connect with Chris

- Incidents that allowed stress to be dissolved

- We have to take of one another

- Universal truths and satori

Links & where to find her here:

Dairyuji Temple Instagram

Dairyuji temple in Oga Akita

Zeb Soto Sect

Poet Laureate Joy Harjo

Online Shop: Sorabento

Griefworks by Julia Samuel

The word I was scrambling for is ‘flippant’.

In this deeply moving and thought-provoking episode of the Legends Podcast, host Sarah Furuya sits down with the miraculous Matthew Dons, a figure who has not only transformed his own life but has profoundly impacted the world around him over the past eight years. This is the final episode of Season 8, themed Skin in the Game, and it brings a powerful close with insights on life, death, and the miraculous experiences that shape our journeys.

In this episode, we discuss:

• Matthew’s Miracle: The extraordinary story of Matthew Dons and the miraculous transformations in his life, particularly in the face of death.
• Facing Mortality: How Matthew's confrontation with his mortality has reshaped his view of the world, life, and the choices he makes every day.
• The Power of Presence: What it means to be truly present in life when you are living with a terminal diagnosis, and how that presence transforms relationships, ambitions, and daily experiences.
• Lessons on Death and Dying: Matthew shares the insights he has gained from walking a path many fear, offering listeners a unique perspective on accepting death as a natural part of life.
• Inspiration for Others: This episode is not only about Matthew's experience but also serves as a beacon of hope and inspiration for others who may be grappling with their own challenges.

If you enjoyed this episode and it inspired you in some way, we’d love to hear about it and know your biggest takeaway. Head over to Apple Podcasts to leave a review and we’d love it if you would come and say hi over on @sarahfuruyacreative on Instagram.

About Matthew

Matthew Dons is a marketing consultant and business coach from the UK. He has been living in Tokyo since 2007.

Matthew came to Japan to study traditional Japanese martial arts. His other hobbies include baking, studying the history of technology and watching 80’s films.

In July 2016 Matthew was suddenly diagnosed with terminal cancer, also known as stage 4 cancer. The cancer had spread a lot so his life expectancy, with treatment, was just 7-9 months. Although crowdfunding and cutting-edge immunotherapy have helped him live almost 8 years so far, he’s still in a life-and-death fight every day.

Although Matthew is very cynical, he was genuinely shocked to discover there’s no serious effort in any country to stop people dying of cancer. This is despite the fact cancer kills around 10 million people every year, and it destroys the lives of many more people. It’s a brutal disease, with equally-brutal treatments. Experiencing this firsthand motivated him to set up the non-profit Make Cancer History.

Make Cancer History connects patients, oncologists and researchers to share cancer knowledge and save lives.

Connect with Matthew & Donate

https://www.matthewdons.org

https://www.makecancerhistory.jp/

https://www.makecancerhistory.jp/donate/

Connect with Sarah

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/sarah-furuya-creative

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sarahfuruyacreative/

Facebook:

Release from daily bullshit is fertile ground for creative freedom, frank talk and advocacy. Also good men, creative forces and the usual rabbit hole of musings with Sarah.

In this episode:

• Sarah muses on her final guest of the season’s daily dialogues with death. They are in a unique position to be absolutely unfiltered because they are close to mortality in every single day and have been for 8 years.
• This takes Sarah on a trip into inquiries around good men, masks, latest obsessions, interests and thoughts about life.
• and more....

If you enjoyed this episode and it inspired you in some way, we’d love to hear about it and know your biggest takeaway. Head over to Apple Podcasts to leave a review and we’d love it if you would come and say hi over on @sarahfuruyacreative on Instagram.

Connect with Sarah

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/sarah-furuya-creative

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sarahfuruyacreative/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sarahfuruyacreative

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXsuS_yVT9fMHjhAylVy8-w

This week I sat down with the remarkable Sarajean Rossitto, a force of positive change in the nonprofit sector. With a wealth of experience and a passion for empowering communities, Sarajean shares her journey, insights, and the pivotal moments that have shaped her career.

Sarajean and I could have talked for hours. She truly is a legend of influence, impact and social change. Currently based out of Tokyo, Japan, hailing from New York State in America, with her ancestry in Italy we talk about the influence of her Italian side (which relates to my Liverpool side) on her way of being in the world, in this conversation and her commitment to hope for the USA.

