Dave Evans: Designing and Living a Meaningful Life Now
Good Faith
Good Faith
4.8 • 1.9K Ratings
🗓️ 5 March 2026
⏱️ 58 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
What Does Radical Acceptance Look Like in Real Life?
In this Good Faith Podcast episode, Curtis Chang sits down with Dave Evans (co-founder of the Stanford Life Design Lab) to tear up the "find your purpose" script and explore how design thinking, faith, and radical acceptance can lead to real meaning—especially through grief and uncertainty. Expect sharp insights, honest stories, and practical tools to build a life with more presence, flow, and authenticity starting now. Dave and Curtis dig into faith and the tension of the "already and not yet" as they look at the ideas in Dave's latest book, How to Live a Meaningful Life.
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03:05 - Dave Evans' Journey & the Origins of Life Design
09:54 - Are there Pitfalls When Pursuing Impact and Transactional Mindset?
18:08 - Design Moves for Greater Meaning
22:05 - Radical Acceptance Illustrated by Personal Loss
28:06 - Why Is the Concept of Flow Important?
39:37 - Compatibility of Design Thinking and Christian Worldview
41:06 - Four Areas of Human Experience for Meaning
45:34 - Meaning in the Second Half of Life
48:59 - Getting Started: Practical First Steps
Scriptures:
- Deuteronomy 30:11–14 (ESV)
- Deuteronomy 30:19–20 (ESV)
- John 10:10 (ESV)
- Philippians 2:5-11 (ESV)
- Romans 12:2 (ESV)
- Ecclesiastes 2:11 (ESV)
- Luke 17:20–21 (ESV)
- Mark 8:18 (ESV)
Mentioned in This Episode:
- Dave Evans + Bill Burnett's How to Live a Meaningful Life: Using Design Thinking to Unlock Purpose, Joy, and Flow Every Day
- What is Radical Acceptance?
- Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience
- Lisa Miller's lecture The Awakened Brain
- Jill Bolte Taylor's TED Talk: My Stroke of Insight
- More about Jean Vanier and L'Arche
- Richard Rohr's Falling Upward
- Veritas Forum: Dallas Willard
- Stanford's Life Design Lab
- What is Design thinking? (pdf)
- Don Norman's The Design of Everyday Things
More from Dave Evans:
- Dave Evans + Bill Burnett's Designing Your Life: How to Build a Well-Lived, Joyful Life
- Dave Evans + Bill Burnett's Designing Your New Work Life: How to Thrive and Change and Find Happiness--and a New Freedom--at Work
- Dave Evans Praxis Mentor page
- Check out: Designing Your Life website
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The Good Faith Podcast is a production of a 501(c)(3) nonpartisan organization that does not engage in any political campaign activity to support or oppose any candidate for public office. Any views and opinions expressed by any guests on this program are solely those of the individuals and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of Good Faith.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Moses literally said, this thing the Lord has asked of you, which is to choose life, by the |
| 0:06.6 | this is choosing the life that you're in. |
| 0:08.7 | And he said, it is not so hard for you that you need to send someone to the top of the |
| 0:13.8 | mountain and bring it back to you like I did with the tablets. |
| 0:16.4 | No, you need not swim across the ocean and bring it back. |
| 0:20.7 | No, this thing I ask of you is so near to you. |
| 0:24.6 | It is in your mouth. |
| 0:27.8 | That you might do it. Welcome to the Good Faith podcast. I'm your host, Curtis Chang. And the Good Faith podcast is we're friends who follow follow Jesus help each other make sense of the world. |
| 0:55.8 | The podcast is a production of a 501C3 nonpartisan organization. |
| 1:02.7 | Making sense of the world is not just about making sense of the world out there. |
| 1:08.7 | This endeavor also involves making sense of our own lives. The particular |
| 1:14.0 | meaning of each of our lives serves as a personal compass for how we move through this world and the |
| 1:21.2 | content we look for it. For instance, if a core part of your life's meaning is being a parent, |
| 1:27.0 | you're going to spend a lot |
| 1:28.2 | of time with your children and you will look for content on how to help you fulfill that meaning. |
| 1:35.3 | So, is there a way to better design this meaning-making compass? Dave Evans says, yes. Dave is a |
| 1:43.6 | longtime friend of mine and he is one of the world's best |
| 1:46.4 | designers. In terms of product design, he led the development of the Apple Mouse, was a co-founder |
| 1:53.2 | of the famous gaming company Electronic Arts, and other tech innovations over a 30-plus year career. |
| 2:00.0 | In 2007, he pivoted from making things to designing |
| 2:03.7 | lives as the co-founder of the Stanford Life Design Lab. And then he co-authored the worldwide bestseller |
| 2:10.3 | Designing Your Life. He's just published a new book titled How to Live a Meaningful Life, Using Design Thinking to Unlock Purpose, |
... |
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