Description:

What if the years everyone warned you about turned out to be the ones you'd been waiting for?

Today, Jen and Amy sit down with Katie Fogarty—a former journalist, career coach, and the voice behind one of the most vibrant midlife podcasts in the country, called A Certain Age—for an honest, energizing hour about what it really means to thrive in this season.

Katie launched A Certain Age thirty-five days before her 51st birthday with one mission: blow up the narrative that women become less relevant as they get older. Five years and 230-plus episodes later, she's interviewed hundreds of midlife women—and she has thoughts. Big ones.

They dig into the myths about midlife that refuse to die, why Katie calls this season an "accelerant" rather than an obstacle, what it looks like when women stop waiting for permission and start claiming their lives—and what she's hearing that gives her real hope for the women coming behind us.

If you've ever felt like midlife was quietly trying to make you smaller—this episode is your push back.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “Sometimes the word ‘reinventing’ implies we're completely changing our lives and getting rid of everything that came before. It's more about reimagining, because we're drawing on all of our expertise to apply it in new ways, big and small.” – Katie Fogarty

• “Midlife is that moment where you say, let me get going. The kids are grown, the career maybe is established, life is sort of on track, moving forward, and we have this moment with space in our brain, maybe on our calendar, to actually hit go on whatever it is we've been thinking about for so long.” – Katie Fogarty

• “If you are feeling disconnected from relationships, or like you're not being supported, find people that you are visible to. There are communities of people out there who care about what you care about, who want to see you, who will see you.” – Katie Fogarty

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Jen’s first colonoscopy - https://www.instagram.com/reel/DWz8nTvgo6p/

• Sophie Grégoire Trudeau on Life, Emotional Regulation and Midlife Reinventions - https://www.acertainagepod.com/shows/sophie-grgoire-trudeau-on-life-emotional-regulation-and-midlife-reinventions

• Tamsen Fadal - https://www.tamsenfadal.com/

• Grown Woman Talk: Your Guide to Getting and Staying Healthy by Dr. Sharon Malone - https://amzn.to/4t14kQY

• The New Perimenopause: What’s Actually Happening to Your Body with Dr. Mary Claire Haver - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-64/the-new-perimenopause-whats-actually-happening-to-your-body-with-dr-mary-claire-haver/

• When Life Happens: The Mindset Shift You Need to Manage Stress, Build Confidence, and Break Free by Dr. Rachel Goldman - https://amzn.to/4mnvZsY

• Midlife Private Parts: Revealing Essays That Will Change the Way You Think About Age - https://www.midlifeprivateparts.com/

• The Midlife Book Club - https://www.themidlifebookclub.com/about

• Jen Hatmaker Book Club - https://shop.jenhatmaker.com/collections/book-club

• Sandwich by Catherine Newman - https://amzn.to/3QauFNM

• Same As It Ever Was by Claire Lombardo - https://amzn.to/4mkK8XI

• The Grand Paloma Resort: A Novel by Cleyvis Natera - https://amzn.to/4meEQNi

• The Secret Book Society by Madeline Martin - https://amzn.to/47MkGnX

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.acertainagepod.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/acertainagepod/

Podcast - https://www.acertainagepod.com/episodes

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy.

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:If any conversation belongs squarely in our “The Body Knows: Midlife In Our Skin” series, it’s this one, and for one simple reason — pleasure is a body conversation. Desire is a body conversation. And if midlife has shifted how you feel in your own skin, this episode meets you exactly there.

Vanessa Marin is a licensed psychotherapist, sex educator, and bestselling author of Sex Talks: The Five Conversations That Will Transform Your Love Life, co-written with her husband Xander. With over two decades of experience helping people dismantle shame and build genuinely intimate relationships, Vanessa brings the kind of candid, warm, and disarmingly funny voice this conversation has always needed.

Whether you're partnered or solo, whether your sex life feels complicated or just quietly neglected, whether you're carrying shame you never asked for — this one is for you. Vanessa is here to help us say yes to communication, to connection, and maybe most of all, to pleasure.

Here's what we're getting into:

• Why so many of us have deeply wired, shame-rooted reactions to sex — and where they actually come from

• Why Vanessa says you should start having sex like a man (yes, really)

• The myth about the female orgasm that most of us were never taught the truth about

• The best things you can do for your sex life that have nothing to do with taking your clothes off

• The difference between spontaneous and responsive desire — and why understanding this might change everything

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “Despite not getting a great introduction to sex or intimacy or relationships, I had this intuitive sense that there should be joy with this act. There should be connection and intimacy, and it should be something I should feel excited to explore when the time is right.” – Vanessa Marin

• “This is literally what I am here on this earth for, is to help people get more comfortable talking about sex, connection, and intimacy.” – Vanessa Marin

• “A lot of people hear, she's a sex therapist. They must have this incredible sex life. The reality is, we've been through ups and downs, too. I am not immune to the water that we all have been swimming in. I've internalized plenty of crap myself. And so I want people to understand we are all struggling to keep that spark alive in one way or another. We are all struggling with our sex lives, with our bodies in one way or another.” – Vanessa Marin

• Research has shown that in male-female relationships, women are carrying the vast majority of the mental load. There is so much that is going through our heads on a daily basis—all this tracking, and preparing, and anticipating, and evaluating, our heads are just constantly going. And when you have so much in your brain, it makes it really hard to make the space for intimacy and desire too.” – Vanessa Marin

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Sex Talks: The Five Conversations That Will Transform Your Love Life by Vanessa Marin and Xander Marin - https://amzn.to/43VSwnS

• The Sex Talks Card Deck and Guidebook: 90 Prompts to Deepen Connection and Spark Intimacy - https://amzn.to/3Hys1xa

• Vanessa and Xander’s Deeper Monthly Membership - https://buy.vmtherapy.com/deeper

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://vmtherapy.com/about

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/vanessaandxander/

Twitter - https://x.com/VMTherapy

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/vanessaandxander/

Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/vanessamarin

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@vanessaandxander

Pinterest - https://www.pinterest.com/vanessaandxander/_created/

Podcast - https://vmtherapy.com/podcast/ 

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

While Dr. Crawford’s work is rooted in fertility, this episode zooms out to something much bigger: how hormone health reflects our overall well-being — and why midlife is often the moment when the body stops whispering and starts speaking clearly.

But this conversation isn’t just for women trying to get pregnant.

It’s for women in perimenopause and menopause wondering what their bodies are doing now — and why. Because fertility is more than reproduction; it’s a health marker. The same patterns that shape our fertility years — inflammation, hormone signaling, metabolic health, stress — also influence how we experience menopause, what symptoms show up, and what kinds of support our bodies will need.

And it’s also for women stepping into the grandparent years — who want to better understand what their daughters, daughters-in-law, and younger women in their lives are navigating. Because the more we understand our own bodies, the more compassion and clarity we bring to the next generation.

Together, they unpack:

• Why your menstrual cycle (even in its changes) is one of your most important health indicators

• Natalie’s experience with pregnancy loss and how it shaped her approach to women’s health

• The effects of societal and political shifts on women’s reproductive choices

• How cycle awareness can support both fertility outcomes and menopause transitions

Whether or not you are thinking about fertility — or are long past that season — this conversation reframes it as something more expansive: a reflection of vitality, resilience, and how supported your body truly feels across every stage of life.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “We’re living in a different era now, luckily, where women are demanding more knowledge about their bodies.” – Dr. Natalie Crawford

• “I think that my own experience reframed how I educate my patients and the public in taking charge and learning how to listen to your body and believe it. What are those little red flags—whether it's my cycle, whether it's symptoms, whether it's fatigue, and how do I get answers or try to modify those so that I can have more control over what is happening to me?” – Dr. Natalie Crawford

• “Anybody who's trying to sell you a quick fix, especially if it comes in a bottle, is most likely not in your best interest. That doesn't mean there aren't medications or supplements that can help, but that comes after you've done what you can do.” – Dr. Natalie Crawford

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• The Fertility Formula: Take Control of Your Reproductive Future by Dr. Natalie Crawford – https://amzn.to/47HZ1NR

• The New Perimenopause: What’s Actually Happening to Your Body with Dr. Mary Claire Haver - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-64/the-new-perimenopause-whats-actually-happening-to-your-body-with-dr-mary-claire-haver/

• Fora Fertility Clinic– https://www.forafertility.com/

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.nataliecrawfordmd.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/nataliecrawfordmd/

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/nataliecrawfordmd/

Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/c/NatalieCrawfordMD/videos

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@nataliecrawfordmd

Substack - https://substack.com/@nataliecrawfordmd

Podcast - https://www.nataliecrawfordmd.com/podcast

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy.

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:Some stories feel less like books and more like quiet companions. Theo of Golden is one of those.

This month in the Jen Hatmaker Book Club, Jen sits down with author Allen Levi to talk about the small-town novel that has quietly captured the hearts of readers around the world. Set in the fictional town of Golden, Georgia, the story introduces us to Theo — a mysterious newcomer whose little shop becomes an unlikely gathering place for the people around him. As neighbors wander in carrying grief, questions, regrets, and ordinary Tuesdays, something remarkable begins to happen: lives shift, wounds soften, and the quiet work of grace unfolds in the most unexpected ways.

But Allen’s path to writing Theo of Golden is a story of its own.

Before this book found its way into readers’ hands, Allen spent decades living another life — as a litigator and as a musician and songwriter, telling stories in courtrooms and through songs long before he ever sat down to write a novel. In this conversation, Jen and Allen talk about how those two worlds — law and music — shaped the storyteller he would eventually become, and how the long arc of a creative life sometimes leads us somewhere we never expected.

Together, Jen and Allen talk about the beauty of slow stories, the sacredness hiding in ordinary places, and why the most transformative moments in life rarely arrive with fanfare. They explore the characters of Golden, the themes of redemption and belonging woven through the book, and the deeper invitation at the heart of Theo’s story — to pay attention to the people and moments right in front of us.

If you’ve ever believed that kindness still matters, that communities can heal one conversation at a time, or that ordinary lives are full of extraordinary grace, this conversation will feel like coming home.