Sarajean and I met in 2008 at a Career Strategy Seminar run by FEW, For Empowering Women in Japan. It was like a baptism of fire meeting her and all the other incredible women in my midst at that point and it was a pivotal event in my life. Little did we know that just 4 years later we would be the President and Vice President of the same organisation and forge a fiery and loving relationship that would endure to this day.

Not only that but we, along with another good friend whom we met at the same 2008 career seminar, would be the Ladies of honour for previous Legends, Angela Ortiz Pettas and her husband Nicholas Pettas. Seriously, you couldn’t script this stuff - all three of us met Angela through different channels too. It’s just the Ordinary Magic.

Sarajean is a courageous and committed activist, who puts her passion for social impact ahead of her own image. She is at the forefront of what needs to happen next and does not necessarily have lofty ideas about world-changing activity, but focuses on what she CAN do in her own sphere of influence and networks.

She holds lecturing positions at Temple University Japan and Sophia University largely focussed on social change initiatives. She is continually proposing new courses, based on the latest information available.

NPOs, News outlets and social impact groups all seek out Sarajean’s counsel and consultation to better serve their clients, and communities or in order to communicate correctly. I wonder how she remains hopeful, something that I sometimes have difficulty with and she explains this in the show.

I was interested in this based on her work with American politics. She does not underestimate the influence that the 38 million Americans living outside of the 50 states can have in elections and as such she works to influence and impact those voters. Much like Terri McMillan, legend of Humans who also got involved in canvassing.

Sarajean has a vim and verve that is hard to resist. She is terrific fun, a trained chef, skilled orator, actor and director and loves fiercely. Her optimism has nothing to do with toxic positivity but a firm foundation of hope and belief that small differences can have an impact that will help humans.

“I am not necessarily a happy person, but I am an excited person”

SJR

I will definitely invite Sarajean back for round 2 because we didn’t touch upon her art, the plays she has directed and appeared in and her support of and promotion of local drama groups.

Here are some gems from our conversation:

• Having skin in the game means investing myself in whatever I believe in, in a way, that I can feel proud

In this episode of Legends Podcast, Sarah Furuya delves into the themes of "Saunter & Frolic", "Creative Musings" and "Slowing Down".

Sarah shares her reflections and experiences over the past few weeks, discussing the inevitability of celebrity influence and the impact it has on our daily lives. She candidly recounts an incident involving a partially recorded session and the challenges of staying focused amidst interruptions. This episode promises to provide listeners with an insightful and engaging exploration of creativity and personal musings.

In this episode:

• The core theme centers around the benefits of slowing down both body and mind.
• The importance of resilience and adaptability when facing unexpected disruptions in creative endeavors and Insights gained from dealing with creative setbacks.
• Thoughtful examination of celebrity culture and its pervasive influence.
• Practical tips for integrating slow living principles into everyday routines to enhance mental health and productivity.

and more....

If you enjoyed this episode and it inspired you in some way, we’d love to hear about it and know your biggest takeaway. Head over to Apple Podcasts to leave a review and we’d love it if you would come and say hi over on @sarahfuruyacreative on Instagram.

Connect with Sarah

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/sarah-furuya-creative

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sarahfuruyacreative/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sarahfuruyacreative

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXsuS_yVT9fMHjhAylVy8-w

Once again, Skin in the Game is described as taking some kind of risk; in Stevens' case in service of the art, the music, the listener, the singers, and himself. In service of the third entity; the actual entity that sits with a life, between all these individual entities. And being vulnerable in the name of authenticity and in the name of creating the very best experience of the music for all the players.

Being a conductor and a composer is a special niche of humanity, yet it relates to any of us who are trying to bring things together in the service of beauty, art and muse.

You will also hear the peculiar habits of non-Japanese in Japan who pepper their language with Japanese words without a second thought and also how we tend to mix and match, forgetting our English words from time to time!

We talk about the Muses, the Greek Chorus and the concepts of time Kronos and Kyros, Kronos being the currently culturally popular time of linear time; the time of clocks and calendars; it can be quantified and measured. Kronos is linear, moving inexorably out of the determinate past towards the determined future and has no freedom. Kyros is numinous. Kyros is a time of festivals and fantasies; it cannot be controlled or possessed. Numinous means "arousing spiritual or religious emotion; mysterious or awe-inspiring"; also "supernatural" or "appealing to the aesthetic sensibility”. We muse on how the art emerges from these numinous timelines and the conditions one can create in order to nudge the muse or to find one’s way into creation. Steven tells the story of how after 7 months of being unable to finish a score, from the outdoor bath of the local onsen, a visitation had him scurry home to complete his work of art. I wonder how I or we can create these conditions for creativity to enter, or for the muse to deliver the next piece of our art.

