On the 145th episode of What is a Good Life?, I’m delighted to welcome Marc Cinanni. Marc is a writer, musician, and co-founder of Muntanya Màgica, a secluded forest retreat space near Barcelona devoted to personal and spiritual renewal. After time spent in an ashram and a transformative period living on a remote Pacific island, Marc now helps others rewild their inner and outer lives through nature, meditation, and presence—inviting a return to stillness and a deep respect for the mystery of life.
In this conversation, we explore courage as the practice of listening to yourself, rewilding a modern life and his move to a remote island, practical spirituality, and how trusting life reshapes friendship, work, and home.
This episode is an invitation to truly notice and trust this life.
The weekly clip from the podcast (4 mins), my weekly reflection (3 mins), the full podcast (56 mins), and the weekly questions all follow below.
1. Weekly Clip From The Podcast
2. My Weekly Reflection
“One night we’d flown back from visiting my parents at Christmas, and we came back to the house — it was absolutely frozen.
We could see our breath inside. We had to put on every blanket we owned and sit on the couch while I made a fire.
And that became one of the best memories we had of the island — that night we came back and froze in the house.”
In this interview, Marc speaks about how he and his family sold everything they owned and moved to a remote island off the coast of Canada. While the experience was filled with various emotions, challenges, joys, growth, and connection, there is something I love about this being one of their fondest memories.
In more than 300 interviews I’ve conducted around this question, it’s become clear to me that we never know what will become our fondest memories ahead of time.
How could we?
Even if the party, holiday, or get-together goes perfectly to plan, how could you know ahead of time what mood or experience you will have in that given moment?
What somebody will say that will either resonate or create distance. Whether you are feeling grounded and rooted, or lost and dismayed.
We just don’t know ahead of time what creates the magic in very particular moments.
Oftentimes it seems to include the unknown, or an element of uncertainty that you can never predict.
After my wife and I had met in India and travelled for a month together — the last week of which was in Nepal — we took a bus to Pokhara from Kathmandu. I didn’t pay too much attention when getting what were probably clear instructions from the guesthouse we were staying in.
When we arrived at the bus pick-up area, it was a busy, bustling market street with long rows of corrugated tin establishments, and no signs on the buses or bus stops. With no Nepali on our part and no English on the few buses we approached, we were getting a bit tetchy. Both with the experience and with each other.
I remember nodding in the direction of a “bar” with a dirt floor, two long benches, and a small fridge. “Shall we just chill out and try again tomorrow?”
I don’t know what it was about the guy who owned the place — he was very open-hearted and lively — and between him speaking his language, my wife speaking German, and me English, and a universal use of body language and back-slapping, we proceeded to laugh our arses off for a couple of hours before finding somewhere to stay that night.
On a trip that we were jokingly referring to as our honeymoon from the outset, we got bumped up to business class for the flight, I got a surprisingly great offer to work for a company in Canada, we went hang-gliding, I proposed to her, and so on.
When we reflected on the trip later in the year, we both, independently and without hesitation, offered up this bar with the dirt floor as our favourite memory of the trip.
If these interviews have taught me anything, it is that we spend so much time planning this life. So much time planning fun, or the ‘important’ moments, that we miss so many of the invitations that are off-script.
“Hurry up, we can’t laugh here — we are scheduled to laugh and live fully at this function five minutes and two blocks away from here.”
The pressure and planning on those “big” moments seep the joy and spontaneity from them, while they only account for a small percentage of our life anyhow.
This life will, at times, bring us to our knees weeping — no doubt. But it’s also a crying shame how much of its wonder we’ve ceased to notice, lost in our ideas of what and when life ought to be.
Thanks for reading What is a Good Life?
3. Full Episode - The Courage To Listen To Yourself with Marc Cinanni - What is a Good Life? #145
4. This Week’s Questions
If courage starts with listening to yourself, what’s one truth you’ve been avoiding hearing?
Is there a fondest memory of yours that is so simple, so ordinary, you might not even realise it?
About Me
I am a coach, facilitator, and podcast host, based in Berlin, via Dublin, Ireland. I started this project in 2021, for which I’ve now interviewed over 300 people. I’m not looking to prescribe universal answers, more that the guests’ lines of inquiry, musings, experiences, and curiosities spark your own inquiry into what the question means to you. I am also trying to share more genuine expressions of the human experience and more meaningful conversations.
If you’re interested in exploring your own self-inquiry through one-on-one coaching, my 5-week group courses, or fostering greater trust, communication, and connection within your leadership teams, feel free to contact me via email or LinkedIn.