A Journey with Bernie | Podcast Guru

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A JOURNEY WITH BERNIE is so much more than an established, internationally recognised Podcast spanning 50 countries. It is an evolving way of life and you, dear friends, are invited to be adventurous explorers with us. Despite constant media-driven advertisements defining ‘success’ as material acquisition and a life-centered around 40 years of incessant, often stressful, empire building work generating six figure bank accounts and million-dollar assets, Bernie K and co believe that there might just be another way. No, we are not budding Buddhas seeking liberation! To the contrary, our point-of-difference, lies in our role not as experts, but as simple people, who like you, are prospecting for actions, strategies, and routines that will inspire constant joy and an enhanced capacity to love self, life and all people. There lies the purpose of the podcast! It’s a purpose we share every Friday with well-chosen guests, some of whom are public figures once featured on the front page of your daily newspaper, while others are yet to be discovered by Google. Some are experts and others are the ‘person next door’. It doesn't matter, for it is through their life stories, that we as a community poke, prod, dig and discover answers to the one question we all ask … WHAT BRINGS REAL MEANING and VALUE TO OUR LIFE? This podcast is fast becoming a global phenomena and is already making an immense difference to people’s lives and to the connectedness of all people across the globe. One push of the SUBSCRIBER and FOLLOWER button will ensure that your life becomes enriched by every episode of A JOURNEY WITH BERNIE. Join the revolution !

Recent Episodes

JUL 10, 2025

102. Peter Cook should have been ICE-d out ... Now he is BREAKING THE CASTLE.

This is an incredible story. In fact, it is a story of despair, desperation and ultimate triumph. It is a story of how one man utilized a life destroying existence, changed its meaning and turned it into 'golden possibility'. Peter Cook by his own admission scarcely believes he is alive to play out his life story in the groundbreaking theatre phenomena called BREAKING THE CASTLE. It is the enactment of Peter's life on stage played by one man ... Peter Cook.

In truth, ICE addiction that defined Peter's life just 8 years ago should have won the battle. It had its chance and had it not been for the love of a best mate, who privately paid for Peter's rehab in Thailand, Peter's life would have been a sad waste.

Instead, Peter faced his demons, climbed his way out of a bottomless pit and now gives hope to those who also need a reason to re-engineer their life.

Peter's 90-minute one-man show moves from a struggling home life to alcohol filled evenings at just 14 years of age, through addiction to a Thailand Rehabilitation Centre with Peter playing 17 different characters and voices. It is a masterful performance first receiving strong recognition in London and now attracting full audiences around Australia. Word is that a movie is also in the offering.

In this interview, Peter tells all. It is sometimes dark, occasionally hopeful but in the end, it is glorious.

As Peter says, "To see the light it is almost necessary to have lived in the depths of chaos".
You will find this episode riveting. More importantly, for those live in the East Coast of Australia seeing BREAKING THE CASTLE is compulsory, and if you do, don't forget to see Peter after the show and let him know you first heard him on A JOURNEY WITH BERNIE.

Breaking the Castleis now touring. It will be performed at Frankston Arts Centre (11-12 July 2025), Theatre Works St Kilda (15-19 July) and Sydney Opera House (23-26 July).

60 MIN

APR 14, 2025

101. The Journey of Grief after losing a Son. From darkness to light with Keith Staite.

Welcome to the first episode of A JOURNEY WITH BERNIE in 2025.
Yes, they were weekly in the past 2 years, all 100 of them. So why the 2025 delay until April?

Quite simply, if you have been one of our 12,000 listeners, then you will know the scope of learning, awareness, and expansion of though and spirit that this journey offers. It has been remarkable. So much so, that I felt compelled to stop and capture it all in the form of a book, the objective of which is to give all of its readers a roadmap to becoming a more loving and joyful human being. It's a pathway given to us from guests, who you may have met on the front page of your National Newspaper, to those who found some prison time, to sports persons one of which ran around the entire planet, to people who suffered unspeakable traumas and others whose names are foreign to Google. This guidebook will outline actions, strategies, routines ... an entire manual to living love constantly.