Steven describes himself as ‘the Young Sheldon’ of music, compelled to challenge authority figures if he thought that there were teaching inaccuracies.

Steven also talks about Darma - something he studied with a Swami who coincidentally lives ten minutes from me in Zushi (I’ll chalk this up to the Ordinary Magic). This is not a popular or well-known neighborhood at all.

Back in the world of Kronos Time, Steven has done many many tens of thousands of hours of musical devotion, starting at music school, where he sang at least 7 times a week and where the academic tutors were told to never give more than 30 minutes homework to these choral students, lest their practice be interrupted. While Steven described this as ‘enlightened’ he also acknowledged there may be downsides and it put me in mind of neurodivergent folk getting accommodations in school or in work. Enlightened - bending time and rules in service of the output.

One way to lead a life is through scarcity - through the expectations of others, which is not necessarily a bad thing, but could be vexing to the Spirit. Another way to lead a life is to follow your heart, but the intuitive promotions of the heart and the other ways to lead a life is to listen to everyone else

I know that I get really creative every time I get on the train to Tokyo, sometimes even almost missing my stop as my creative mind works in Kyros, but those pesky trains run on Kronos! Rest, Water, and Transition. Creating conditions for emergence of art. Travel could be typified as the in-between time. Neither here nor there; betwixt and between. A liminal space affording the muses a channel by which to enter our consensus reality.

We talk about the technical elements of music and in addition to the physics of vibrations, the mystical, soulful, impact that these have on our sacred

Kwan Chan - what a man! He is so humble and genuine, I felt peace talking to him. He has this lovely childlike essence coupled with an absolutely mature and mindful approach-building skill and he has incredible body strength - check out his YouTube channel to see his breaking. Skills that apply not only to dance but all areas of life. It was just the conversation I needed to have. Sage wisdom from this fierce and gentle soul. And deep creativity.

I was blown away by his answer to my final question “There are many ways to lead a life - what does that mean to you?"

It’s more than enough to provide quality and value to the people you reach.

In this Podcast you will learn:

• The essence, lineage and canon of breaking and where we feel it;
• The physical manifestation of the spirit and the creative process (for him it isn’t too crazy)
• We learn a lot about the history of dance
• How your physicality can signal dignity - through amazing dance and physicality, we come to conclusions that can relate to writing and other forms of expression
• In talking about his work counselling children in London primary schools, I ask a big question of Kwan about his own reflections - his answer is not won easily but it is beautifully thought out, expressed and revealing. This work is important.

If you enjoyed this episode and it inspired you in some way, we’d love to hear about it and know your biggest takeaway. Head over to Apple Podcasts to leave a review and we’d love it if you would come and say hi over on @sarahfuruyacreative on Instagram.

About Kwan

Kwan Chan was born in Hong Kong and grew up in Toronto. In September 2023, after working in Japan for seven years, Kwan moved to London, UK, to pursue a Master's degree in Dance Movement Psychotherapy at Goldsmiths, University of London. Kwan is a breaker and has been breaking for more than 17 years. Additionally, Kwan is a singer-songwriter and plays the acoustic guitar. In London, Kwan continues to train, compete, and teach breaking, remaining quite active in the local breaking scene. As a singer-songwriter, Kwan frequently performs at open mics throughout the city. Kwan also works part-time in a primary school as a school mentor, providing counselling and supporting students with their mental and emotional well-being.

Links

Apache Sugarhill Gang https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQObWW06VAM

Give it up and turn it loose James Brown https://youtu.be/921kqkHOHDo?si=u0SN1BJdKZdg42gX

Just begun Jimmy Castor https://youtu.be/WylCcdTrzS4?si=Zkv1UQ0mksWwW1s4

Connect with Kwan

Website: www.kwankchan.com/

Instagram: www.instagram.com/kwankitchan/

LinkTree: www.linktr.ee/kwanchan

Facebook: www.facebook.com/kwanchan91

Connect