Grab your coffee, pull up a chair, and join Jen and Allen Levi for a conversation about stories, second acts, and the quiet magic that happens when people really see one another.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “All through the writing of the book, I cried and cried and I'm not an easy crier, but I fell in love with these characters. They still kind of inhabit the space around me. But it told me that there was something bigger going on than just the story. Maybe the better angels of our nature are waking up and bringing something to the surface that maybe is good for us. I hope so.” – Allen Levi

• “I have heard, if you want to write, you just sit down with a pen and you start writing and the story will bubble up. And so I did that and the story never bubbled up. It just frustrated me and frustrated me. That's why I quit so many times, but eventually it started coming together almost like writing a song.” – Allen Levi

• “Everything that I've done professionally has required me to use words to tell stories, usually to persuade people. As a lawyer, I did that. As a singer songwriter, I did that. And now as a novelist.”– Allen Levi

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Theo of Golden: A Novel by Allen Levi - https://amzn.to/47J6V9p

• Allen Levi’s Music - https://open.spotify.com/artist/2UaP04apWp23PxnhKQHJgx?si=3tzeCi3HROqRampni92Dew

• Jen Hatmaker Book Club - https://shop.jenhatmaker.com/collections/book-club

• Alan Bradley - https://alanbradleyauthor.com/

• The Flavia de Luce series by Alan Bradley - https://amzn.to/412lNMm

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.allenlevi.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/allenlevi/

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/allen.levi.31/

Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQa2G5Ym0pyNnnK0nocxZ3Q

Substack - https://substack.com/@allenclevi

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Jen is joined by her beloved friend (and actual genius) Kate Bowler to talk about her new book, Joyful Anyway—a bracing, funny, tender rebellion against the optimization industrial complex. This is not a “choose joy” pep talk where somebody sprints past you tossing a Live Laugh Love pillow at your face. Kate is here for the after: after the before-and-after story didn’t pan out, after grief and guilt and longing set up permanent residence, after you realized happiness is fragile and reality keeps kicking in.

Together, Jen, Amy, and Kate name what so many of us can’t quite articulate: the ache—that “achy, stabby want” at the center of our lived experience. They talk about why we need permission just to be human, why “performing resilience” is exhausting, and how telling the truth can loosen the grip of the story that’s been swallowing the rest of our life.

Kate also shares an unforgettable story about a snake bite, an ER, and a moment of unexpected mercy that cracked something open—proof that joy doesn’t always come through the front door. Sometimes it slips in sideways, like grace. Like a sudden, full-bodied yes—even when nothing is resolved.

You’ll also hear about:

• The difference between happiness (fragile and expensive) and joy (sneaky, un-schedulable, and—somehow—free)

• How joy finds us through embodied moments—beauty, absurdity, paying attention

• The Burn Book / Resentment List and why making a “this scarred me, this counted” list might be the most faithful thing you do all week (including Kate’s deeply personal grievance about her tragically unaesthetic family gravesite)

• Roadside Joy Detours: Kate’s practice of putting herself “in the way of joy” with absurd road trips to local oddities

• And Kate’s reminder: you are a song—don’t die with it still inside you

Bottom line: if you’re quietly undone, if your body feels weary, if the headlines have you spiraling—Kate is here with permission, language, and a weird little flashlight. The ache stays. But joy still shows up. Sometimes as grace. Sometimes as absurdity. Sometimes as a roadside attraction you drove two hours to see for no reason—except you’re alive, and that’s reason enough.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “I think there's a great mystery at the heart of the human experience and I wanted to explore joy as one of those unbelievable places.” – Kate Bowler

• “The purpose of that ache inside you is to get you to re-examine how it feels in your body, bring your honesty to it, and then ask, where can I go from here? Where can this take me that's lovelier than here?” – Kate Bowler

• “I find that absurdity is one of the side doors to joy.” – Kate Bowler

• “Joy is asking us to step up to the edge of a mystery where we get momentary fulfillment and then we get life. And God is asking us to say that this is holy.” – Kate Bowler

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Joyful Anyway by Kate Bowler - https://amzn.to/3ZWqNBT

• Kate Bowler book tour - https://katebowler.com/books/joyfulanyway/#tour

• Theo of Golden: A Novel by Allen Levi- https://amzn.to/4bdpN2q

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://katebowler.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/katecbowler/

Twitter - https://x.com/katecbowler

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/katecbowler

Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCf8m7lNdR7YVieU0muCg5cg

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@katecbowler

Substack - https://katebowler.substack.com/

Podcast - https://katebowler.com/podcasts/

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Not fixed.

Not optimized.

Not cured.

Just… okay.

This week, Jen and Amy sit down with bestselling author and professional weirdo Jenny Lawson to talk about surviving — and sometimes even thriving — inside a brain that does not always cooperate. Jenny’s new book, How to Be Okay When Nothing Is Okay, is a field guide for tender humans: a collection of tiny tools for when the big solutions feel impossible.

Today, we talk about:

• Living with “tiny erratic squirrels” in your head

• Why imposter syndrome gets louder with success

• Learning to live within your real capacity

• Why you’re not failing if it’s just not for you

• Helpful tools like “weird walks”, “body doubling”, “writing Zooms”, 

• The radical courage of simply staying

This conversation explores what happens when we stop trying to override our nervous systems and start listening to them instead. Midlife has a way of stripping away illusion — about productivity, about comparison, about who we’re supposed to be.

Jenny reminds us that sometimes grit looks like finishing the book. And sometimes it looks like taking a drink of water and calling it enough.

If you are exhausted, if you feel behind, if your brain tells you you’re the only one struggling – YOU ARE NOT ALONE. And being “still here” is no small thing.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “Self-help books are super helpful for the right kind of person but I’m not that person.” – Jenny Lawson

• “Keep in mind that what worked for you in the past might not necessarily work for you now or in the future, and that doesn't mean you failed. It just means that's an opportunity.” – Jenny Lawson

• “If you throw humor into a really dark subject, it gives people permission to laugh. And then that big monster becomes so much smaller.” – Jenny Lawson

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• How to Be Okay When Nothing Is Okay: Tips and Tricks That Kept Me Alive, Happy, and Creative in Spite of Myself by Jenny Lawson – https://amzn.to/4qWKZi5

• Samantha Irby – https://www.samanthairby.com/

• A Ghost and His Gold by Roberta Eaton Cheadle – https://amzn.to/405lMH8

• Anne Rice – https://annerice.com/

• Dean Koontz – https://www.deankoontz.com/

• Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia – https://amzn.to/475Qp31

• Focusmate (Body Doubling App) -  https://www.focusmate.com/

• Let's Pretend This Never Happened: (A Mostly True Memoir) by Jenny Lawson – https://amzn.to/4rGEBN7

• Furiously Happy: A Funny Book About Horrible Things by Jenny Lawson – https://amzn.to/4u4RBxG

• Broken (In The Best Possible Way) by Jenny Lawson – https://amzn.to/4r3Bhuh

• Jenny Lawson Book Tour - https://thebloggess.com/2026/02/25/how-to-be-okay-when-nothing-is-okay-on-book-tour/

• Jenny Lawson’s Nowhere Book Shop in San Antonio, TX - https://nowherebookshop.com/
  

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://thebloggess.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/thebloggess/

Twitter - https://x.com/TheBloggess

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/jennythebloggess

Pinterest - https://www.pinterest.com/thebloggess/

Substack - https://thebloggess.substack.com/

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy.

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

They’re exhausted but can’t sleep. Gaining weight but eating less. Anxious, foggy, irritable, disconnected. And too often, they’re told it’s stress. Aging. Depression. Just part of being a woman.

But what if it’s something else?

This week, Jen and Amy sit down with board-certified OB-GYN and menopause expert Dr. Mary Claire Haver to talk about what’s really happening in perimenopause — the hormonal transition that can begin years before your final period and affect nearly every system in your body.

Drawing from her new book The New Perimenopause, Dr. Haver explains:

• Why the brain may be the first organ to notice hormone shifts

• Why antidepressants are often prescribed before hormones are even discussed

• The dangerous legacy of outdated research and underfunded women’s health

• How bone density, cholesterol, muscle mass, mood, libido, and cognition are all connected

• And why midlife is not a decline — but a powerful window of opportunity

This is not just a conversation about hot flashes. It’s about the “Zone of Chaos.” It’s about medical gaslighting. It’s about reclaiming your body as your ally, not your enemy.

If you’ve ever whispered, “What is wrong with me?” or spent your sleepless nights up Googling dramatic questions like “is my brain broken?” — this episode is for you.

You’re not broken. You’re not weak. And you are definitely not alone.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “We got some bad f*cking advice…Power through! You built this life. You asked for this. Oh, and also be thin, and make yourself smaller, and don't take up space, and make sure you put everyone in your family before your needs. That's the only way you're gonna be rewarded, elevated, celebrated is on this altar of self-sacrifice. You know what that did for my mother and my grandmother? Dementia and sarcopenia. I’m saying we’re going to take a different path.” – Dr. Mary Claire Haver 

• “Men build rockets. Women build healthcare systems.” – Dr. Mary Claire Haver 

• “One of the good things about menopause is that women lose their give-a-shit filter.” – Dr. Mary Claire Haver

• “I just want menopause to be taken half as seriously as erectile dysfunction.” – Dr. Mary Claire Haver

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• The New Perimenopause: An Evidence-Based Guide to Surviving the Zone of Chaos and Feeling Like Yourself Again by Dr. Mary Claire Haver – https://www.amazon.com/New-Perimenopause-Evidence-Based-Surviving-Yourself/dp/0593736613/

• The New Menopause: Navigating Your Path Through Hormonal Change with Purpose, Power, and Facts by Dr. Mary Claire Haver - https://amzn.to/4aUtrx3

• The Blue Lagoon film (1980) – https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0080453/

• Menopause.org

• The International Society for the Study of Women’s Sexual Health (ISSWSH) - https://www.isswsh.org/

• The Pause Life - https://thepauselife.com/

• MidiHealth - https://www.joinmidi.com/

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://thepauselife.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/drmaryclaire

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/drmaryclaire

Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/@drmaryclaire

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@drmaryclaire

Substack - https://drmaryclairehaver.substack.com/

Podcast - https://thepauselife.com/blogs/the-unpaused-podcast

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

When the headlines won’t let up, when grief and uncertainty sit heavy in our bodies, when we’re carrying more than we ever thought we could—how do we keep going without numbing out or falling apart?

This week, Jen sits down with beloved writer and friend Shannan Martin to talk about her new book Counterweights, a tender, practical guide for living with hope in a heavy world.

At the center of Shannan’s work is a deceptively simple idea: when life gets heavy, we don’t eliminate the weight—we learn to carry something equally weighty in the other hand. Not balance. Not denial. But both/and.

Together, Jen and Shannan explore what it means to hold grief and joy at the same time, to resist despair without turning away from reality, and to find steady ground in the middle of it all. They talk about community as survival, faith that evolves and expands, and the small, ordinary moments that become lifelines when everything feels overwhelming.

This conversation is a fitting close to our Wilderness & Wonder exploration—because if the wilderness strips us down to what’s real, Shannan helps us ask: what will hold us up now?

