My mission at Zen & Callsigns is to find inner peace in a chaotic and often broken world through stories, humor, and interesting antidotes. Think Joe Rogan, Smedley Butler, Alan Watts, and Frank Herbert had a podcast baby. Zen & Callsigns strives to create a data-driven discussion about the true nature of our world and universe. It’s revealed in discussions based on science considered from a philosophical perspective. Sometimes, though, it's just an ex-military asshole shooting the shit.
Zen & Callsigns
Claim This Podcastby Blake Fisher
5.0(3 reviews)
43 episodes
Updated Bi-weekly
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Podcast Overview
My mission at Zen & Callsigns is to find inner peace in a chaotic and often broken world through stories, humor, and interesting antidotes. Think Joe Rogan, Smedley Butler, Alan Watts, and Frank Herbert had a podcast baby. Zen & Callsigns strives to create a data-driven discussion about the true nature of our world and universe. It’s revealed in discussions based on science considered from a philosophical perspective. Sometimes, though, it's just an ex-military asshole shooting the shit.
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Publishing Since
8/6/2024
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Recent Episodes
June 12, 2026
Ep 43 - Callsign: "Cata" - Economist, Mother, Conservationist, Rewilder
<p>Catalina Robledo's journey begins in Colombia, winds through London's economics programs, Geneva investment firms, global development work, and corporate leadership roles across three continents. By every conventional measure she was succeeding. Yet beneath the achievements sat a growing sense of disconnection that eventually culminated in depression. What followed was not a rejection of science, economics, or modernity, but an expansion beyond them. Through sacred medicine, indigenous wisdom, motherhood, conservation work, and deep personal reflection, Catalina began reconstructing her understanding of wealth, health, consciousness, and purpose. This conversation explores the space where rigorous analytical thinking meets ancient wisdom traditions, and what becomes possible when success is no longer measured solely by growth, achievement, or status, but by relationship, balance, and meaning.</p>
May 26, 2026
Ep 42 - Callsign: "Blueprint" - Actor, Producer, Storyteller, Father
<p>Theo van Dort joins the show for a wide-ranging conversation that starts in childhood and moves through performance, entrepreneurship, media, spirituality, and men’s mental health. He talks about growing up between Dutch and English family roots, being sick as a child, wanting to act from an early age, and being told by teachers he would never amount to anything. That path led him through drama school, theater-in-education, live television, shopping TV, online course production, and documentary work before eventually landing in Bali. </p><p>The emotional center of the episode comes later. Theo shares, in blunt and vulnerable detail, how financial collapse, panic attacks, sleep deprivation, and shame pushed him into a dark place in Bali. Out of that experience, and through the support of men’s circles, came a new mission: help men speak honestly before silence turns terminal. That mission became <strong>Brotherhood Blueprint</strong>, a documentary series and larger movement aimed at brotherhood, listening, and suicide prevention.</p><p>Key Themes</p><p><strong>Masculinity without theater</strong><br>This episode keeps returning to the difference between performing strength and actually living it.</p><p><strong>Brotherhood as infrastructure</strong>Men do not just need advice. They need spaces, repetition, ritual, and people who can hold weight with them.</p><p><strong>Story as medicine</strong>Theo’s whole life bends around storytelling, whether in acting, live TV, documentary, or men’s work. The medium changes. The underlying function stays the same.</p><p><strong>Success does not inoculate you from collapse</strong>A man can have experience, talent, family, and perspective and still hit the wall.</p><p><strong>Vulnerability is not softness</strong>Used rightly, it is a survival tool and a doorway to connection.</p><p><br></p><p>Timeline:00:00 Intro00:01 Theo’s childhood in England00:04 Fatherhood and inherited trauma00:08 Wanting to become an actor00:10 ADHD, school, and being underestimated00:13 Drama school and theater00:21 Breaking into TV00:27 First big presenting shot00:33 Gamifying television00:38 The suitcase story00:40 Building a major jewelry TV business00:42 Success, collapse, and hard lessons00:50 Online courses before they were mainstream01:02 Time of the Sixth Sun01:07 Why Theo moved to Bali01:13 Losing everything financially01:16 Bali Brotherhood01:21 The darkest moment01:24 Birth of Brotherhood Blueprint01:29 How men’s circles work01:35 Funding suicide hotlines through the mission01:41 Psychedelics and healing01:46 Closing thoughts</p>
