From Sparks to Light - Inspiring Stories for Challenging Times
From Sparks to Light is the podcast about ordinary people doing extraordinary things. These are the stories of people who are giving back in different ways. Learn what inspires them and what they learned along the way. We hope their stories inspire you to find your spark and encourage you to shine your own precious light in the world.
Episodes
89 episodes since 2022
The Power of Women - Manizha Wafeq
At the age of 19, Manizha Wafeq traveled to Oklahoma City with 13 women to participate in Peace Through Business, a program to support women from her native Afghanistan to become entrepreneurs. No sooner had they arrived in the United States wh...
September 12, 2024
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Season 4
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Episode 78
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1:11:45
Summer Series - Ideas to Inspire with Koen van Rompay - One Small Step (ep. 57)
This summer we’re replaying some of our favorite episodes from season 3, episodes that offer inspirational ideas to help you get involved in making a difference in your community. This week we’re revisiting an episode with Koen van Romp...
August 01, 2024
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Season 3
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Episode 78
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1:00:23
Summer Series: Ideas to Inspire with Wendy Voet - Keep Moving Forward (ep. 53)
This summer we’re replaying some of our favorite episodes from season 3, episodes that offer inspirational ideas to help you get involved in making a difference in your community. This week we’re revisiting an episode with non-prof...
July 25, 2024
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Season 3
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Episode 80
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53:04
Summer Series: Ideas to Inspire with Dan Glass - Beautiful Trouble (ep. 52)
This summer we’re replaying some of our favorite episodes from season 3, episodes that offer inspirational ideas to help you get involved in making a difference in your community. This week we’re revisiting an episode with author a...
July 18, 2024
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Season 3
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Episode 79
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52:28
Summer Series: Ideas to Inspire with Joey Garcia - Say Yes (ep. 56)
This summer we're replaying some of our top episodes from season 3, episodes that offer inspirational ideas to help you get involved in making a difference in your community. This week we're revisiting an episode with Joey Garcia, ...
July 13, 2024
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Season 3
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Episode 78
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54:24
The Voices of Honoring Our Experience - Martina Clark
This is part 8 of a special series focusing on the community of Honoring Our Experience, and their work with long-term survivors of the HIV/AIDS virus.Today on the podcast we're revisiting a conversation from Season 2, with Mart...
June 27, 2024
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Season 3
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Episode 77
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1:00:43
The Voices of Honoring Our Experience - Greg Casillas
This is part 7 of a special series focusing on the community of Honoring Our Experience, and their work with long-term survivors of the HIV/AIDS virus.“I am an educator, listener, advocate, supporter and challenger,” reads Greg ...
May 30, 2024
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Season 3
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Episode 76
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1:01:40
Project: Music Heals Us - Molly Carr and Dana Martin
“I felt as empty as a drum,” says Molly Carr, a Juilliard-trained, world class violist. It was a career she had worked her whole young life for. She travelled the world and performed on some of music’s most iconic stages. From Carnegie Hall to ...
May 02, 2024
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Season 3
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Episode 75
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1:09:15
The Voices of Honoring Our Experience - Hulda Brown
"No matter who other people are, when you peel back the skin, we're all the same," says Hulda Brown of her struggle to find her place in a world that hasn't always been welcoming.The daughter of a single mom, she had a difficult childho...
April 24, 2024
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Season 3
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Episode 74
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42:28
Giving Joy - Joy Kolin
“I’m not Melinda Gates,” says Joy Kolin, the founder of Giving Joy, an organization that encourages and strengthens women entrepreneurship world wide through micro grants and mentorship. “But yo...
April 18, 2024
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Season 3
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Episode 73
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48:43
A Pioneer of Change - Mariana Incarnato
“I wanted to work in something that could better the lives of my community,” says Mariana Incarnato, an Ashoka Fellow and the Founder of Doncel, an agency in Buenos Aires Argentina that focuses on changing the way youth who leave residential ca...
April 11, 2024
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Season 3
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Episode 72
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50:11
The Adoptee’s Voice: La Voz del Hijo - Florencia Lalor
Florencia Lalor’s adopted family always spoke openly of her adoption. “It was one of the things they did right,” she says. And if she ever wanted to search for her birth mother, she always knew she would have their support. That moment came in ...