If you’ve been feeling stretched thin, worn down, or just plain tired of carrying it all alone, this episode is for you.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “Now, what are the things that are keeping me going? For me, it’s clawing for those little tiny moments where we can. I need to see myself take care of myself.” – Shannan Martin

• “We have to carry a lot of really heavy things in one hand. We don't choose these things. We would never have asked for them. And we can't just put them down. We don't have control over them. We can't just set them aside. So how do we carry these heavy things? We fill the other hand with heavy goodness.” – Shannan Martin

• “The world feels catastrophic right now. My bowl of curry for lunch cannot cancel that out. There's no amount of beautiful sunsets that can cancel out a diagnosis that nobody wants or these heavy, heavy things that we are tasked with carrying because balance is impossible.” – Shannan Martin

• “When wholeness is our goal, beauty is our emergency.” – Shannan Martin

• “Anytime I can disrupt the algorithm, I feel it in my body.” – Shannan Martin

• “The abundant life is not getting all the things we ever wanted. The abundant life is you get this and this and the task now is to figure out how to carry it.” – Shannan Martin

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Counterweights: An Essential Practice for Holding Hope in a Heavy World by Shannan Martin - https://amzn.to/4sRdTRZ

• David Chang - https://www.instagram.com/davidchang/

• 7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess by Jen Hatmaker

• Rainer Maria Rilke - https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/rainer-maria-rilke

• Sara Miles - https://sara-miles.squarespace.com/bio

• Shannan Martin Book Tour - https://www.shannanmartin.com/counterweights-events

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.shannanmartin.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/shannanwrites/

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/shannan.garbermartin

Substack - https://www.shannanmartin.com/newsletter

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A three New York Times best-seller and frequent contributor to the Today Show and the Wall Street Journal, Professor Welch is considered a leading expert on decision-making, and the discovery and pursuit of authentic purpose. Join Suzy every week to laugh, learn, get riled up, get calmed down, and basically get closer to becoming you, joyfully, in this crazy, upside-down, scary, messy, and altogether beautiful world we share.

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:Sometimes a conversation lands so gently—and so powerfully—that it deserves another moment in the light.

In this encore episode, Jen revisits her conversation with poet, writer, and visual artist David Gate, whose work explores themes of care, community, and spiritual resilience.

Jen first discovered David the way so many of us discover the words that change us: late at night on Instagram, stumbling across a poem that made her stop mid-scroll and immediately send it to six friends. That was the beginning of a quiet fandom that eventually turned into this conversation—one that felt less like an interview and more like sitting in the presence of someone who has learned how to notice beauty in hard places.

David’s work—including his collection A Rebellion of Care—is rooted in the radical idea that tenderness, attention, and compassion are not small acts. They are resistance. They are survival. They are a way through the wilderness.

Together, Jen and David explore the ways language can become a lifeline during difficult seasons. They talk about the courage of softness in a harsh world, the sacred practice of paying attention, and how poetry can give us words for things we thought we had to carry alone.

This conversation sits right at the intersection: the wilderness of grief, uncertainty, and fatigue—and the wonder that still insists on growing in the cracks.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “I did not want to have an email job and I did not want to be in meetings that could have been emails. I did not want to be on Slack. I just didn't want that to be what I was spending my time doing. I loved caring for people, and I loved creating and writing, and I got to do that within the church world.” – David Gate

• 
  

• “It’s a constant battle to speak the truth. Even things we all know It can be difficult to say, if it's not something that is normally said, and it's not something that is normally expressed, so you have to fight for that and you have to fight for your experience of the truth. You have to fight for your story. You have to fight for all of that.” – David Gate

• “I think it's very, very difficult for men to reach for emotional honesty because everything tells you that you're failing if you do that. But it's the most important work right now. And so much of what men are actually looking for in this world, intimacy, a sense of place, a sense of belonging, companionship, adventure, excitement, is on the other side of reaching for that emotional honesty.” – David Gate

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• A Rebellion of Care: Poems and Essays by David Gate - https://amzn.to/4jjf87X

• Good Soil: The Education of an Accidental Farmhand by Jeff Chu - https://amzn.to/3GnS21w

• Cultivating Belonging and Evolving Faith with Jeff Chu - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-64/cultivating-belonging-and-evolving-faith-with-jeff-chu/

• Sarah Bessey - https://www.sarahbessey.com/

• Armando Veve, Illustrator - https://www.instagram.com/armandoveve/

• Awake: A Memoir by Jen Hatmaker - https://amzn.to/3YHKgpw

• Sinners film (2025) - https://www.imdb.com/title/tt31193180/

• Malaprop's Bookstore, Asheville - https://www.malaprops.com/

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.davidgatepoet.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/davidgatepoet/

Substack - https://substack.com/@davidgatepoet

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Anne returns to For the Love to talk about her upcoming book, Good Writing, co-written with her husband, journalist and editor Neal Allen. While Neal couldn’t join us today, this conversation is very much about the shared work they created together—a book that isn’t chasing polish or perfection, but clarity, honesty, and respect for the reader.

Good Writing is part craft guide, part philosophy of living. Written in alternating voices, it blends Anne’s signature warmth, humor, and spiritual insight with Neal’s journalistic precision and discipline. Together, they explore what makes sentences work, how voice is formed, why ego gets in the way, and why clarity is not just a stylistic choice—but an act of generosity.

In this intimate and often funny conversation, Jen and Amy talk with Anne about what it was like to co-write a book so closely, what collaboration revealed about trust and restraint, and how writing—at its best—is a relationship. They dig into voice and ego, bad sentences and letting go, rhythm and revision, and why removing what doesn’t serve the sentence can feel like both grief and grace.

But as always with Anne, the conversation goes deeper than craft. This episode explores writing as a way of being in the world—how attention, humility, and courage shape not only our sentences, but our lives. 

If you’ve ever loved Bird by Bird, wrestled with your inner critic, or longed to tell the truth with a little more care—this conversation is for you.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “I only have to do today, today.” – Anne Lamott

• “We write because we try to tell the truth. We try to share our experience, strength and hope.” – Anne Lamott

• “Say what you mean. Mean what you say. And don’t say it mean.” – Anne Lamott

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith by Anne Lamott - https://amzn.to/4qLZRQR

• Anne Lamott on Faith, Writing, and Radical Self-Love - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/bonus/anne-lamott-on-faith-writing-and-radical-self-love-2/

• Neal Allen - https://www.shapesoftruth.com/

• Good Writing: 36 Ways to Improve Your Sentences by Neal Allen and Anne Lamott - https://amzn.to/3NMoKNP

• Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life by Anne Lamott - https://amzn.to/4t7FteL

• Somehow: Thoughts on Love by Anne Lamott - https://amzn.to/3Z4Nd3r

• Stanley Tucci on the For the Love podcast - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-64/stanley-tucci-food-memories-and-emotions/

• Amy’s Full of Microplastics and Existential Dread Sweatshirt - https://www.threadless.com/shop/@dinomike/design/full-of-microplastics/womens/sweatshirt

• Awake: A Memoir by Jen Hatmaker - https://amzn.to/4rlv3Gz

• Jessica Mitford - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jessica_Mitford

• Tyler Merritt - https://thetylermerrittproject.com/

• I Take My Coffee Black: Reflections on Tupac, Musical Theater, Faith, and Being Black in America by Tyler Merritt - https://amzn.to/49N1ms8

• Better Days: Tame Your Inner Critic by Neal Allen - https://amzn.to/3LTEVs9

• A Writing Room - https://awritingroom.com/

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://awritingroom.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/annelamott/

Twitter - https://x.com/ANNELAMOTT?lang=en

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/AnneLamott/

Substack - https://annelamott.substack.com/

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, we’re stepping into one of the most humbling arenas for compassion and grace: your own living room. Because fierce compassion isn’t just for coworkers and complicated relatives—it’s also for the tiny humans melting down over the wrong color cup or the soccer uniform that didn’t get washed in time for game day. And it’s for YOU, standing there, wondering how you got so activated over this nonsense.

Jen and Amy are talking to Mandy Grass—nationally recognized Board-Certified Behavior Analyst, founder of The Family Behaviorist, former teacher, and mom in a blended family of seven kids (ages four to sixteen). Yes, seven. Her house is less “quiet retreat” and more “ongoing behavioral case study.” The data is… robust.

For nearly two decades, Mandy has been translating behavior science into practical, no-guilt tools for families. Her central message feels radical in a culture obsessed with control: kids’ behavior is communication—not a moral failure. And neither is your exhaustion.

In this conversation, we talk about:

• What Mandy actually hears when parents say, “We’ve tried everything”

• How shame and blame sneak into parenting—and how to gently escort them out

• Why so much of parenting work begins with the parent, not the kid (I know. We had feelings about this too.)

• And one tiny shift you can make tonight that will cool the temperature at home (no sticker charts required)

Here’s the truth: we cannot regulate our kids if we are operating at DEFCON 1 ourselves. Fierce compassion means holding boundaries without losing your humanity. It means seeing your child clearly—and offering yourself the same grace when you inevitably lose it over bedtime negotiations.

Mandy also shares about her new podcast, The Behavior Blueprint, a grounded, step-by-step guide for parents who are tired of quick fixes and ready for something that actually works in real life—not just on Instagram. It’s equal parts instruction, compassion, and “oh thank God, it’s not just me.”

Take a breath. Your child isn’t the problem. You aren’t either. And that might be the fiercest compassion of all.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• "In behavior analysis, every behavior has a function –attention, escape, access to something tangible, and an automatic or a sensory function."– Mandy Grass

• “Do I have ADHD, anxiety, or am I just a mom?” – Mandy Grass

• “Our default is take away, take away, take away. And really what we want to do is reinforce the behavior we want to see more of.” – Mandy Grass

• “You’re not gonna get it right every time, but at least it doesn't feel like you have no idea what to do.”– Mandy Grass

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• The Behavior Blueprint podcast with Mandy Grass - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-behavior-blueprint-with-mandy-grass/id1872526999

• Too Much Junk on Your Social Media Feeds? I'll Show You How to Clean It Up - https://www.pcmag.com/how-to/too-much-junk-on-your-social-media-feeds-ill-show-you-how-to-clean-it-up?test_uuid=04IpBmWGZleS0I0J3epvMrC&test_variant=A

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.thefamilybehaviorist.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/thefamilybehaviorist

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61560942080087

Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/@thefamilybehaviorist

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@thefamilybehaviorist

Podcast - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-behavior-blueprint-with-mandy-grass/id1872526999

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:What if you were handed a single piece of information that could change everything you think you know about your life?

