What does a psychological operations officer actually do?Ashley Holzmann spent over a decade inserting information into conflict zones to change behavior, reduce crime, and bring terrorists to the peace table. Not with weapons. With strategy, sociology, and social science.In this conversation we go deep on how influence actually works — from Afghanistan's $50 million research program to North Korea's social media campaigns targeting Americans today.But what surprised me most about Ashley wasn't the military story.It was the artist. The soccer coach. The scout leader. The human who manages his entire life in 1-2 hour calendar blocks and says "the world won't end if I set it down."Everything — war, art, parenting, scouting, writing — comes back to one thing for Ashley - Problem solving.This is one of the most layered conversations I've had on Soul In The Game.

May is Mental Health Awareness Month. And this conversation might be one of the most important ones you'll hear this month.

What happens when a software engineer with 20 years of experience hits her own breaking point — and finds her way back through healing?

Anjana spent two decades in technical roles before something shifted. Quietly. Painfully. She found herself crying every night, not wanting to wake up. A life coach helped her heal over 5-6 years of deep inner work.

And then she asked one question: "Why so much pain? If I felt this — do other women feel it too?"

That question became her calling.

Today Anjana is a transformative coach specializing in family trauma healing — combining NLP, neurosomatic practices, and a programmer's curiosity to help women heal from the inside out. She brings a unique gift: the ability to ask the exact right question that helps clients see themselves clearly — and the results speak for themselves.

This is a conversation about courage, transformation, and what it really means to help someone heal.

Because sometimes the most qualified healers are the ones who have walked through the darkest rooms themselves.

What does war teach you about energy?

Wes Herche was a senior US intelligence officer deployed to Baghdad — three months after becoming a father for the first time. In that war zone, he watched energy become a matter of life and death. For every 39 fuel convoys running through Iraq, there was one casualty.

That experience forged something rare: a sustainability leader who can stare at worst-case scenarios and still show up with clarity and optimism.

Today Wes is Director of Energy & Sustainability Solutions at Prologis, former Amazon global lead for supplier decarbonization, former BCG, and co-founder of Sustainability Decoded — the newsletter for sustainability professionals. He holds a PhD in Sustainability from ASU.

In this episode we talk about the intelligence mindset applied to climate, why emissions are actually an efficiency opportunity, the truth about degrowth, AI's energy appetite, and the trim tab theory of change.

Oh — and Wes was born on Earth Day. He didn't choose this path. He was built for it.

Learn more about Wes here:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/herche/

https://www.sustainabilitydecoded.com/