An Invitation to My Soul
What does it mean to live a life of character — not just teach it? “When we think about people in our own lives we look at and admire, it’s not those who achieve great awards usually. It’s those who actually were kind to us and demonstrated courage in a time of moral conflict, who made sacrifices for the good of others. That kind of compassion, humanity, hope is what we’ll think about when we imagine our own eulogy.” Dr. Michael Lamb teaches at Wake Forest University, where he directs a Program for Leadership and Character that has reached over 1,600 faculty and staff across 146 institutions. But his most important lesson came when he burned out completely at forty — the year of tenure, a book deadline, and a landmark grant — and walked the Camino de Santiago alone for eighteen days. He called his Camino “an invitation to my soul.” These days, he writes baseball haiku. In this conversation, Michael talks with co-hosts Michelle Weise and Dana Allen Walsh about: * How a childhood of farming taught him that character is cultivated, not conferred * The political career he almost had — and the Socrates passage that changed everything * What burnout looked like at his peak moment of professional success * How the Camino helped him find the parts of himself his ambition had buried * Why haiku, of all things, became his most important creative practice * The Rilke idea of “living the questions” — and why it’s now the motto of his program On vocation: “I love that word — vocation. It comes from the Latin meaning voice. What voice do you hear from outside of yourself that calls you to a certain way of being or doing in the world?” Why This Matters We live in a culture that mistakes achievement for excellence. Michael Lamb has spent his career making the philosophical case that character — courage, compassion, humility, wisdom — is its own form of excellence; the Greek arête, which means both. His program at Wake Forest isn’t a feel-good initiative; it is a serious academic and institutional effort to shift what higher education measures and celebrates. And the fact that he nearly burned out doing it — that he had to walk a pilgrimage route to let his soul speak — makes his work all the more credible. He is not just teaching character. He is trying to live it. He is living the questions. 📬 Subscribe to A Life Worth Working on Substack A Life Worth Working is hosted by Michelle Weise and Dana Allen Walsh. Each week, we talk with guests who open up about the messiness, transformation, and wonder of their work lives — because we believe the real story of work is always about what we call the soul of work. Subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts, and share with someone who may be navigating their own uncertain path. 🎙️ Listen wherever you get your podcasts 📩 Email us: alifeworthworking@gmail.com This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit michelleweise.substack.com