For this Jen Hatmaker Book Club episode, Jen sits down with novelist Nikki Erlick, author of the wildly imaginative and deeply human novel The Measure—a story that asks one unsettling question: What would you do if you knew exactly how long you had to live?

In The Measure, every adult in the world receives a small wooden box containing a string that reveals the length of their life. What follows isn’t chaos for chaos’ sake, but something far more intimate: marriages tested, dreams deferred or pursued, fears amplified, and love redefined. It’s a novel about mortality, yes—but even more so about meaning, choice, and how we show up for one another when certainty is stripped away.

Jen and Nikki talk about the origin of this unforgettable premise, the emotional weight of writing about death in order to illuminate life, and why the book resonates so deeply with readers navigating grief, anxiety, hope, and big unanswered questions. They explore what The Measure reveals about how we value time, how fear can quietly shape our decisions, and what it might look like to live more honestly—even without guarantees.

Whether you’ve already read along with the book club or are just encountering this story for the first time, this conversation invites you to reflect on your own “measure”—and to consider how love, courage, and presence might matter more than the number of days themselves.

This episode is tender, thought-provoking, and quietly life-altering. Come for the story. Stay for the questions it leaves you asking long after the last page.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “I was preoccupied with these big questions in life, the things that don't have easy answers or any answers at all. Why do people have different fates? Why do bad things happen to good people? How much power do we actually have over our lives? That inspired me.” – Nikki Erlick

• “My process felt like people knocking on the door to my brain at all times, being like, what about me? What about me? I would be an interesting story too. I had to answer the first couple of knocks and bring these new characters in. Once I hit eight or 10, I felt like readers can't handle any more than this.” – Nikki Erlick

• “I wanted to pull on everything, for every community that has been marginalized to make this experience feel real for the people in this book.” – Nikki Erlick

• “The one thing that doesn't go out of style is hope.”– Nikki Erlick

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• The Measure: A Novel by Nikki Erlick - https://amzn.to/3OmiJaK

• The Poppy Fields: A Novel by Nikki Erlick - https://amzn.to/49ZxdGf

• Allen Bradley, author - https://alanbradleyauthor.com/

• Sandwich: A Novel by Catherine Newman - https://amzn.to/4a0bOwB

• Catherine Newman on the For the Love podcast - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-64/august-2025-catherine-newmans-sandwich/

• Wreck by Catherine Newman - https://amzn.to/4bvUy3o

• This Is Not About Us by Allegra Goodman - https://amzn.to/4qnGIE3

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.nikkierlick.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/nikkierlick/

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:Many of us were taught that desire is dangerous—something to manage, suppress, or feel ashamed of. But what if desire isn’t the problem at all? What if it’s not just about sex or attraction, but about the places we feel most alive?

Today, Jen and Amy sit down with FTL fan-favorite Jay Stringer, a licensed therapist and author whose work helps people understand the deeper stories shaping their desires—especially the ones we’ve been taught to hide, or silence. Drawing from his powerful new book Desire, Jay reframes desire not as a moral failure or impulse to eliminate, but as a signal worth listening to—one that points us toward what formed us, what wounded us, and what we are still longing for beneath the surface.

Jay shifts the focus from behavior modification to understanding the story behind desire—for intimacy, success, escape, creativity, or belonging—shaped by early attachment, trauma, and unmet needs. The conversation moves from "What's wrong with me?" to "What happened to me?" turning desire from shame into meaning. This is not a conversation about labeling or fixing yourself. It’s about understanding yourself—how your story formed you, and how listening to what brings you to life can lead toward freedom, wholeness, and deeper connection. 

This episode also serves as the opening doorway into our Wilderness & Wonder series. In a season when many of us are navigating uncertainty—spiritually, relationally, or internally—this episode grounds us in the idea that exploration isn’t aimlessness, but formation. That the wilderness can be a teacher. And that desire itself may be one of the quiet guides helping us stay awake, curious, and present as we learn how to live inside the questions.

This is a gentle conversation, but it’s also a brave one. And we’re really glad you’re here for it.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “Desire is a navigational term from Latin that means ‘lack of a star’. I'm looking into the skies, trying to find this new direction. How do I get home in the midst of all this wandering, all this misery that I feel like I'm in?” – Jay Stringer

• “When did you last feel alive? When did you feel connected to your body, connected to others? That's the essence of desire that we're trying to get back to.” – Jay Stringer

• “The antidote to shame is really developing some curiosity for it.” – Jay Stringer

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Harper’s Magazine | Who Goes Nazi? by Dorothy Thompson - https://harpers.org/archive/1941/08/who-goes-nazi/

• Desire: The Longings Inside Us and the New Science of How We Love, Heal, and Grow by Jay Stringer - https://amzn.to/4buLADD

• Unwanted: How Sexual Brokenness Reveals Our Way to Healing by Jay Stringer - https://www.amazon.com/Unwanted-Sexual-Brokenness-Reveals-Healing/dp/1631466720

• Annie Dillard - https://www.anniedillard.com/

• Brené Brown - https://brenebrown.com/

• Alex Honnold climbs Taipei 101 skyscraper without ropes - https://abcnews.go.com/GMA/Living/video/alex-honnold-climbs-taipei-101-skyscraper-ropes-129537771

• Bill Plotkin - https://www.animas.org/about-us/our-founder/

• Awake: A Memoir by Jen Hatmaker - https://amzn.to/3LTorjM

• Stanzas from the Grande Chartreuse by Matthew Arnold - https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43605/stanzas-from-the-grande-chartreuse

• Jon Batiste - jonbatiste.com

• Sarah Bessey - https://www.sarahbessey.com/

• Dacher Keltner, PhD - https://www.dacherkeltner.com/

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://jay-stringer.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/jay_stringer_/

Twitter - https://x.com/_jaystringer

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/JayStringerUnwanted#

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:What does it look like to strive ardently for justice and equality without losing yourself in the process?

Today, Jen sits down with Norah O’Donnell—award-winning journalist, anchor, and managing editor of the CBS Evening News—for a conversation about courage, compassion, and the women who have quietly shaped the arc of American history.

Norah’s new book, We the Women: The Hidden Heroes Who Shaped America, uncovers the stories of women who refused to disappear: printers and poets, doctors and intellectuals, community builders and policymakers, women who risked safety, status, and belonging to tell the truth, expand freedom, and insist that dignity belongs to everyone. In this episode, we reflect on what these lives reveal about compassion—not as sentiment, but as action.

Jen, Amy, and Norah talk about the indomitable women who made justice visible, who challenged power without losing their moral center, and who built systems of care that outlived them. The conversation also turns inward, as Norah reflects on her own career as one of the most trusted voices in American broadcast journalism, regularly asking hard questions in public spaces and of people in positions of power.

This is a conversation about fierce compassion—the kind that tells the truth, draws boundaries, builds community, and refuses erasure. It’s an invitation to remember the women who came before us, and to consider how we might carry their courage forward in our own time.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “I think that journalists are doing an incredible job right now under really tough circumstances. But they're bringing to light what the power of the federal government, what the power of state governments and others are doing, and allowing the electorate to be informed so that they can get involved, they can vote, they can be energized, and each of us can be part of this great American democracy.” – Norah O’Donnell

• “I do believe we need more women in government and more women in positions of power.” - Norah O’Donnell

• “I’m in the business of information not affirmation.” – Norah O’Donnell

• “Women have been at the forefront of helping to bend that arc towards justice. Women have crashed through the educational glass ceiling. More women get degrees than men. Women have the right to vote and they do vote in greater numbers than men. So when are we gonna see this tipping point? I keep waiting for that in my lifetime.” – Norah O’Donnell

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• We the Women: The Hidden Heroes Who Shaped America by Norah O’Donnell - https://amzn.to/4keE2Hb

• We The Women Tour  - https://www.wethewomenbook.com/about

• CBS News | Norah O’Donnell - https://www.cbsnews.com/team/norah-odonnell/

• The Six Triple Eight | Netflix - https://www.netflix.com/title/81590591

• Mary McLeod Bethune Statue - https://www.aoc.gov/explore-capitol-campus/art/mary-mcleod-bethune-statue

• The Declaration of Sentiments - https://www.nps.gov/wori/learn/historyculture/declaration-of-sentiments.htm

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.cbsnews.com/team/norah-odonnell/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/norahodonnell/

Twitter - https://x.com/NorahODonnell

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/norahodonnell/

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@norahodonnell?lang=en

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy.

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description: Description:
What happens when the life you’ve been managing no longer fits?

Jen Hatmaker sits down with Nedra Glover Tawwab, Emily Nagoski, Kobe Campbell, and Kate Bowler for an honest conversation about what it really means to wake up in midlife.

Together, they explore where awakening often shows up first—our relationships, bodies, mental health, and faith. This isn’t about fixing yourself. It’s about noticing what’s shifting, understanding why it feels disruptive, and realizing you’re not alone.

From boundaries and burnout to anxiety, trauma, body shame, and faith after certainty, this episode offers language and clarity for women navigating midlife change with courage.