Have no concerns that the podcast is winding down ... not at all!! Temporarily, it might slow down the regularity, but that is all. The podcast coupled with the book is as dedicated to the mission as ever. Both are valuable contributions to our purpose. So too is this podcast. In fact, this Episode 101, may go down as one of our best in our second hundred episodes!

Cast your mind back to Episode #8, when we first met Joel Staite, a young man who was given months to live thanks to an incurable kidney cancer. Remarkably, Joel through his belief, devotion to wellbeing practices and high-level awareness lives another 6 years. What would you learn about life if you lived everyday with the prospect of death tapping you on the shoulder?
What Joel learnt and shared with us opened eyes and moved souls, so much so we replayed it in Episode # 98.

Then in Episode # 28, just 5 months after the loss of his Son, Joel's father, Keith gave us a remarkable and intimate insight into who Joel had become. Our take was that while values like gratitude, love and kindness might also be the way for many others, very few became those values to such a high degree as did Joel. In his last years, Joel was the living embodiment of all that can be beautiful as a human. The story of Joel shuffling down the aisle to marry his beloved, Kieran, just 4 days before his passing is beautiful told by Keith at the 23.25 mark of this Episode # 101. You will need a tissue.

This episode is Keith's story approaching 3 years after Joel's death. It is the journey of a grieving Father, adopting his son's legacy and living so many experiences to honor him. It is the story of the cost of living someone else's life even if it be that of your son. It is the story of recovery, the story of returning home to the power of practices that shift your energies from darkness to life. You will be intrigued by Keith's commentary as to when he feels Joel's presence and how it impacts him. It's as if Joel has returned to remind dad that living gratitude, love and kindness the Keith Staite way is now his mission. This episode is raw. It is authentic and it is powerful. Chip and I are so proud to offer you this remarkable insight into the profound relationship between love and grief. Open up your hearts and absorb every minute of it.

Bernie Kelly ... +61 412 982 444 ... [email protected] ... Your feedback and follow-ship is so valuable.
Chip ... +61 410 603 336 ... [email protected]
Keith Staite ... +61 411 348 220

60 MIN

NOV 29, 2024

100. Emeritus Prof Ken Pakenham started this journey 100 Episodes ago. He returns 2 years later.

When I first started A JOURNEY WITH BERNIE just over two years ago, I thought the podcast objectives would be realized in 10 episodes. Afterall, how many strategies, actions, disciplines, ways of seeing the world can there be that could inspire constant inner joy and greater love for self, life and people?

Well, here we are 100 episodes and 2 plus years later and still the exploration and the thirst for wisdom is alive!

The scope of this journey turned out to be expansive and I began to see that in the very first episode with Emeritus Prof Ken Pakenham. Displaying my amateurish interviewing skills, I asked him … ‘So, what do you see as the Meaning of Life?’

His answer became a reference point over the next 99 episodes. Ken simply suggested, ‘That the meaning of life is found by first identifying and then clarifying one’s values. This becomes your core reference point for all of your behavior and authentic activity. Of course, Ken then rightfully pointed out that the next step is to KNOW your values … to know what they look like as behaviors and finally, the great challenge is to BE the behavioral manifestation of your values’.

Little did I know that this 'piece of gold' given to us in the very first episode would become a core discussion over the next two years.

Therefore, it is only appropriate that the guest for our century of interviews be the wisdom of Prof Ken Pakenham, and what an incredible episode it is. The additional insights into our possibilities is coming from a very aware soul. It is a soul that has experienced the traumas, the vagrancies and the tribulations of life. It is a soul who has found a way to manage his challenges and arrive at a place of self-respect and personal harmony.

Apart from this exhilarating discussion you can understand so much more of the journey of Prof Ken Pakenham in his outstanding memoir called “THE TRAUMA BANQUET”. It is a must read.

