Teaching Learning Leading K-12

Harold Phifer talks with me about his memoir - Surviving Chaos: How I Found Peace at a Beach Bar. This is episode 423 of the audio podcast Teaching Learning Leading K12. Harold Phifer was living a life that he was hiding from everyone—including himself. Then he met a woman at a bar in Thailand who cracked that secret open. Finally listened to, and guided by the stranger’s on-target, thoughtful questions, Harold spoke for the first time of his near-death experience in Afghanistan while flashing back to his dysfunctional past.   His inspiring memoir, Surviving Chaos: How I Found Peace At A Beach Bar. does not shy away from the stark details of childhood bullying, family tension, being raised in poverty in 1960s Mississippi, a mother with schizophrenia, and feeling like an outsider even at home.  Having spent the past decade in Iraq and Afghanistan as a contractor (air-controller), he survived a suicide bombing by the Taliban but feels more at peace amidst the war zone than he did during his shattered childhoo