If you’ve ever thought, Something’s changing—and I don’t know what to do with it, this conversation is for you.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

“You’re not broken. You’re paying attention.” — Jen Hatmaker

“Midlife clarity isn’t cruelty. It’s information.” — Nedra Glover Tawwab

“Healing doesn’t mean you stop feeling. It means your responses finally make sense.” — Kobe Campbell

“Anxiety can bring clarity—but it’s not meant to be the fuel forever.” — Kobe Campbell

“You don’t complete stress by thinking it through. You complete it by letting it move through your body.” — Emily Nagoski

“Certainty falling away doesn’t mean faith is gone. It means it’s growing up.” — Kate Bowler

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Set Boundaries, Find Peace: A Guide to Reclaiming Yourself by Nedra Glover Tawwab – https://amzn.to/4rhSzofThe Balancing Act: Creating Healthy Dependency and Connection Without Losing Yourself by Nedra Glover Tawwab – https://amzn.to/46cF4hgCome As You Are: Revised and Updated: The Surprising New Science That Will Transform Your Sex Life by Emily Nagoski – https://www.amazon.com/Come-You-Are-Surprising-Transform/dp/1982165316/

• Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle by Emily Nagoski – https://amzn.to/3MgTXIK

• Why Am I Like This?: How to Break Cycles, Heal from Trauma, and Restore Your Faith by Kobe Campbell – https://amzn.to/4qIMqR9

• Joyful, Anyway by Kate Bowler – https://amzn.to/3MdyfW3

• Everything Happens podcast with Kate Bowler – https://katebowler.com/podcasts/

Nedra’s Links:

Website - https://www.nedratawwab.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/nedratawwab/

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/nedratawwab/- 

Substack - https://nedratawwab.substack.com/

Podcast - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/you-need-to-hear-this-with-nedra-tawwab/id1686288228

Emily’s Links:

Website - https://www.emilynagoski.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/enagoski/

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/emilynagoskiphd/

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@emilynagoski

Substack - https://substack.com/@emilynagoski

Podcast - https://www.pushkin.fm/podcasts/come-as-you-are

Kobe’s Links:

Website - https://kobecampbell.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/kobecampbell_/

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/TheKobeCampbell/

Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/@TheKobeCampbell

Substack - https://substack.com/@kobecampbell

Podcast - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-healing-circle-podcast-with-kobe-campbell/id1448504061

Kate’s Links:

Website - https://katebowler.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/katecbowler/

Twitter - https://x.com/katecbowler

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/katecbowler

Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCf8m7lNdR7YVieU0muCg5cg

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@katecbowler

Pinterest - https://www.pinterest.com/katecbowler/

Substack - https://katebowler.substack.com/

Podcast - https://katebowler.com/podcasts/

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description: 

Jen revisits this fan favorite episode with Mel Robbins. Buckle up, listeners.  It was only a matter of time before our paths crossed with Mel Robbins, one of the most respected experts on change and motivation in the zeitgeist, and today is that day. Known for being the host of the #1 ranking education podcast in the world, bringing deeply relatable topics, tactical advice, tools, and compelling conversations to her audiences, Jen and Amy spend today’s hour diving into Mel’s “Let Them” theory, which is taking the world by storm, already delivering instant peace and freedom in the lives and relationships of people putting it into practice.

Together, they discuss:

• The difference between “Let Them” and “Let Me”

• Learning to release the white-knuckle grip we hold over other people’s behavior (and other things beyond our control)

• Reframing disappointment to view it as a gift (yes, it’s possible!)

• Repositioning self-worth inward, rather than leaving it dependent on others' opinions.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “For a lot of women, we spend so much time upstairs in our heads as people-pleasers and over-analyzers, over-thinking and ruminating, trying to get things perfect. That’s the last place I should be, personally. I need to drop into my body and get out of my head.” – Mel Robbins

• “People reveal who they are and what they care about through their behavior. Ignore their words. Watch their behavior. Let people be who they are. Let them do what they’re going to do. Focusing on them is not where your power is.” – Mel Robbins

• “The difference between ‘not my business’ and ‘let them’ is worlds apart. When you say, ‘not my business’, you’re scolding yourself. With, ‘let them’, you’re in the power position because you see what’s happening and are choosing to allow it without allowing it. You’re rising above it.” – Mel Robbins

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Demotivators - https://despair.com/collections/

• Effin Birds on Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/effinbirds/

• Van Morrison - https://www.vanmorrison.com/

• No Hard Feelings by the Avett Brothers - https://open.spotify.com/track/0bgQ1hQrpP6ScdBZlDfLE2

• Foo Fighters - https://foofighters.com/

• DePeche Mode - https://www.depechemode.com/

• The Cure - https://www.thecure.com/

• Taylor Swift - https://www.taylorswift.com/

• The 5 Second Rule: Transform Your Life, Work, and Confidence with Everyday Courage by Mel Robbins - https://amzn.to/427OHwu

• The Let Them Theory: A Life-Changing Tool That Millions of People Can't Stop Talking About by Mel Robbins - https://amzn.to/4hc53bE

• The Mel Robbins Podcast - https://www.melrobbins.com/podcast

• The Four Questions: For Henny Penny and Anybody with Stressful Thoughts by Byron Katie - https://amzn.to/3C7tKXT

• My Legacy Podcast - https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1119-my-legacy-podcast-255793246/

• Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl - https://amzn.to/4ajbyaz

• Dr. Stuart Ablon - https://www.stuartablon.com/

• The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life by Mark Manson - https://amzn.to/3PCqxmi

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.melrobbins.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/melrobbins/

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/melrobbins

Twitter - https://x.com/melrobbins

Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/melrobbins

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@melrobbins

Podcast - https://www.melrobbins.com/podcast/

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:In this special listener voicemail episode, Jen and Amy turn the mic outward—listening closely to the voices, stories, and wisdom of the community that makes this show what it is.

From reflections sparked by our Wake Up Call season to deeply personal responses to Jen’s book Awake, these messages trace a powerful throughline: what happens when we begin to tell the truth about our lives—and make space for who we’re becoming.

Listeners share how conversations with Lee C. Camp, John Fugelsang, Melani Sanders, and Chrissy King stirred something awake in them, naming long-held questions around faith, body, identity, and courage. Others call in to reflect on the uncanny resonance of Awake, beginning again and again with the same line: “Jen, our stories are very similar.”

This episode is tender, funny, and honest—a reminder that none of us are doing this work alone. It’s about waking up, letting go, finding language for the ache, and choosing what comes next—together.

If you’ve ever wondered whether your voice matters here, this episode is your answer.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “Our stories are very similar—and hearing that out loud made me realize I’m not behind. I’m just in it.” – FTL Listener

• “I didn’t know how much I needed someone to say, ‘You’re allowed to change your mind,’ until this season.” – FTL Listener

• “That episode felt like someone finally put words to the questions I’ve been carrying quietly.” – FTL Listener

• “Something in me relaxed when I heard someone else say it first.” – FTL Listener

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Beyond Words: Listening to a Hidden Community — Ky Dickens and The Telepathy Tapes - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-64/unlocking-the-secrets-of-consciousness-and-telepathy-ky-dickens-and-the-telepathy-tapes/

• The Telepathy Tapes podcast - https://thetelepathytapes.com/

• Rick Rubin - https://x.com/RickRubin

• Elizabeth Gilbert - https://www.elizabethgilbert.com/

• Human Flourishing in a Distracted World: Theologian Lee C. Camp Offers a Wake Up Call To Living Well - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-64/human-flourishing-in-a-distracted-world-theologian-lee-c-camp-offers-a-wake-up-call-to-living-well/

• Love Over Dominance: John Fugelsang on the Future of Christianity - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-64/love-over-dominance-john-fugelsang-on-the-future-of-christianity/

• Social Media Sensation Melani Sanders Reminds Us That We Are Enough and We Do Not Care - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-64/social-media-sensation-melani-sanders-reminds-us-that-we-are-enough-and-we-do-not-care/

• Wake Up Call: Your Body Was Never the Problem with Body Liberation Advocate, Chrissy King - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-64/wake-up-call-your-body-was-never-the-problem-with-body-liberation-advocate-chrissy-king/

• Dr. Mary Claire Haver - https://www.instagram.com/drmaryclaire

• Jen Hatmaker Book Club - https://shop.jenhatmaker.com/collections/book-club

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy.

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:

This month in the Jen Hatmaker Book Club, Jen is joined by novelist Eliana Ramage to talk about her stunning debut, To the Moon and Back—a book that is as page-turny as it is tender, and as expansive as it is rooted.

Jen and Eliana trace the actual arc of this book—how it began with an unforgettable spark of an idea at Dartmouth (about an “astronaut girl” who shows us that our stories aren’t static, and neither are our people) and how, over more than a decade, that idea became a novel about ambition, belonging, identity, and the complicated, beautiful gravity of connection.

In this conversation, Jen and Eliana explore a story centered on a young woman unraveling in the aftermath of loss, navigating complicated relationships, spiritual longing, and the quiet ache of wanting more than the life she’s been handed. They dig into the women at the center of the novel—the ones you’ll root for, the ones who will frustrate you (hi, ambition), and the ones who will linger long after you close the cover—and they unpack why the ending matters: not because it ties everything into neat bows, but because it honors what’s true. Because in real life, healing doesn’t land with fireworks. It lands with honesty. With restraint. With the choice to keep loving, even when certainty has slipped through our fingers.

This is a conversation about grieving honestly, questioning inherited beliefs, and staying awake to your own life. It’s about learning that connection matters more than performance—and trusting that the long arc of love and healing is still unfolding.

Whether you’re reading along with the book club or simply craving a thoughtful, soulful conversation to start the new year, this episode invites you to slow down, feel deeply, and remember: even in loss, even in doubt, we are still reaching—toward connection, toward each other, and back to ourselves.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “This is a story about women who are trying to understand who they are and move forward together after making some mistakes. That's where I definitely am right now. And if I could just finish this one thing that has been so hard for so many years, then it would be the first time I had done something that I could be really proud of.” – Eliana Ramage

• “I think in real life, you don't need to know that everything is all gonna be figured out at once. You need to land the plane on what matters. I don't think any of us, for our own lives, feel like we have that written out. And so there's some wiggle room on where we could go next, I think.”– Eliana Ramage

• “It’s become kind of a ritual to ask myself,  can you believe that you're doing this job because your wildest dreams came true?”– Eliana Ramage

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Avid Reader Press - https://avidreaderpress.com/

• Fancy Lunch - https://tinyurl.com/3uyuxryf

• Joyride: A Memoir by Susan Orlean - https://amzn.to/49vTrhC

• The Uncool: A Memoir by Cameron Crowe - https://amzn.to/3LFmd7n

• Lily King - https://lilykingbooks.com/

• Reese Witherspoon book club pick - September 2025 - https://reesesbookclub.com/book/to-the-moon-and-back/

• Mid-America All Indian Center, Wichita, KS - https://www.theindianmuseum.org/

• Awake: A Memoir by Jen Hatmaker - https://amzn.to/4swRPg9

• Parnassus Books - https://parnassusbooks.net/

• Ring of Salt: A Memoir of Finding Home and Hope on the Wild Coast of Ireland by Betsy Cornwell - https://amzn.to/3Z9qtPu

• I’ll Tell You When I’m Home by Hala Alyan - https://amzn.to/4bof7yr

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.elianaramage.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/elianaramage/

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s guest is someone who has helped millions of people name that tension—and find a gentler, healthier way forward. Nedra Glover Tawwab is a licensed therapist, relationship expert, and New York Times bestselling author of Set Boundaries, Find Peace and Drama Free. With more than fifteen years of clinical experience, she has become one of the most trusted voices in modern mental health, helping people navigate boundaries, attachment, emotional health, and sustainable connection in real, everyday life.

Nedra ‘s work consistently meets people with clarity, compassion, and deep respect for how hard relationships can be. Her new book, The Balancing Act, invites us to rethink what healthy connection actually looks like—not as hyper-independence or over-functioning, but as learning how to depend on one another without disappearing in the process.