Finally, I thank you, the 12000 listeners from 52 countries who continue to FOLLOW and SUBSCRIBE to our weekly episodes. You are the ones that give A JOURNEY WITH BERNIE the reason to embrace the years to come.
Blessings to you all. Bernie K ... +61 412 982 444

63 MIN

NOV 8, 2024

99. She saw her Mother's murder and as a result Donna Leigh KNOWS LIFE. A TOP 100 Episode.

This is the penultimate episode before we celebrate a century of A JOURNEY WITH BERNIE and as promised I wanted you to hear the very best of the last two years. That's why it's compulsory for us all to re-visit Episode 57 with Donna Leigh Perfect. If you haven't heard this episode, then you are in for 80 minutes of epic, mind-blowing LIFE. For many people, it would not be conceivable for one at 7 years of age to recover after watching the murder of your Mother.
How does a child then respond to the shallow, mixed, regularly painful experiences of 13 Foster Homes?
How through these traumatic experiences does one recover to see life so simply, so beautifully, so gloriously?
This is the gift of Donna Leigh Perfect.

I do believe that there is a golden moment in this episode that is one of the top learnings ever offered on A JOURNEY WITH BERNIE. It was when Donna Leigh was working with Lifeline and her advisor helped her realize that 'These things happen TO people, not BECAUSE of them'. In that moment Donna was able to achieve separation from the pain and chaos of her traumatized life. Furthermore, she was then able to use the experiences beneficially to serve her life. I think you should read that last sentence again ! She was able to use the trauma of watching her mother's murder to understand and extract benefit for her life!! If you want evidence of this, see what she is doing now that brings meaning to her life and adds incredible value to 1000's around the globe ... www.donna-leighperfect.com ... There is the miracle.

Embrace the journey dear people!! Just embrace the journey and just remember do all that you do with loving intent.
Bernie K + 61 412 982 444 ... [email protected]

Have you pressed the SUBSCRIBE button yet??

95 MIN

NOV 1, 2024

98. Cancer taught Joel, YOU and I how to live. The epic Journey of Joel Staite returns.

A JOURNEY WITH BERNIE is approaching 100 episodes, and I can honestly share with you that I thought the purpose of this podcast would be fulfilled in 10!! Afterall, how many strategies and actions are there that lead to becoming a more loving and joyful human being?

This Journey has been one of the more profound experiences of my life, with every guest contributing something of value to the ever-expanding pathway towards love becoming a way of life. Of course, some episodes were potent and need to be heard again and again to capture the full learning they offered. Among these were Episodes 8 and 25, which combined to tell the remarkable story of Joel Staite. Joel was diagnosed with an incurable cancer and given 3 months. He lived another 6 years and when I say 'lived', I actually mean he lived every day as if it was his last. Joel's story opened our souls and taught us of what living every moment actually looks like. Only the wisdom of Joel Staite could say something like this ...

“This might sound crazy, but I actually think cancer has changed my life for the better – I feel like I have become a better person for having been through this … I so appreciate every moment, every single day so much more”.

His incredible story went to air on Jun 15, 2022. On October 8, four months later, Joel passed away.

Last month, I received a message from Keith Staite, Joel's dad, whose Episode 28 gave us even more insight into Joel's journey and the depth of our capacity to love. The image Keith gave us of Joel's 'raw courage' leaving the wheelchair and shuffling down the aisle to marry his treasured love, Kieran, will forever be a feature segment on this podcast. Joel did this just days before his death. At the time his body had withered to not much more than skeletal.

The Mater Hospital once described Joel as ... 'An ordinary guy doing extraordinary things in the face of gut-wrenching adversity.' I think they are wrong …

Joel Staite became an extraordinary human being responding in way that few would to the 'grim reaper' tapping him on the shoulder every day for 6 years. Joel brushed death's hand away for all of that time and in the process discovered a meaning in life that few could comprehend. For this reason, giving you the lessons of Joel Staite in this 98th episode seems to be the only appropriate thing to do. Afterall, you are being taught by a man who crossed the bridge and became 'love'.
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Your feedback on this episode is vital and so is your Followship. So please find a minute to press that Subscriber button and send us a message. Together, let's you and I play our role in making our humanity a more loving, joyful and aware species for that surely would bring greater meaning to our lives!

Bernie K ... + 61 412 982 444 ... [email protected]

62 MIN