Made In Chaos with Ryan Curtis

Ireland's Best-Known Financial Advisor on What We Get Wrong About Money, and Why You're Probably Doing Better Than Social Media Tells You.
Paul Merriman, better known as Ask Paul, is one of Ireland's most recognisable financial advisors and CEO of Fairstone Ireland. In this conversation he cuts through the noise, the viral "skip your coffee" advice, the pressure to be a millionaire by sixty, the panic about pensions, and gives a refreshingly honest, jargon-free take on money in Ireland.
Ryan sits down with Paul for a genuinely useful conversation about planning, property, pensions, investing and why the best investment most people can make is in themselves.
What we get into:
Why we don't plan enough, and the one habit that quietly changes everything
Financial literacy in Ireland versus the US, and why we're actually good savers
Good debt versus bad debt, and what wiped the country out in 2008
Why he pushes back on the "cut out the coffee" advice, and when a "money diet" does make sense
The housing crisis, developers, planning, and why there's no will to fix it
Why you're probably doing better with money than social media makes you feel
The real biggest asset most people have, and it isn't their bank balance
Pensions, tax relief, ETFs and why there's no one-size-fits-all answer
Deemed disposal, the savings account changes coming, and the noise around both
Why investing in yourself beats an ETF in your twenties
Looking wealthy versus being wealthy, lifestyle creep and "Die With Zero"
After 20 years, the one thing he's determined not to get wrong in his own life
Ryan Curtis is a former Irish MMA fighter who was paralysed from the neck down and told he would never walk again. Made in Chaos exists to platform guests who've turned adversity into hard-earned wisdom worth sharing.
This conversation is general information, not personal financial advice. For advice specific to your situation, speak to a qualified financial advisor.
Follow: @madeinchaospod | @chaoscurtis
🖊️ Sponsored by The Ink Factory, Temple Bar. theinkfactory.ie | @theinkfactory

A Professional Poker Player on Risk, Luck, Reading People and Why You Can Make the Perfect Decision and Still Lose.
Chris Dowling has spent well over a decade making a living at the poker table, from local card rooms in Ireland to the high-stakes rooms of Las Vegas. But this conversation is about far more than cards. It is about how to think clearly under pressure, how to read people, how to manage risk and emotion, and how to keep making good decisions when the outcome is out of your hands.
Ryan sits down with Chris for a genuinely fascinating look inside the mind of a professional, and the mental habits that apply to anyone's life, whether you have ever played a hand or not.
What we get into:
How Chris went from the electrical trade to professional poker after the recession
The three levels of poker, and where the real money and the real pros actually are
Why films get poker completely wrong, and how cheating really works
Why poker is not gambling, and the maths that makes the house always win
Reading people: what you can actually tell from how someone acts, dresses and bets
Game theory, exploiting mistakes, and the rock paper scissors trick that explains it all
Why the best players randomise their decisions using their watch
Going on tilt, and how the same emotional spiral shows up everywhere in life
Why most people badly misunderstand luck and probability
What separates a calculated risk from being reckless, and when to walk away
How experience, not talent, lets the best stay calm playing for millions
The single most useful thing poker can teach you about decisions in real life
Ryan Curtis is a former Irish MMA fighter who was paralysed from the neck down and told he would never walk again. Made in Chaos exists to platform guests who've turned adversity into hard-earned wisdom worth sharing.
Follow: @madeinchaospod | @chaoscurtis
🖊️ Sponsored by The Ink Factory, Temple Bar. theinkfactory.ie | @theinkfactory

He Built One of Dublin's Best-Known Businesses While Addiction Nearly Took Everything. Rob Connolly on Success, Grief, Recovery and the Brother He Lost.
Rob Connolly is the founder of The Ink Factory, one of the most recognisable tattoo studios in Ireland, and a serial entrepreneur since his teens. But behind the businesses is a life shaped by addiction from the age of twelve, the loss of his brother John to suicide, and a long, honest reckoning with what success is really worth.
Ryan sits down with Rob for one of the most open and moving conversations Made in Chaos has had, about building a life while battling addiction, the loss that changed everything, and why he believes there is always a way back.
What we get into:
Getting into business as teenagers, from nightclubs to The Ink Factory
Why he built The Ink Factory around community, not just tattoos
Growing up in an addicted household and using from the age of twelve
How success became the perfect place to hide an addiction
Mistaking net worth for self-worth, and the hole that no business could fill
Losing his brother John to suicide, and the years of grief that followed
The conversation with Ryan that helped Rob reconnect with his brother in time
Why there is always a way back, no matter how far down
The John Connolly Foundation and the mental health work it funds
The loneliness and identity crisis facing young men in Ireland
Why Ireland's mental health system too often fails people until crisis point
Ryan Curtis is a former Irish MMA fighter who was paralysed from the neck down and told he would never walk again. Made in Chaos exists to platform guests who've turned adversity into hard-earned wisdom worth sharing.
Follow: @madeinchaospod | @chaoscurtis
If anything in this episode affects you, support is available in Ireland. Samaritans are free, 24/7, on 116 123. Pieta (suicide and self-harm support) is on 1800 247 247, or text HELP to 51444. The HSE Drugs and Alcohol Helpline is on 1800 459 459.
🖊️ Sponsored by The Ink Factory, Temple Bar. theinkfactory.ie | @theinkfactory

