The 1000 Hours Outside Podcast

MIT professor and bestselling author Sherry Turkle has spent more than four decades studying our relationship with technology. Now she says we’ve entered a fundamentally new era: one where artificial intelligence isn’t just helping us think—it’s asking us to form relationships with it. In this conversation, Sherry joins Ginny to discuss her new book, Artificial Intimacy, and why AI companions, chatbots, and even AI-powered toys pose unique risks for children.

They explore how outsourcing reading, writing, conversation, and emotional connection can “de-skill” young people, why solitude and boredom are essential for developing empathy, and what happens when friction-free relationships with machines begin replacing messy human ones.

Sherry also explores AI friendship, grief technology, privacy, and why parents still have the power to push back. A timely conversation about protecting childhood, human connection, and the experiences that help us become fully human.

Get Sherry's book here!

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In this uplifting conversation, Ginny Yurich sits down with bestselling author and artist Ruth Chou Simons to explore the ideas behind her new book, This Moment Matters: 100 Ways to Cultivate a Grace-Laced Life. Drawing from nearly two decades of motherhood, creativity, faith, and family life, Ruth shares practical ways to embrace limitations, simplify everyday routines, cultivate delight, create a welcoming home, and invest intentionally in the people who matter most.

They discuss everything from protecting unscheduled family time and putting phones away at the table to hospitality, creativity, exercise, and finding beauty in ordinary moments. Ruth also shares how small, consistent choices can help us stop chasing more and become more present to the life already in front of us. It’s an encouraging conversation about grace, intentionality, and remembering that the seemingly ordinary moments of our lives truly matter.

Get Ruth's book here!

** A huge thank you to our sponsors! Check them out below:

My Green Mattress: Visit www.mygreenmattress.com and save 15% on your order during their Labor Day Sale. Plus, use code 1000hours for an additional $10 off your cart total when you purchase any mattress.

BetterHelp: Visit www.BetterHelp.com/1000HOURS today to get 10% off your first month.

Quince - Visit www.quince.com/outside and get free shipping and 365 day returns

IXL Learning - Head to www.ixl.com/1000hours to get an exclusive 20% savings on your membership

Whisker - Take care of your cats while taking an additional $50 off bundles with code 1000HOURS when you shop www.whisker.com/1000HOURS

Looking for guided adventures that will blow you away with their attention to detail? Head to www.exploreworldwide.com and tell them 1KHO sent you!

Muzzle Sleep Tape - Go to MuzzleSleep.com and use code 1000HOURS for 10% off.

Zenni Optical- Go to www.zenni.com/podcast and use code PODCAST15 for 15% off your first order, plus free shipping on all U.S. orders over $65.

Active Skin Repair - Don’t forget to put this in your first aid kit! Visit ActiveSkinRepair.com and use the code 1000HOURS to save 20% on all Active Skin Repair products.

Boll & Branch - Get 15% off your first order plus free shipping at BollAndBranch.com/1000hours with code 1000hours

Ka’Chava - Go to https://kachava.com and use code 1000HOURS for 15% off your first order.

Hey Polo - Protect your loved ones without spying on them. Go to heypolo.com/1000hours or use code 1000HOURS and get 70% off your first year!

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Four forgotten hunting rounds turned a five-day vacation into a 70-day fight to get home. Ryan Watson traveled to Turks and Caicos with his wife and friends expecting a few restful days away.They had those but as they were headed home Ryan and his wife found themselves facing a possible 12-year prison sentence after ammunition Ryan didn’t know was buried in the lining of his luggage was discovered at the airport. Ryan joins Ginny Yurich to tell the unbelievable story behind Turks and Chaos. This episode includes everything from the jail cell to the fear of missing his children’s entire childhood to he strangers who risked their own possessions to help him, and to the faith that carried his family through 70 days of uncertainty. It’s a story about how quickly an ordinary life can change and how a nightmare can strip away everything that doesn’t really matter and teach you about what does.

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No one actually knows how many people are missing in America’s wilderness. In this gripping conversation, Ginny Yurich sits down with professor, journalist and The Cold Vanish author Jon Billman to explore what he calls the nation’s “silent mass disaster.” The silent mass disaster is about the people who vanish in national parks, forests, mountains, and other wild places. They talk about those who went missing and the families and searchers who refuse to stop looking. They discuss baffling disappearances, a father who gave up everything to search for his son, the astonishing abilities of search dogs, and what all parents should know before heading into the backcountry with their families. But this isn’t a conversation meant to make us afraid of wild places. It’s about respecting how vast they still are, being prepared when we enter them, and remembering the people who keep searching when everyone else has gone home. As Jon says, “It’s a good thing to find missing people.”'

Grab your copy of The Cold Vanish !

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Popularity matters across our entire lifespan but it’s only a certain kind of popularity matters. Today, you get to learn what kind of popularity that is! Dr. Mitch Prinstein has spent decades studying what makes people liked, accepted, influential and connected, and his research also includes why popularity matters. Ginny talks with Mitch about the crucial difference between status and likability. You’ll learn why the “cool kids” of childhood don’t necessarily fare better later in life and why being more likable to can affect your health, relationships, and career. They also explore what happens in the adolescent brain that makes approval feel so important, raising likable kids, and the hundreds of small opportunities we have every day to become more likable.

Mitch is the author of Popular and Likeability and host of That Popular Podcast.

Learn more about Dr. Mitch Prinstein and all he has to offer here

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