April 24, 2026
Ep 41 - Callsign: “SMASHING” Brand Builder, Entrepreneur, Steward, Father
<p>Will Travis joins Zen & Callsigns for a conversation that moves far beyond branding and business. What starts as a story about creativity, advertising, and global agency success becomes something deeper: grief, reinvention, fatherhood, masculinity, failure, resilience, identity, and the long road back to authenticity. Will reflects on losing his father as an infant, growing up in a house full of strong women, struggling with dyslexia and bullying, building a persona to survive, and then using that persona to rise through the worlds of branding, design, and leadership. From New York and San Francisco to Bali, Saatchi, Sid Lee, and the founding of Elevation Barn, this episode is about what happens when success stops being enough and a man has to rebuild from the inside out.</p><p>Main Themes</p><ul><li>Childhood loss and carrying the legacy of an absent father</li><li>Growing up with strong women and becoming a listener</li><li>Boarding school, bullying, ADD, dyslexia, and grit</li><li>Persona, identity, and “the cloak” we wear to survive and success</li><li>Building a career in branding and creative leadership</li><li>Rejection, resilience, and using obstacles as fuel</li><li>Marriage, ego, collapse, and recovery</li><li>9/11, business collapse, physical injury, and total life disruption</li></ul><ul><li>Rebuilding through friendship, nature, mountains, and fatherhood</li><li>Turning down status and choosing family over ego</li><li>The origins and philosophy of Elevation Barn</li><li>Superpower versus nemesis</li><li>Presence, calm, and learning to live from a deeper center</li><li>AI, technology, and the hunger for real human connection</li></ul><p><br></p><p>Notable Story Beats</p><ul><ul><li>Will recalls being born while his father was dying of cancer and growing up as the vessel for his father’s legacy.</li><li>He describes a simple but vivid childhood shaped by solitude, imagination, strong women, and not much money.</li><li>At boarding school, he was bullied, struggled academically, and was told he was “thick,” later learning he was dyslexic and ADD.A pivotal lesson came from his stepfather after academic failure: when you hit a wall, work back from it until you find a way over, under, or around.</li><li>He entered branding and advertising almost as an extension of learning how to hear “no” and keep moving.</li><li>America became a major turning point, giving him confidence, momentum, and eventually career breakout.</li><li>He helped build a powerful design and branding agency culture, including the “Noise” books, and landed major clients like MTV, Columbia TriStar, Ford, PepsiCo, AT&T, Nike, and Sony.</li><li>At the height of success, ego overtook balance. He lost his marriage, then the dot-com collapse and 9/11 compounded personal and professional breakdown.</li><li>He rebuilt through physical challenge, mountains, friendship, fatherhood, and eventually a reevaluation of what mattered most.</li><li>He turned down a major role at Saatchi & Saatchi because he recognized it would cost him the life he actually wanted.</li><li>Elevation Barn emerged from a simple but powerful insight: people in transition often need a process, a peer group, and honest reflection more than more noise, more status, or more information. </li></ul><ul><li>The cloak: a persona can protect and propel you, but you have to know how to take it off.</li><li>The wall: every obstacle has a way over, under, or around it.</li><li>Superpower as nemesis: the thing people rely on you for is often also the place where you are hardest to help.</li><li>False summits: growth often requires going back down before you can climb higher.</li><li>The backpack of expectancy: modern life stacks pressure, identity, and performance until people forget who they are.</li><li>Branding for a person: just like a company, a human being needs clarity, direction, and a North Star.</li><li>Belonging matters more than performance theater.</li><li>Presence and quiet create space for truth to emerge. </li></ul><p><br></p><p><strong>Elevation Barn website:</strong> <a href="www.ElevationBarn.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferer">www.ElevationBarn.com</a></p></ul><ul><p><strong>Will’s personal site:</strong> <a href="www.willtravis.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferer">www.<strong>willtravis.com</strong></a></p></ul>
43 total episodes available
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