Shows
Lost & Found with Karmen WiidWhat 19th-Century Romanticism Can Teach Us About Navigating Our 20s and Feeling Alive AgainWhat if beauty wasn’t something soft and sweet… but something vast, dangerous, and soul-shaking?
In this episode, we dive deep into the Romantic movement - not dating apps or romcoms, but the 19th-century revolution of artists and poets who believed that awe, longing, terror, and wonder were not distractions from life but the very point of it.
This isn’t your high school English syllabus. The Romantics were obsessed with danger, desire, melancholy, and the sublime… that dizzying, breathtaking feeling that reminds you you’re still alive.
It was an art movement that inspi...2025-07-3139 min
Lost & Found with Karmen WiidStory Time: Reading You "The Fifth Lover" (Think Sultry Nights, Doomed Prophecies & Ghosts in Silk)A bottle of whisky, a palm reader, a prophecy. And a night that unfolded like silk around the hips. Slow, hot, dangerous.
In this episode, I'm reading you my latest short story, "The Fifth Lover."
From rooftops in Northern India to the dark dancefloors where we lose ourselves, this is a story about what we remember and what we rewrite. About possibilities and dead ends. About the high of being young, untethered, and briefly, beautifully, unbroken.
Until it all unravels.
Is it a story or a memory? Real or constructed?
...2025-07-2834 min
Lost & Found with Karmen Wiid8 Powerful Mindset Shifts That Will Rewire How You See Your LifeIn this episode, I’m sharing the mindset shifts I return to when I feel lost, tired, or just trying to ground myself in something deeper than a to-do list.
We’ll talk about:
The underrated art of trusting detours (and the psychology of hedonic adaptation)
What discomfort actually means, and why it’s a good sign
How to stop squeezing every moment for meaning
Why empathy might actually be selfish and what that means for real connection (according to philosopher Edith Stein)
These are the beliefs that h...2025-07-2445 min
Lost & Found with Karmen WiidWhen Ambition Becomes Identity: On Critical Theory & The Quarter-Life CrisisAt 21, I walked into a philosophy class on Critical Theory, not because I was particularly curious about Marxism, but because the professor radiated something I couldn’t explain. Calm. Clarity. Joy.
I didn’t know that one elective would unravel everything I thought I knew about ambition, success, freedom, and identity.
Two years later, I was living in a hippie commune in rural Nicaragua, showering outside, swearing off money, and trading work for food, trying to figure out what I really wanted when nothing familiar was there to define me.
In this episode, I ex...2025-07-2136 min
Lost & Found with Karmen WiidThe Truth About Main Character Energy: The Beautiful, the Dangerous & the DelusionalIn this episode, we explore the cultural phenomenon and philosophical roots of main character energy, both its empowering promise and its dark underside.
Sparked by a moonlit conversation in Hanoi, this episode unspools into many threads.
We talk about:
What main character energy really means (and why it matters)
How to find joy and agency even in the absurd… yes, we’re talking The Myth of Sisyphus
The dark side of performance and Western privilege
Travel, language, culture, and why no one is just a “side character”
Martin Buber’s I-It vs. I-T...2025-07-1736 min
Lost & Found with Karmen WiidFrom Broke and Burnt Out to Full-Time Travel and Writing: The Stories I’ve Never Told Before (and the Unlearning That Changed Everything)You know how sometimes all you really need is something that shakes you by the shoulders and gets you so fired up you can’t not do the scary thing?
And other times, you’re craving a deep, heart-expanding, soul-softening chat about life and meaning and why any of this matters.
And then there are those times when all you want is an unhinged conversation with a friend that reminds you how young, dumb, and wildly alive you still are.
Yeah. This one is all of that - in one conversation.
In th...2025-07-141h 19
Kindred Roads PodcastHow She Went From $0 in Cambodia to Becoming a Full-Time Writer on the RoadKarmen Wiid is a South African solo traveler, writer, and host of The Lost & Found Podcast. She published her first book at 12, studied philosophy and literature in university, and now works remotely while moving through the world with curiosity and creativity. She’s currently based in India, and she shares such profound wisdom on the meaning of life and how to actually work through things, rather than letting fear or expectation stop you from living your dream.
In this episode, Karmen shares stories from running out of money in Cambodia, crashing a motorbike in Nicaragua, and traveling th...2025-07-121h 17
Lost & Found with Karmen WiidI Travelled Solo Through India for 3 Months — Here’s Everything I Wasn’t Expecting to Learn, Love, and Leave BehindYou’ve heard the rumours, right? Seen the movies with chaotic streets, overflowing trains, and spiritual awakenings. Heard the warnings: it’s too much, too unsafe, too overwhelming.
