Think Outside the Lines

The old scripts for how to live, work, and belong are breaking down. Think Outside the Lines is a podcast for anyone ready to stop checking boxes, step off autopilot, and start living with intention. Host Shawn Feeney spent over a decade leading teams at Apple, Microsoft, and high-pressure tech startups before dedicating his work to helping others live more intentionally. The show explores what happens when we choose to build the life we want rather than accepting the one we were handed.

Think Outside the Lines is a education podcast hosted by Shawn Feeney, with 55 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80.

Shawn Feeney hosts Think Outside the Lines, a education show with 55 episodes published.

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  Think Outside the Lines

  Amanda Udis-Kessler (Pt 2): What If You Traded Control for Presence?

  Sep 25, 20261 hour

  When Amanda Udis-Kessler came back for a second conversation, the ground had shifted again. In Part 1, she told the story of rebuilding her entire life at sixty. This time she goes inward, to the harder, quieter work of showing up as her whole self once the external obstacles are gone. What she keeps hearing, in her job, her friendships, and her own healing, is a single instruction: trade control for presence. After sixty years of managing life's challenges by trying to control everything, she is learning to simply be there, to listen more than she speaks, and to trust that presence alone can meet the needs of a moment. She calls the old habit the conscientious cartographer. The new practice is being a steady witness. Amanda is a queer pastor leading a progressive Christian congregation in Colorado Springs, which she calls the Evangelical Vatican of the United States. From that vantage point, the conversation opens out into attention and overwhelm in a culture built to keep us reactive, what it means to witness someone rather than fix them, and the internalized homophobia many of us absorbed without ever choosing it. This is a conversation about presence over control, listening over solving, and finding creativity and hope in a loud, fast, divided moment. In this episode, we explore: What it means to trade control for presence, and why that is so hard after a lifetime of managing everything The difference between being a witness and being a fixer, and why people often just need to be heard How the urge to give advice can come from insecurity rather than confidence Why our feeds, our culture, and even our institutions are built to keep us overwhelmed and reactive Practical ways to notice the default toward negativity and gently choose something else What it is like to be a queer pastor in one of the most conservative cities in the country Internalized homophobia, how it shows up, and why we don't talk about it enough Reclaiming language and faith that were once used to cause harm Where Amanda finds hope, and why her creativity feels like evidence of something bigger than herself Resources & Links: Connect with Amanda, her books, music, and work → amandaudiskessler.com Her free progressive worship music → queersacredmusic.com Ready to step off autopilot? Visit thinkoutsidethelines.com to access free worksheets designed to help you cut through the noise, ask the right questions, and finally hear yourself clearly Explore 1:1 coaching and other resources at thinkoutsidethelines.com Follow along on all platforms → @thinkoutsidethelines Enjoyed the episode? Please share it with someone who might need to hear it, and subscribe so you don't miss what's coming next.

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  Think Outside the Lines

  Amanda Udis-Kessler (Pt 1): What If the Wake-Up Call Isn't One Big Moment? Amanda Udis-Kessler (Pt 2): What If You Traded Control for Presence?

  Sep 18, 202646 min

  At sixty, in the span of a single year, Amanda Udis-Kessler ended a thirty-year relationship, left the home she shared, walked away from a two-decade career in higher education, and became the pastor of a small church. From the outside it can look like one dramatic reinvention. Up close, it was anything but. There was no single lightning-bolt moment. There was a cancer diagnosis that reminded her she would not live forever. There was a health crisis that interrupted a lifelong eating disorder and, for the first time, left her unable to numb what she was feeling. There was a quiet, years-long knowing that something was off, and a marriage she could not bring herself to leave until her partner found the courage to ask the question first. Amanda is a writer, a musician, and now a pastor in Colorado Springs, a city she calls the Evangelical Vatican of the United States. In this first of two conversations, she traces how all of these threads came together, and what it took to finally say yes to a life that fit. This is a conversation about the slow, stumbling nature of real change, the difference between numbing a feeling and facing it, codependency and the boundaries that finally set her free, and why creating the life you want is rarely one big leap and more often a series of small, brave gates you walk through one at a time. In this episode, we explore: Why a wake-up call is rarely one dramatic moment, and more often a slow stumble through many smaller ones How ending a long relationship, leaving home, and changing careers all unfolded in a single year What it means to finally say yes to a change you have avoided for years How a lifelong eating disorder kept hard emotions at bay, and what surfaced when she could no longer numb them Codependency in both a marriage and a career, and the boundaries that made a healthier life possible The boundary described as "the distance at which I can love both you and myself" Why you cannot change another person, only model change through the work you do on yourself Choosing progressive Christianity as a form of resistance, and stepping into ministry in a deeply conservative city How to sit with a discomfort you can't yet name, and gently ask it what it is about Resources & Links: Connect with Amanda, her books, music, and work → amandaudiskessler.com Her free progressive worship music → queersacredmusic.com Ready to step off autopilot? Visit thinkoutsidethelines.com to access free worksheets designed to help you cut through the noise, ask the right questions, and finally hear yourself clearly Explore 1:1 coaching and other resources at thinkoutsidethelines.com Follow along on all platforms → @thinkoutsidethelines Enjoyed the episode? Please share it with someone who might need to hear it, and subscribe so you don't miss what's coming next.

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  Think Outside the Lines

  What Permission Are You Still Waiting For?