April 04, 2024
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Season 3
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Episode 71
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1:09:58
The Voices of Honoring Our Experience - Harry Breaux
This is part 5 of a special series focusing on the community of Honoring Our Experience, and their work with long-term survivors of the HIV/AIDS virus.Harry Breaux never thought he’d live past 30. His father died o...
March 28, 2024
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Season 3
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Episode 70
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56:58
Look for the Helpers - Cleveland Harvey
“I knew I wanted to look at things differently,” says Cleveland Harvey, a social worker who works in palliative care with people who are struggling with serious illnesses. “When I interact with people I want to either help or understand them be...
March 21, 2024
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Season 3
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Episode 69
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53:58
Episode Rewind: An Advocate for Children - Gary Mallon
Hi folks,March is national social work month. Social work is one of many professional helping careers, but it’s also an identity. I am a social worker, I tell my students with pride. It’s not my career, its my calling.&...
March 14, 2024
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Season 3
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Episode 68
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1:02:30
The Write Place - Paula Sheil
“I’m very much a proponent of chop wood, carry water. Just do,” says Paula Sheil, an educator, writer, poet and the founder and president of Tuleburg Press. “My sock drawer is incredibly organized.”It’s an old Zen proverb. Before enl...
March 07, 2024
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Season 3
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Episode 67
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54:31
The Voices of Honoring Our Experience - Deirdre "Speaks" Johnson
This is part 4 of a special series focusing on the work of Honoring Our Experience, and their work with longterm survivors of the HIV/AIDS virus.It started like a nightmare. Pregnant, in a toxic relationship and far away from th...
February 29, 2024
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Season 3
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Episode 66
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52:18
Anatomy of a Survivor - Dr. Joyce Mikal-Flynn
“There is no getting over this. You will find a way to use it,” says Dr. Joyce Mikal-Flynn of the traumatic injury that changed her life. “You will find a way to incorporate this into your life. You will make meaning of this pain and you will f...
February 22, 2024
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Season 3
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Episode 65
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1:03:51
Episode Rewind: The Importance of Role Models - Dr. Samuel Aymer
In honor of Black History month, we revisit a conversation from Season 2 with Dr. Samuel Aymer, a professor of Social Work at Hunter College."How do we hold multiple truths? How do we (as people of color) embrace our humanity when...
February 08, 2024
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Season 3
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Episode 64
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1:16:26
The Compassion Remedy - Catherine Schweikert
“Everyone is looking for the same things,” says Catherine Schweikert, a PhD and Physician Assistant who has spent the past few years researching the profound power of compassion. “We are all in search of what makes us feel safe, happy, healthy ...
February 01, 2024
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Season 3
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Episode 63
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1:10:04
The Voices of Honoring Our Experience - Ms. Billie Cooper
“I got tired of being tired,” says Ms. Billie Cooper of her life as an addict. ,Along term HIV survivor and trans activist, she knew she needed to make a change. “I got tired of not being able to eat, of living on top ramen. I wanted a be...
January 26, 2024
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Season 3
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Episode 62
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43:39
The Voices of Honoring Our Experience - Carlos Ferriera
On From Sparks to Light, we hear the stories of people who are making a difference. People who are giving back in various ways. What we don’t often hear, however, is the stories of how their actions impact others. What happens because of that w...
December 28, 2023
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Season 3
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Episode 61
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52:21
The Culture of Change - Sandy Holman
When Sandy Holman was a teenager, she watched as the Klu Klux Klan burned a wooden cross on her high school soccer field. This wasn’t in the deep south, but in the Sacramento, California neighborhood where her family moved when she was in eleme...
December 14, 2023
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Season 3
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Episode 60
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1:01:20
Honoring Our Experience - Gregg Cassin
Back on the podcast this week is my dear friend Gregg Cassin. Gregg is an HIV/AIDS activist, a public speaker and someone I’ve known since our college days back in Boston. He is also someone who has dedicated his life to serving the HIV/A...
November 30, 2023
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Season 3
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Episode 59
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59:48