Well, I heard them too. And I went anyway.
This is what three months travelling solo through India as a woman really looks like. It was messy. It was heart-achingly beautiful. And it changed me in ways I never expected.
In this episode, I speak honestly about the magic I experienced, the discomfort I leaned into, and the lessons I learned the hard way - from...2025-07-1033 min
Lost & Found with Karmen WiidFeeling Lonely, Lost, or Disconnected from Yourself? You Need to Hear This.Ever felt like you're surrounded by people, but still weirdly alone? Like you're just... not quite you lately? Like something’s missing, but you can’t put your finger on what?
This episode is about that feeling.
The kind of loneliness and disconnectedness that leaves you feeling depleted and lost.
In this one, I get into:
The different types of loneliness (and how to tell what yours is really asking for)
How to go from craving connection to actually loving your own company
What philosophers and p...2025-07-0734 min
Lost & Found with Karmen WiidStory Time: Reading You My Favourite Short Story I’ve Ever Written (Think Abandoned Manor Houses, Long Train Rides & Dark Forests)Recorded during a monsoon evening in Delhi with chai in hand and the world quieting outside my window, I read you one of my favourite short stories - a piece I wrote when I was 22, while riding Greyhounds across the American South with an uncharged phone and a journal in my lap.
Where the Women Go is a story about grief, sisterhood, memory, and the spaces that live between dreams and forests, life and afterlife. It’s lyrical and strange and vulnerable. And it matters to me deeply.
This isn’t my usu...2025-07-0324 min
Lost & Found with Karmen WiidTravel For Free (Yes, I’m Serious): Work-Exchange, Couchsurfing & Other Legal HustlesTonight, I’m recording from a tiny apartment in Delhi, a little dazed after surviving what might’ve been the wildest overnight bus of my life. But also feeling grateful. Because I’m reminded, once again, that travel doesn’t have to be expensive to be extraordinary.
In this episode, I’m answering a question I get all the time: How do you actually afford to travel long-term? The answer? It’s not a trust fund. It’s curiosity, courage, and a willingness to get your hands dirty.
I share the exact tools, platforms, and stories that h...2025-06-3030 min
Lost & Found with Karmen Wiid5 Unconventional Tips to Stop Abandoning Your Goals And Finish Something📚 Some very exciting news: my book Untethered: A Beginner’s Guide to Solo Travel is officially available for pre-order on Kindle!
It’s part handbook, part workbook, part travel memoir. Check out the preview on my website or pre-order on Amazon Kindle to be the very first to get the book when it goes live on Sunday, 29 June.
____
Do you feel like you have so many ideas but never follow through?
Sick of making plans, setting goals, getting excited… and then somehow abandoning them halfway through?
Then this episo...2025-06-2624 min
Lost & Found with Karmen WiidThe Politics of Desire: The Sex Education I Got from Philosophers (That I Wish I Got in High School)Our desires, our turn-ons, our ideas of sex… where do they come from? And who benefits from them?
Because sex isn’t just an act. It’s an archive of cultural conditioning.
This episode is a crash course in feminist philosophy, critical theory, and the tangled relationship between sex, power, and culture. From shitty sex ed classes to porn culture, internalized scripts to embodied autonomy, we’re asking the uncomfortable questions we’re usually too afraid to voice.
We’ll talk consent beyond the yes/no binary, porn as both a...2025-06-2341 min
Lost & Found with Karmen WiidIf You're Asking “Should I Break Up With Them?” You Already Have… And Other Unhinged Truths I'm Learning in My TwentiesI just came out of one of the most inspiring conversations with a friend and had to hit record. So today, we're talking about the kinds of lessons that shake your worldview and leave you wondering how no one told you this sooner.
Some of what we cover:
The breakup question that answers itself
How bitterness is often just blocked creativity
Why your “cringe” phase was necessary
What it means to want more without lack
What real luxury is
The power of curiosity and letting yourself evolve
If you're in your twenties (or feel like you...2025-06-1925 min
Lost & Found with Karmen WiidSolo Travel vs. Group Trips: How to Know Which One’s for You — and How to Make the Most of BothWhat do you need more right now — to remember who you are, or to remember you're not alone?
In this episode, we dive into the real differences between solo travel and group trips — not just the logistics, but the soul of the thing. From rooftop dance parties in Udaipur to quiet solo moments that changed me, I explore how each kind of journey offers its own kind of magic.
Whether you’re craving deeper self-trust, new friendships, a break from routine, or the courage to finally book that one-way ticket… this one’s for you.