  Sep 11, 20265 min

  There's something you want to do. You've thought about it for months, maybe years. You've imagined it, researched it, talked around it with friends who told you to go for it. And still, you haven't started. If someone asked you why, you'd have a list of good, practical reasons. But underneath all of them is a simpler one you probably haven't said out loud: you're waiting for permission. This short solo episode sits with that quiet truth. Nobody hands out permission slips for career changes, creative projects, or hard conversations, and the signal you keep waiting for is never going to come, because that is not how permission works. The people who love you can tell you they're proud, that they support you, that you're ready, and it helps, but you still go home and don't start. The permission gap was never between you and them. It's between you and yourself. In this episode, I explore: Why "the timing isn't right" and "I need to learn more first" are often permission-seeking in disguise Where the habit of looking up for approval begins, and why it outlives the childhood that taught it The difference between managing, waiting for the green light, and leading, giving it to yourself Why no one in any hierarchy is going to authorize the choices that matter most to you What it looks like to grant yourself permission, quietly and without apology, and start now Resources & Links: Ready to step off autopilot? Visit thinkoutsidethelines.com to access free worksheets designed to help you cut through the noise, ask the right questions, and finally hear yourself clearly Explore 1:1 coaching and other resources at thinkoutsidethelines.com Follow along on all platforms → @thinkoutsidethelines Enjoyed the episode? Please share it with someone who might need to hear it, and subscribe so you don't miss what's coming next.

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  Think Outside the Lines

  Gila Melamed: What If You've Been on the Right Path All Along?

  Sep 4, 202654 min

  At fifty-something, Gila Melamed gave away ninety-eight percent of what she owned, converted first a small car and then a minivan into a home, and drove off to live nomadically in the wild she had always felt she belonged to. She does not call it an escape. She calls it an experiment in alignment. The road was the last step in a much longer story. Years earlier, at her lowest point, Gila survived a moment that nearly ended her life. A single sentence from her therapist, that a decision made seventeen years ago could be remade, gave her back her breath. She asked for a divorce that same day, and slowly began the years-long work of coming back to herself. Underneath it all was a childhood shaped by an abusive father, a loneliness she carried for decades, and the belief that her sensitivity was something wrong with her. Through her own healing, she came to understand it as her greatest strength. On a hot morning in Yosemite, off the trail and drawn toward the view like a magnet, she had the realization that anchors her life now: she had been on the right path all along. Gila is a former home and color designer turned nomad, writer, and self-published author of three books who documents her journey on Substack. She lives simply, works seasonally to fund her travels, and treats fear not as something to eliminate but as a dance partner she walks with every single day. This is a conversation about surrender, learning to trust yourself after a lifetime of other people's voices, the difference between fear and intuition, breaking generational patterns, and what becomes possible when you stop waiting and finally give yourself the life your heart has been asking for. In this episode, we explore: Leaving a conventional life to live on the road, not as an escape but as an experiment in alignment The turning point that gave her back her life, and the single sentence that changed everything Coming home to yourself after decades of living by other people's voices Why she came to see her sensitivity as a strength rather than a flaw Breaking generational trauma, and choosing to parent differently than she was raised The realization in Yosemite that she had been on the right path all along Fear as a dance partner, and how to tell the difference between fear and intuition Surrender, uncertainty, and finding aliveness in not having a plan How solitude in nature became a mirror and a teacher The quiet ceremony of a slow morning, and presence as a daily practice Writing as a way to process, and letting a loud inner voice lead her to finally share her story If you or someone you know is struggling, the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline is available 24/7 in the US. Call or text 988. Resources & Links: Connect with Gila, find her three books, and follow her blog → gilacolorguru.com Ready to step off autopilot? Visit thinkoutsidethelines.com to access free worksheets designed to help you cut through the noise, ask the right questions, and finally hear yourself clearly Explore 1:1 coaching and other resources at thinkoutsidethelines.com Follow along on all platforms → @thinkoutsidethelines Enjoyed the episode? Please share it with someone who might need to hear it, and subscribe so you don't miss what's coming next.

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  Think Outside the Lines

  What Would You Choose If No One Was Watching?

  Aug 28, 20265 min

  Here is a question that sounds simple and gets uncomfortable fast. What would you choose if no one was watching? Not what would you do without consequences. That is a different question. This one is about audience. Because most of us are performing all the time, and we have been doing it so long we have forgotten we are doing it. This short solo episode looks at the quiet cost of that performance. The steady editing of yourself for the room. Saying what will land instead of what you actually think. Choosing the path that makes sense to other people instead of the one that makes sense to you. It adds up slowly, choice by choice, until someone asks what you truly want and you realize you are not sure. The good news is that authenticity is far less exhausting than performance, and deciding for yourself is a skill you can practice, starting small. In this episode, I explore: How performing becomes invisible, until the edited version of you is the only one you remember The real reason it is so draining: living your life while monitoring how it looks to everyone else The difference between managing your image and leading from the inside Why deciding for yourself is a skill, and why it can feel exposed at first Small places to start choosing for you, from what you order at dinner to when you leave the party Resources & Links: Ready to step off autopilot? Visit thinkoutsidethelines.com to access free worksheets designed to help you cut through the noise, ask the right questions, and finally hear yourself clearly Explore 1:1 coaching and other resources at thinkoutsidethelines.com Follow along on all platforms → @thinkoutsidethelines Enjoyed the episode? Please share it with someone who might need to hear it, and subscribe so you don't miss what's coming next.

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