I'm Matt Gilhooly. I build things around what happens when someone finally gets asked the right question. That's The Life Shift, a podcast now five seasons and 280+ episodes deep. It's two books. And it's my day job, where I run content strategy for a fintech brand and was just named a 2026 HousingWire Marketing Leader for it.
Twenty years of not being asked, then a microphone.
When I was eight, my mom died suddenly. My parents were divorced, and I was visiting my dad in another state when it happened. In one afternoon I lost my mom, my home, my school, the whole shape of my daily life. Nobody really talked about it. The adults kept moving, so I learned to do the same. I got very good at holding it together.
In 2022, a grad-school project at the University of Florida turned into The Life Shift, a podcast where I ask strangers about their before and after, the line in the sand where everything shifted. I wasn't trying to heal. I was just curious. Two hundred conversations later, I realized I'd spent two decades asking everyone else the question nobody had asked me.
Figure out what's actually true, then build something honest around it. That's the same instinct I bring to my day job. I'm the Head of Digital Content at Optimal Blue, a fintech company serving the mortgage industry, where I write and design most of what the company says in public: the website, paid media, social, blogs and articles, digital signage, event signage, and the Optimal Insights video and podcast platform, plus managing our graphic designer. In the past year that work grew YouTube views 5× and podcast engagement 35%+ year-over-year, which is the kind of thing that gets you named a 2026 HousingWire Marketing Leader, an honor I'm still a little stunned by.
Whether the medium is a grief conversation, a market update, or a coloring book, the job is the same: listen for what's real, then design the container that carries it well.
2026 HousingWire Marketing Leader
Featured in Forbes, July 2026
Ear Worthy: Top Independent Podcasts
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What I Make
Content strategy on one end, illustration on the other.
I've spent the last several years working every part of the content chain: the strategy behind it, the thing itself, and the design wrapped around it. A working list of what that looks like:
01
Content Strategy & Production
Turning one idea into a system (podcast, video, social, newsletter) built to run without burning out the person making it. This is literally what I teach in a course I'm building, Solo & Scalable.
02
Brand Voice & Creative Direction
Warm and reflective for The Life Shift, confident and benefit-driven for a fintech audience. I own the copy and design across web, paid media, social, blogs, and signage for Optimal Blue, and manage the graphic designer who helps bring it to life.
03
Visual & Interactive Design
Illustration, coloring books, and pet portraits under my studio 57MGAve, plus SHIFTS, a six-word framework and an interactive project I built for how people move through life-altering moments.
04
Audience Growth
The Life Shift grew to 280+ episodes and national press with no agency, no algorithm push, and no media deal. Word of mouth only. At Optimal Blue, running Optimal Insights, the same instincts moved YouTube views 5× and podcast engagement 35%+ year-over-year.
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The Flagship
The Life Shift
"Honest conversations about becoming who we are after everything changes."
Every episode is one long, unhurried conversation about a pivotal moment: grief, addiction, reinvention, a diagnosis, a divorce, a decision that split a life into before and after. No panel, no cross-talk, just space for someone to say the thing out loud, maybe for the first time. Now in Season 5, with more than 280 episodes since launching in March 2022, grown entirely by word of mouth and recognized by Ear Worthy as one of the top independent podcasts in its category, plus a feature in Forbes on podcasts that help people deal with life's hardest moments.
Not everything I make is heavy. Some of it is quick, some of it is just kind, but it's built with the same care.
SHIFTS
A six-word model for how people move through a life-altering moment: Stop, Hide, Identify, Face, Transform, Share. Built into an interactive site, lineinthesandproject.com, where anyone can get their own energy portrait and add their turning point to The Wall, anonymously if they choose. The seed of a future book.
Interactive / framework
It's Okay If…
A short-form audio series of permission, one reminder at a time: it's okay if you don't have motivation today, if you're not over it yet, if you need to take up space. The same ethos as the shirt on my back: you're allowed to start over.
Short-form series
57MGAve
My design studio: hand-illustrated coloring books, custom pet portraits, and digital art. Where the podcast is about listening, this is about making something someone gets to hold. Shop the books on Amazon.
Illustration studio
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Books
Two books, written the same way I podcast.
Anthology
An anthology built from Life Shift conversations: guests' own words, on the page, about the moment their life split into before and after.
A map for recognizing your own shift, wherever you're stuck in it. Built from the same before-and-after questions I've been asking guests for five seasons, finally turned on myself.
Currently being written
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On Stage
Saying it out loud, in person.
I gave my first public talk in 2025. Turns out standing in front of a room and a microphone aren't so different.
CreativeMornings Orlando
2025
My first talk, on how a podcast quietly became my own path through grief, and what happened when the audience realized they weren't just hearing my story, they had permission to think about their own.
Building something that needs a voice, a strategy, or the right question asked?
That's the work I want more of: content strategy, brand voice, creative direction, a show that needs a host who actually listens. Reach out and let's figure out what we'd make together.