In this conversation, we talk about:

 - The major attachment styles and how they quietly shape our relationships- Why so many of us confuse independence with emotional health

- The dependency spectrum—and how to recognize where we’re over- or under-functioning

- When closeness crosses into enmeshment, and how to find your way back

- Gentle, practical first steps toward healthy dependency and asking for help

We honestly could not think of a better person to help us wake up in the area of mental health. This conversation is tender, honest, and deeply freeing—and it offers language for places you may have felt stuck, tired, or alone for a long time. You are not broken. You are learning how to connect.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

 ★ “You can be conflict-avoidant and peace-positive.” – Nedra Tawwab

★ “We have to allow people to exist as they are. And sometimes that's not in the same way as we exist.” – Nedra Tawwab

★ “The connection you’re seeking is on the other side of your discomfort.” – Nedra Tawwab

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

 ➢ The Balancing Act: Creating Healthy Dependency and Connection Without Losing Yourself by Nedra Tawwab – https://amzn.to/3Z77GEC

➢ Set Boundaries, Find Peace: A Guide to Reclaiming Yourself by Nedra Tawwab - https://amzn.to/49q8zg8

➢ Drama Free: A Guide to Managing Unhealthy Family Relationships by Nedra Tawwab - https://amzn.to/4b3cSkh

➢ Nedra’s Quizzes - https://www.nedratawwab.com/quizzes

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.nedratawwab.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/nedratawwab/?hl=en

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/nedratawwab/

Substack - https://nedratawwab.substack.com/

Podcast - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/you-need-to-hear-this-with-nedra-tawwab/id1686288228

Connect with Jen!

Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmaker

Jen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmaker

Jen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy.

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:Sometimes a wake up call doesn’t arrive as a crisis. Sometimes it arrives as a quiet realization: the way I’m living isn’t actually working.

In this encore episode, we revisit a powerful conversation with James Clear, bestselling author of Atomic Habits, whose work has helped millions rethink how real, lasting change actually happens. Not through willpower, reinvention, or overnight transformation—but through the small, often invisible choices we make every day.

This conversation is a wake up call to the myth of “someday”, a wake up call to waiting for motivation before we act, and a wake up call to the belief that big change requires big drama.

James breaks down why habits are less about self-discipline and more about identity, environment, and systems—and how the patterns we repeat, often unconsciously, are shaping our lives for better or worse. Together, we explore how paying attention to what we practice daily can wake us up to the lives we’re actually building.

If you’re standing at the edge of change—feeling stuck in patterns you can’t seem to break, exhausted by self-improvement cycles, or longing for a more sustainable way forward—this episode offers a grounded, hopeful reset.

Let this be your wake up call to begin again, not perfectly, not dramatically, but honestly, intentionally, and one doable step at a time.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “The most powerful change doesn’t happen when you decide to achieve a goal—it happens when you decide to become a different kind of person. Every small habit is a vote for the identity you’re building, and over time those votes add up to who you believe you are.” — James Clear

• “You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems.” — James Clear

• “If you can get 1% better every day for one year, you’ll end up thirty-seven times better.” — James Clear

• “Fix the inputs, and the outputs will fix themselves.” — James Clear

• “The goal isn’t to run a marathon. It’s to become a runner.” — James Clear

• “Lasting change isn’t about doing something perfectly or dramatically. It’s about showing up consistently in small ways, even when it feels insignificant, because that consistency is what makes transformation inevitable.”— James Clear

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones by James Clear - https://amzn.to/4pQLrh6

• James Clear’s 3-2-1 Newsletter - https://jamesclear.com/3-2-1

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://jamesclear.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/jamesclear/

Twitter - https://x.com/jamesclear

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/jamesclear

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy.

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:This is your wake up call: your body was never the problem.

By midlife, so many women are exhausted—not just by life, but by decades of being told to manage, fix, discipline, and override our bodies. Wellness culture promised health and control. What it often delivered was shame, disconnection, and the quiet belief that rest, ease, and joy had to be earned.

Today’s conversation asks us to wake up to something different.

Chrissy King is a writer, educator, and body liberation advocate whose work exposes the harm baked into diet and fitness culture and offers a radically more honest path forward. One rooted in consent instead of control. Trust instead of punishment. Listening instead of fixing.

In this Wake Up Call episode, Chrissy opens our eyes to what happens when we stop treating our bodies like projects and start treating them like partners—especially in midlife, when our bodies are changing and asking us to pay attention. We unpack why rest is a biological need (not a reward), and how relearning how to listen can be a form of liberation.

This is a wake up call to the truth we’ve ignored: the body knows. It knows when something isn’t working. It knows when we’re depleted. It knows what it needs next. And when we learn to trust that wisdom—not just individually, but collectively—we don’t just heal our relationship with our bodies, we change the story entirely.

If your body has been tapping you on the shoulder, this episode is your invitation to listen.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “Society has conditioned women to put all of our value, effort, and energy into being the smallest version of ourselves possible. Then we have to spend the second half of our lives trying to unlearn that.” – Chrissy King

• “In ancient art, we see these big, beautiful bodies being immortalized and looked at as beautiful. So, how did we get to this point where we're demonizing people in larger bodies?” – Chrissy King

• “I think falling in love yourself is the most beautiful love story of all time.” - Chrissy King

• “The focus can't just be, do I feel good in my body? The focus has to be, is anybody in any body able to feel safe and respected and exist in their body free of harm? That's what the modern body positivity movement is really missing.” - Chrissy King

• “I think that we have to accept what our abilities are today, that what our bodies look like today is what it looks like today and tomorrow could be completely different. Bodies are designed to change.” - Chrissy King

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Awake: A Memoir by Jen Hatmaker - https://amzn.to/4qoLTnZ

• The Body Liberation Project: How Understanding Racism and Diet Culture Helps Cultivate Joy and Build Collective Freedom by Chrissy King - https://amzn.to/49m6TWn

• The Body is Not an Apology: The Power of Radical Self-Love by Sonya Renne Taylor - https://amzn.to/3YJyfQ9

• Fearing the Black Body: The Racial Origins of Fat Phobia by Dr. Sabrina Strings - https://amzn.to/49rmeoA

• White Fragility: Why It's So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism by Robin DiAngelo - https://amzn.to/3NyO75z

• Be The Bridge organization - https://bethebridge.com/ 

• We Were Never Meant to Have Universal Healthcare by Dr. Jessica Knurick - https://drjessicaknurick.substack.com/p/we-were-never-meant-to-have-universal

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://chrissyking.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/iamchrissyking/

Twitter - https://x.com/iamchrissyking

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@iamchrissyking

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/ChrissyKingFitness/

Substack - https://chrissyking.substack.com/

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:Today’s guest is someone who instantly made an impression on Jen when they met at a recent Hello Sunshine event in LosAngeles, when she moderated a Shine Away panel with Jen and beloved 9010 star and recent For the Love guest, Jennie Garth. Within five minutes Jen thought, “Okay… she’s one of us.” Warm, sharp, steady — Kanika Chadda-Gupta has this grounding presence that makes a whole room exhale.

An award-winning former CNN journalist and producer, Kanika built a thriving career in television news before motherhood rerouted her life in the most profound way. Born in India and raised in the U.S., her story is braided with themes so many of us know intimately: immigration and bicultural identity, the expectations women inherit, the invisible labor we carry, and the endless negotiation between ambition, caregiving, and our own becoming.

Today, Kanika is the creator and host of the beloved Total Mom Sense podcast, where she distills her lived experience — raising children while caring for aging parents, navigating mental and emotional load, reinventing purpose in midlife — into practical wisdom for women who are doing it all and feeling all of it.

In this conversation, we talk about what happens when life asks us to reevaluate our pace, our priorities, and the stories we’ve been handed about success. We discuss staying rooted inside seasons of huge responsibility, finding yourself in the middle of caregiving, and reclaiming a sense of agency and identity in motherhood and beyond. If you’ve ever felt stretched thin between generations, pulled in every direction, or unsure how to follow your own calling while caring for everyone else — Kanika’s clarity and compassion will feel like a deep breath. This one’s for all of us standing at the intersection of who we were, who we are, and who we’re still becoming.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• "I like getting the gold star from all of my teachers. I did all the AP classes. I hung out with my teachers at lunchtime. We had open lunch, and it was like you could go to McDonald's, or you could go across the street to the pizza place. But I would go sit with Ms. Townsend, my biology teacher, and just kick it.” – Kanika Chadda-Gupta

• "It may be, the only headlights that you see heading to the eye of the storm are the first responders and the reporters. And I thought, I want to be in the eye of the storm. I belong here. I need to be here. I need to prove myself. And so then I stayed.” – Kanika Chadda-Gupta

• "I was most surprised by how your kids will make you face your childhood trauma head on. My dad and I get along great now, but when we were younger, he would say things that really just shot my self-esteem. And those are the first things that come up when my kids do something wrong and I'm like, wow, I gotta reframe." – Kanika Chadda-Gupta
  

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Hello Sunshine Shine Away Conference 2025 – https://shineaway.hello-sunshine.com/event/eddb3575-ec80-4812-a371-354c900d7cbf/summary

• Jim Gaffigan, comedian – https://www.jimgaffigan.com/

• Mom Brain with Hilaria Baldwin and Daphne Oz - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/mom-brain/id1438292826

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://kanikachaddagupta.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/kanikachaddagupta/

Twitter - https://x.com/KanikaChadda

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/kanikachaddagupta/

Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCgkOq_AmLsvu6YJsKglQvSw

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@kanikachaddagupta?lang=en

Pinterest - https://www.pinterest.com/kanikachaddagupta/

Podcast - https://kanikachaddagupta.com/podcast/

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:Today, we’re stepping into the candlelit, corseted world of Victorian England with New York Times bestselling author Madeline Martin—a master of emotionally rich, meticulously researched historical fiction. Madeline’s novels (The Last Bookshop in London, The Librarian Spy, The Keeper of Hidden Books) have introduced millions of readers to hidden corners of history where ordinary people wield books as lifelines, rebellion, and hope. Her latest work and our December JHBC pick, The Secret Book Society, is no exception.

Set in an era when women were warned that reading could “inflame the imagination,” The Secret Book Society follows Lady Duxbury—a thrice-widowed countess trailed by scandalous whispers—who covertly gathers a small circle of women for tea…and contraband literature. What begins as shared curiosity blooms into a daring underground society where women read the stories they’ve been forbidden, claim a power they’ve been denied, and build the kind of sisterhood that can spark a quiet revolution.