He's an Irish Traveller Who Speaks Five Languages, Reads Nietzsche in German, and Is Reviving a Dying Language. Lucas Connors on Culture, Community and Everything Settled Ireland Gets Wrong.
When most people hear the word "Traveller," a set of assumptions follows. Lucas Connors spends this episode gently, brilliantly taking those assumptions apart. He's a jiu-jitsu black belt, a linguist reviving the Shelta language, a voracious reader of philosophy, and one of the most thoughtful guests Made in Chaos has had.
Ryan sits down with Lucas for a warm, funny, genuinely eye-opening conversation about Traveller culture, identity, prejudice, community and curiosity.
What we get into:
Why Lucas says he doesn't really believe in bigotry — and his remarkable approach to changing prejudiced minds
What settled Ireland gets most wrong about Travellers, starting with the fact that it's an ethnicity
The Traveller sense of community — walk in, no knock, the company is the reward
Shelta (or Gammon): the Traveller language, where it came from, and how Lucas is reviving it
Why so many young Travellers grow up believing they're "only simple" — and how that belief is passed down
How his mother refused to let him set his sights low
Curiosity as a superpower: from the Bible and the Quran to Jung, Freud and Nietzsche
Why he reads Nietzsche in German — and journaling as a tool for thinking
My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding, reality TV, and how stereotypes get manufactured and sold
The generation of educated young Travellers changing the culture from within
Jiu-jitsu, "culchie strength," and the mindset of never staying down
Lucas turns the tables and interviews Ryan about the accident, gratitude, and living fully
Ryan Curtis is a former Irish MMA fighter who was paralysed from the neck down and told he would never walk again. Made in Chaos exists to platform guests who've turned adversity into hard-earned wisdom worth sharing.
Follow: @madeinchaospod | @chaoscurtis
🖊️ Sponsored by The Ink Factory, Temple Bar — Ireland's highest rated tattoo studio. theinkfactory.ie | @theinkfactory

He Went From Addiction, Violence and a Seven-and-a-Half Year Prison Sentence to Studying the Very Behaviour That Destroyed His Life. Bob Cullen on Violence, Class and Whether People Can Really Change.
Bob Cullen grew up in Blanchardstown as, by his own account, a shy and sensitive kid — and became a violent, addicted young man who ended up serving over seven years in prison. What makes his story extraordinary is what he did next: he studied criminology from his cell, and is now finishing a master's, trying to understand exactly what turns an ordinary child into a violent criminal.
Ryan — who shares a lot of common ground with Bob — sits down for a genuinely thought-provoking, at times challenging conversation that pushes back on both sides.
What we get into:
What actually turns an ordinary kid into a violent criminal
Why Bob believes violence is a "pathogen" you catch through proximity
Masculinity, patriarchy, and how young men build status when they have nothing
Why he argues the harsher a system punishes, the more crime it creates
The difference between explaining your actions and excusing them
Systemic vs street crime: why a bike shed can cost more than people go to prison for stealing
Why the same few postcodes fill every prison in the country
Addiction, two suicide attempts, and the moment he decided to stop
Prison abolition — what it actually means, and the pushback he gets
Delusional self-confidence, luck, and the doors that have to open
Routine, discipline, neurodivergence, and how structure saved him
The one lesson he learned the hard way: the love you need has to come from you
Ryan Curtis is a former Irish MMA fighter who was paralysed from the neck down and told he would never walk again. Made in Chaos exists to platform guests who've turned adversity into hard-earned wisdom worth sharing.
Follow: @madeinchaospod | @chaoscurtis
If anything in this episode affects you, support is available in Ireland. Samaritans are free, 24/7, on 116 123. Pieta (suicide and self-harm support) is on 1800 247 247, or text HELP to 51444. The HSE Drugs & Alcohol Helpline is on 1800 459 459.
🖊️ Sponsored by The Ink Factory, Temple Bar — Ireland's highest rated tattoo studio. theinkfactory.ie | @theinkfactory