Plus...2025-06-1632 min
Lost & Found with Karmen WiidRest Without Rot: How to Spend a Weekend That Actually Recharges YouWe’ve forgotten how to rest and it’s costing us more than we think. In this episode, I dive into what it means to actually feel restored after the weekend, not just distracted, numbed, or hungover.
Let's redefine what intentional rest looks like (spoiler: it’s not just doing nothing), we talk nervous system repair, dopamine menus, and why scrolling isn’t a hobby.
This isn’t your typical productivity pep talk. It’s a reminder to treat your time off like a ceremony, not an afterthought.
Whether you’re burnt out, in need of a g...2025-06-1235 min
Lost & Found with Karmen WiidThe Truth About Closure And What You Actually Need To Move OnWe think closure is a conversation. A final text. An apology. But more often than not, it’s silence—and confusion.
In this deeply personal episode, I talk about the kind of closure I never got, what I learned from it, and why waiting for someone to explain their confusion might be the thing keeping you stuck.
From messy endings to aisle-seat breakdowns to unexpectedly falling in love again—I take you through the real, raw, unfiltered journey of trying to heal when there’s no clean goodbye.
You’ll hear:
• Why they probabl...2025-06-0941 min
Lost & Found with Karmen Wiid7 Things That Don't Belong in a Life You LoveYou can’t build a life that feels truly your own if you’re carrying things that don’t belong to you.
In this episode — a part two to How to Build a Life That Feels Like Yours — I explore the emotional clutter we need to let go of: resentment, guilt-tripping, over-explaining, comparison, victimhood, fear of loneliness, and more.
This one’s about radical self-responsibility. About learning to be unapologetically yourself without becoming bitter, about making choices that fill you up so your love and energy can flow outward, not get drained away.
If you’ve ev...2025-06-0530 min
Lost & Found with Karmen WiidReimagining Your Twenties: How To Create A Life That Feels Like Your OwnWhat if the version of success you’re chasing isn’t actually yours? In this episode, I talk about throwing out the blueprint, redefining your values, and choosing a life that makes you feel lit up, not burned out.
I’ll walk you through:
Signs you’re living on autopilot
How to re-evaluate your values and beliefs
My own turning point that made me question what I really wanted from work and life
Why joy is not a luxury, it’s your compass
Let’s get a little lost...2025-06-0430 min
Lost & Found with Karmen WiidWelcome: Solo Travel, Self-Growth, and Saying Yes AnywayIt’s 3AM in a tiny Airbnb in Rajasthan, India. I have a full travel day ahead, a 7AM meeting on the books—and yet here I am, recording the first episode of a podcast I’ve been dreaming about for months.
Welcome to Lost and Found, a space for anyone navigating the beautiful, confusing mess of their twenties. In this raw, unscripted debut, I talk about what led me here—from solo travel to heartbreak, creative restlessness to radical joy. There’s no niche, no filter—just a deep desire to connect and make sense of the chaos al...2025-06-0418 min
Voelgoed PodsendingsMaak jou hart 'n warm plek (Karmen Wiid)#SondagStilword vir Meisies Week 432022-11-0203 minVoelgoed PodsendingsJesus was die eerste feminis (Karmen Wiid)#SondagStilword vir Meisies Week 392022-09-1903 minVoelgoed PodsendingsGeloof is nie altyd maklik nie (Karmen Wiid)#SondagStilword vir Meisies Episode 352022-09-0502 minVoelgoed PodsendingsJy mag vrae oor geloof vra (Karmen Wiid)#SondagStilword vir Meisies Week 312022-08-0802 minVoelgoed PodsendingsSpandeer kwaliteit tyd saam met God (Karmen Wiid)#SondagStilword vir Meisies Week 272022-07-2102 min
Voelgoed PodsendingsPassies en talente is rigtingaanwysers - Karmen Wiid#SondagStilword Meisies Week 152022-06-0102 minVoelgoed PodsendingsGeluk kom van binne en binne van bo (Karmen Wiid)Voelgoed Meisie Week 19 2022-05-0902 minVoelgoed PodsendingsDie Bybel as self-love handboek - Karmen Wiid#SondagStilword vir MEISIES2022-05-0304 minVoelgoed PodsendingsNeem eienaarskap van jou geloof - Karmen Wiid#SondagStilword vir MEISIES2022-02-1602 minVoelgoed PodsendingsMoenie jou voorregte as vanselfsprekend aanvaar nie - Karmen Wiid#SondagStilword vir MEISIES2022-02-1603 min