In this conversation, we pull back the velvet curtain on:

• how real Victorian restrictions inspired her fictional rebellion

• the archival rabbit holes that uncovered surprising truths about women, reading, and resistance

• the power of “found family” in times of surveillance, judgment, and constraint

• why stories become sanctuaries when the world demands silence

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “Reading can really provide such lightness in dark times.” – Madeline Martin

• “Every book that I've written, I have been to the location where it is set. And I've been able to get that really wonderful firsthand experience of being there. I feel like it takes this black and white world and colors it in this really vivid, wonderful way that lets me accurately convey it onto the book for hopefully what makes for a very evocative read for the reader.” –  Madeline Martin

• “If you read a book and it's so good you can't put it down, you read it over the course of a weekend, and you can viscerally recall every part of that story, from what the character drank and ate, to what they wore, to that snarky little one-liner that they gave the antagonist. But if you took six months to read that book, you might have a different experience. So for me, when I get to write that book in one month, it's like I'm living in their skin, and I'm living in their heads.” – Madeline Martin

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Outlander by Diana Gabaldon - https://amzn.to/4iv5e3C

• The Last Bookshop in London: A Novel of World War II by Madeline Martin - https://amzn.to/4pKU0uq

• For the Love: Fighting for Grace in a World of Impossible Standards by Jen Hatmaker – https://amzn.to/48AqikP

• A Time of Witches: A Novel by Madeline Martin – https://amzn.to/3MBpnJl

• The Forgotten Pages by Madeline Martin – coming 2027

• Goodreads 2025 Reading Challenge – https://www.goodreads.com/readingchallenges?ref=rc_summerreading_25

• The Hope Keeper: A Novel by Heather Webb –https://amzn.to/48uJkc2

• The Lotus Shoes: A Novel by Jane Yang – https://amzn.to/447ANuy

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://madelinemartin.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/madelinemmartin/

Twitter - https://x.com/MadelineMMartin

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/MadelineMartinAuthor

Pinterest - https://www.instagram.com/madelinemmartin/

Substack - https://authormadelinemartin.substack.com/subscribe

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy.

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:Buckle up, friends — today’s episode is a whole ride in the best possible way. Our guest is Melani Sanders, the founder of the global We Do Not Care Movement™, a viral sisterhood of women who are reclaiming humor, agency, and sanity in the absolute circus that is perimenopause, menopause, and midlife.

Melani went from full-time mom of three to an overnight cultural phenomenon when a candid little reel she posted — “If you are in perimenopause, menopause, and beyond and simply do not care much anymore, let me hear from you” — blew up the internet and awakened millions of women who said, “Oh… same.” What began as one moment of honesty became a movement, a community, and now a book called The Official We Do Not Care Club Handbook,

A hysterectomy in 2024 sent Melani into early perimenopause, and suddenly everything she knew about her mind and body went off the rails. A meltdown in a Whole Foods parking lot became her personal wake-up call — the moment she stopped spiraling, started laughing, and began telling the unvarnished truth about hormone chaos, identity shifts, brain fog, midlife rage, caregiving, and the mental load women carry without complaint.

In today’s conversation, we talk about what perimenopause really feels like, how midlife reshapes our relationships and self-perception, and why humor can be a lifeline when your hormones are staging a coup. We also explore what it looks like to drop shame, release the pressure to hold it all together, and embrace this wild, transformative season with honesty, community, and a big ol’ dose of “we simply do not care.”

If you’re in perimenopause, menopause, or that hazy middle place where your brain, body, and identity are all renegotiating the terms — this episode will feel like being seen and understood. Melani is a treasure, and we cannot wait for you to meet her.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “When you get off your period, you have maybe a good week and a half where you can laugh and engage with everyone. But with perimenopause and menopause and beyond, it's every day.  So, if I throw a shoe, I'm sorry. I did what I did, you know? Lock me up.” – Melani Sanders

• “I can't niche down because I'm too freaking much.” – Melani Sanders

• “I'm not big on attention. I don’t want all eyes on me. I'm typically the mom that will set things up and make it beautiful and then sit at the back of the room where you'll never know that it's me. I want to be able to open the door for my sisters and while they go out there and do it.” – Melani Sanders

• “Humor can be so healing. We need it. The second we lose our ability to laugh, we are in real trouble.” – Jen Hatmaker

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• We Do Not Care Club – https://wedonotcareclub.com/

• The Official We Do Not Care Club Handbook: A Hot-Mess Guide for Women in Perimenopause, Menopause, and Beyond Who Are Over It by Melani Sanders – https://amzn.to/3MC9BxS

• Ashwagandha Supplement – https://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/grocery/search?k=ashwagandha+supplements

• Harper Collins, Harvest imprint – https://www.harpercollins.com/pages/harvest

• The We Do Not Care Movement - A Glimpse Into How It All Started – https://www.facebook.com/melani.sanders/videos/1445359516454880/

Guest’s Links:

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/justbeingmelani/

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/melani.sanders/

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@justbeingmelani

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy.

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:What happens after the dream you built your life around ends?

In today’s tender and searching conversation, Jen and Amy sit down with acclaimed novelist Ben Markovits to talk about his forthcoming book, The Rest of Our Lives—a story that lingers in the quiet spaces of midlife, marriage, parenting, friendship, and the quiet reckonings that arrive when the future you imagined no longer fits. The book is so spectacular, it has been shortlisted as a finalist for the illustrious Booker Prize.

Together, the trio explores what happens when the life you worked toward doesn’t quite deliver what you expected—and how that reckoning ripples through family, intimacy, and identity. Ben speaks honestly about ambition, and the grief of letting go of former selves, while also naming the surprising beauty found in showing up for the people you love in ordinary, unglamorous moments. He and Jen talk about the similarities between the fictional story that he wrote and the real-life account that Jen penned in Awake. 

This episode is for anyone standing in the middle of their life, caring for children or parents (or both), wondering how to hold disappointment without becoming hardened—and how to love the life in front of you without pretending it’s easy. It’s a conversation about endurance, tenderness, and the brave, ongoing work of choosing one another as the years keep unfolding.

If you’ve ever asked yourself, Is this really it?—and then quietly hoped the answer might still be no, not yet—this one is for you.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “The author of Anatomy of a Murder said that writing a novel is like driving on a mountain road late at night. You should know where you're trying to get to, and you should be able to see 30 yards in advance.  I guess I have some sense of where I want to get to and then I spend a lot of time watching the next 30 yards.” – Ben Markovits

• “I like to write about characters who feel like the place they have made for themselves in the world doesn't totally express their sense of who they are.” – Ben Markovits

• I love the way you write all the backstories of everything because I'm someone who wants to ask 20 questions about what was the furniture in the in-laws beach house like and how did that shape the family dynamic that he married into? Which if you, if you ask all those questions, you sound a little crazy. But actually, you answered all of my questions as I was reading. – Amy Hardin

• “At a certain point in marriage, you have your fingerprints all over each other.” – Ben Markovits

• “I love when characters are human, flawed, curious, confused, just really working out their own story. I'm drawn to stories like that that aren't necessarily tidy.” – Jen Hatmaker

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• The Rest of Our Lives: A Novel by Ben Markovits – https://amzn.to/4qanlhM

• The Booker Prizes | Ben Markovits – https://thebookerprizes.com/the-booker-library/authors/ben-markovits

• Anatomy of a Murder by Robert Traver – https://amzn.to/3YAUTKc

• Awake: A Memoir by Jen Hatmaker – https://amzn.to/4qaARlw

• Phineas Redux by Anthony Trollope – https://amzn.to/4qiOPSN

• Starting Out by Ben Markovits – https://www.faber.co.uk/journal/faber-announces-the-acquisition-of-a-new-novel-by-ben-markovits/#:~:text=It%20will%20be%20published%20in,'

• New York Times – out 12/21

• Atlantic Excerpt – 

• The Rest of Our Lives Book Tour – https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/The-Rest-of-Our-Lives/Ben-Markovits/9781668231562

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.simonandschuster.com/authors/Ben-Markovits/250699726

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:What if the most faithful thing we could do right now is simply pay attention?

In this episode of For the Love, Jen and Amy sit down with theologian, ethics professor, and artist Lee C. Camp for a soulful conversation about the kind of faith that wakes us up to what truly matters. As part of our Wake Up Call series on faith, Lee invites us to slow down and notice the world—our lives, our neighbors, and the beauty that keeps trying to reach us.

Together, they explore why paying attention is not a luxury but a spiritual practice—and how our obsession with productivity, planning, and certainty can cause us to miss the most beautiful and formative parts of our lives. Lee reflects on what it means to know ourselves as deeply beloved by God, not because of what we produce but because love is the starting point of a life well lived.

This conversation traces the threads of human flourishing and imagination, and asks why beauty—found in art, nature, poetry, and story—often teaches us more about God than arguments ever could. As he often does on his own No Small Endeavor podcast, Lee challenges us to consider what Christians are being called to wake up to in this season: a renewed attention to community, to creation, and to a church that is something we practice together, not merely something we attend.

If you’re longing for a faith that feels grounded, spacious, and alive—one that helps you live a good life in the world you actually inhabit—this episode is a gentle, necessary wake-up call.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “What Christianity most needs right now is to rediscover the basics of the beautiful story which we claim to believe.” – Lee C. Camp

• The model of the cross means that if we take up our cross and follow Christ, that we can expect difficulty because so much of human history doesn't want that kind of way. Religious powers don't want that. Imperialist powers don't want that. And so we can trust that we're going to have our own kind of crosses to bear along the way. And yet that life has triumphed over death. That love has triumphed over hatred. that beauty and truth and goodness has triumphed over hostility and ugliness and meanness. And so that's the big story.” – Lee C. Camp

• I deeply understand why a lot of people just can't believe all this [religious] stuff. But for me, it, the story at its best. is so beautiful that I don't know why everybody doesn't want to believe it, even if they can't believe it. It's this place  we embody this narrative, embody this beauty, embody this brokenness in which we try to find tangible ways to do life together.” – Lee C. Camp

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Jen Hatmaker on Lee Camp’s No Small Endeavor podcast | Jen Hatmaker: When Everything Breaks: Grief, Growth, and Human Flourishing – https://www.nosmallendeavor.com/jen-hatmaker-when-everything-breaks-grief-growth-and-human-flourishing

• No Small Endeavor Podcast – https://www.nosmallendeavor.com/

• Munther Isaac: Palestinian Christian Pastor on War, Hope, and Love –https://www.nosmallendeavor.com/munther-isaac-palestinian-christian-pastor-on-war-hope-and-love

• Munther Isaac Sermon | Christ in the Rubble – youtube.com/watch?si=zK8OKK_xGMZR64ZD&v=ZPTrmN6Dzmw&feature=youtu.be

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.leeccamp.com/home

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/LeeCCamp

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/leeccamp

Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2Rk2D2fHz5mzmJT8G-x9uO5kyhQiU1N2

Podcast - https://www.nosmallendeavor.com/

The Subtext Podcast – https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-subtext/id1835471106

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:As we close out the year, we wanted to do something a little different—and a little more tender.

In this special end-of-year episode of For the Love, we’re turning the mic over to you. Over the past months, your voicemails have poured in, telling the story of what it’s been like to read Awake: the unraveling, the naming, the grief, the relief, the courage, the slow return to yourself. The messages were so honest and so resonant that we knew we needed to play some of them back—not just to honor the people who shared them, but to remind anyone listening in a similar space that they are not alone.

We’ve woven these voices together in four acts, tracing the arc so many of us recognize.

Act I — “The Moment Everything Broke”

We hear from Nadine, Allison, and Sharon about the before-and-after moments: marriages ending, bodies shamed, the deep wounds of purity culture, and the rupture that comes when the life you were living can no longer hold.

Act II — “Finding Language for the Ache”

Paulette and Inez share what it means to finally name what couldn’t be named before—untangling attachment and codependence, wrestling with faith, Jesus, and the pain of church rupture, and discovering words for a long-held ache.

Act III — “Coming Back to Ourselves”

With Kelly and Laura, we witness what healing can look like in motion: reclaiming agency, inhabiting our bodies again, joy returning, learning to cherish yourself, embracing life, committing to therapy, finding community, and being truly seen.

Act IV — “Witnessing a Life Over Time”

Tracy closes us out with the long view—what it means to trust the slow arc of a life, to be held in shared history, and to witness change unfolding over time.

If something in you woke up this year—even painfully—you’re not behind. You’re right on time. And you are certainly not alone.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “Here’s to cherishing ourselves. We have so much to cherish.” – Kelly, For the Love listener

• “If you’re willing to believe a voice from the future who has been sitting exactly where you are sitting…There is something after this story, even though you can't see that, something good is still coming for you.” – Jen Hatmaker

• “Everyone's experience can be a lantern to someone else.” – Amy Hardin

• “This is how it goes. This is how people are inspired and moved. This is how we lend courage to one another by saying our things out loud. And that is literally how my life moved. I listened to other people who were saying their thing out loud and I just was just sitting there quietly listening, going, I wonder if this is something I could consider.” – Jen Hatmaker

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Awake: A Memoir by Jen Hatmaker – https://amzn.to/44U2DuL

• Codependent No More: How to Stop Controlling Others and Start Caring for Yourself by Melody Beattie – https://amzn.to/48UTYcn

• Jen Hatmaker Book Club – https://shop.jenhatmaker.com/collections/book-club?srsltid=AfmBOooHcTDRzkwfxjaozkEQyYWtFpthqUtOcFwOOiSYTqO7fCTbaEsb

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:Peace can feel elusive — globally, socially, personally. So what does it look like to reclaim it? And how do we rise when everything feels beyond dead?

In this encore episode, we look back on one of our most galvanizing conversations from our For the Love of Peace series with Father James Martin — Jesuit priest, bestselling author, and one of the most trusted spiritual voices in America.

Together, Jen and Father Martin explore what a centuries-old story still teaches us today. Rooted in the raising of Lazarus, their discussion unfolds into a modern invitation:

What are we willing to let die so that we can live?

Drawing on grief, mystery, advocacy, and the disruptive tenderness of Jesus, this conversation reaches for peace in the places that feel buried — in the church, in our communities, in ourselves. They talk candidly about:

• why Jesus still disorients us (and why that’s good)

• the comfort and challenge of real resurrection

• why faith should push us toward the margins, not away from them

• and how letting old patterns die brings us closer to peace

If you’re hungry for spiritual clarity, exhausted by harmful religion, or longing for a God who feels like a deep breath — this episode is a balm. Father Martin’s humanity and integrity remind us what faith can still be: hopeful, liberating, trustworthy. May this encore meet you where you are — in grief, confusion, curiosity, or longing — and call you to come forth into peace, presence, and new life.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “We’re called to reach out to people who feel—and who are—marginalized and excluded. That’s pretty clear in the gospels. For Jesus there’s no ‘us and them,’ there’s just ‘us.’ He’s about making the community into an us.” — Father James Martin

• “Jesus is fully human and fully divine. And it’s the fully human part that a lot of people have a hard time with. He weeps, he gets frustrated, he gets tired — and we have to keep those two things in tension, because if we lose sight of either one we risk not really understanding who he is.”— Father James Martin

• “What are the things in my life — patterns, behaviors, resentments — that I have to let die? What do I want to leave in the tomb? And can I trust that God is calling me to something new?” — Father James Martin

• “So much of the Christian message is forgiveness — letting resentment, bitterness, and grudges die. That does lead to peace. ‘Peace be with you’ isn’t just comfort — it’s invitation, it’s transformation, it’s listening to God and letting things go.”— Father James Martin

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Inspired: Slaying Giants, Walking on Water, and Loving the Bible Again by Rachel Held Evans - https://amzn.to/494t9Uo

• The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything: A Spirituality for Real Life by Father James Martin - https://amzn.to/3Kn8KAI

• Learning to Pray: A Guide for Everyone by Father James Martin – https://amzn.to/44nfAwK

• Transgender People Can Be Baptized Catholic  Reuters Article – https://www.reuters.com/world/transsexuals-can-be-baptized-catholic-serve-godparents-vatican-says-2023-11-08/

• Come Forth: The Promise of Jesus’s Greatest Miracle by Father James Martin – https://amzn.to/3KS1c9a

• Mary Karr – https://www.marykarr.com/  

• The Seven Storey Mountain byThomas Merton – https://amzn.to/44TmdXL

• Dorothy Day — https://www.dorothydayguild.org/dorothy-day7ce4a03b

Guest’s Links:

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/jamesmartinsj/?hl=en

Twitter - https://x.com/JamesMartinSJ

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/FrJamesMartin/

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@jamesmartinsj?lang=en

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:Today we’re talking to someone whose work really hits right where we live this year — in that messy middle space where you know you need joy, but you’re not totally sure how to find your way back to it. Sarah Catherine “SC” Perot created Styles of Joy, which is genuinely one of the most grounding, practical, soul-forward frameworks we’ve encountered in a long time. 

SC is an author, speaker, Vanderbilt professor, and self-proclaimed joy enthusiast whose work explores how we reclaim joy in seasons of transition, loss, rebuilding, and reinvention. Her debut book blends personal storytelling, cultural observation, and her CAPS Framework—Cultivate, Adopt, Protect, and Spread—a blueprint for understanding how joy works in us, around us, and through us.

In this conversation, we talk about reclaiming joy after difficult seasons, the identity shifts that come with major life transitions, the science and soulfulness of joy, and why small, daily practices matter more than we think. SC brings brilliance, compassion, and practicality to a topic that often feels elusive, reminding us that joy isn’t something we “earn” — it’s something we can cultivate and choose, even in the midst of imperfect lives.

If you’ve been craving a reset, a reorientation, or just a little more light in your day, this episode is a beautiful place to begin.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “Music is like a scent that can transport us back in time. We have so many memories bookmarked in our heads.” – SC Perot

• “Joy can meet us in our quiet moments. It can meet us at a concert in a room full of people drowned in confetti. And it can meet us anywhere in between.” – SC Perot

• “The heat I was getting in my DMs, people are saying, have you lost your mind? You used to be on the straight and narrow. What has happened to you? What is with the feather boas?” – SC Perot

• “If we know we can tee ourselves up for productivity and if we know we can tee ourselves up for healthy decision making, why would we also not give joy a shot first thing in the morning?” – SC Perot

• “Joy can start small, just as hope does.” – SC Perot

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Styles of Joy: A Feel-Good Framework for Rediscovering Joy (with a Twist!) by SC Perot – https://amzn.to/48yUooy

• Harry Styles – https://www.hstyles.co.uk/

• The Joy Hotline – https://www.scperot.com/joy-hotline/

• Make Your Bed: Little Things That Can Change Your Life...And Maybe the World by Admiral William H. McRaven – https://amzn.to/4oC3iYK

• Unlocking the Secrets of Consciousness and Telepathy: Ky Dickens and The Telepathy Tapes - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-64/unlocking-the-secrets-of-consciousness-and-telepathy-ky-dickens-and-the-telepathy-tapes/

• Jen Hatmaker | Advent Week One: The Light of Hope – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Obh3zvna-ng

• Elizabeth Gilbert Oprah show botox post on Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/p/CCyHEtZh8DG/

• Tom Holland “Umbrella” Lip Sync Battle – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jPCJIB1f7jk

• The Guardian | I tried some hacks to make my phone less appealing. It got existential – https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2024/jan/15/phone-addiction-cut-screen-time-diary

• Catherine Shannon Substack | Everyone is Numbing Out –  https://catherineshannon.substack.com/p/everyone-is-numbing-out

• This Is Not a Book About Benedict Cumberbatch: The Joy of Loving Something--Anything--Like Your Life Depends On It by Tabatha Carvan – https://amzn.to/4pora36

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.scperot.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/scperot/

Substack - https://substack.com/@scperot

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:

If you’ve been lucky enough to stumble upon ‘The Keeper of Lost Things’ the bestselling debut novel by British author Ruth Hogan, you know exactly why it captured our hearts and was selected as our JHBC November Fireside Read selection. This book is a whimsical, tender, and deeply human story about a man who collects seemingly insignificant lost objects — and the woman who inherits both his home and this strange little mission. As she begins to return these “lost things” to their owners, we discover that every object holds a story, every story holds a loss, and every loss holds a little bit of light.

Ruth’s own story is just as moving — she began writing after recovering from a serious car accident, during a time when she felt a bit lost herself. And from that season came this debut novel that went on to charm readers all over the world. This book feels like a love letter to brokenness — to the idea that what’s been lost can still be redeemed. It’s a generous, tender book — one that invites us to look closer at the world around us and remember that meaning lives everywhere, even in the smallest things.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “I was one of those people who thought, ‘I'll write a book one day… it'll happen one day.’ But you should never wait for one day. You should get on with it.” – Ruth Hogan

• “You can't control what life throws at you but you can control what you do with it.” – Ruth Hogan

• “I think I write in quite an unusual way, speaking to other authors. I don't worry about planning and plotting. I like it to just come out organically. I will sit down, the story is in my head and it will come out. But what I do do is I edit chapter by chapter, which is a very bizarre way of working. And I'm so finicky that sometimes I can't move on if one word isn't right.” – Ruth Hogan

• “I'm a great believer that the universe will tell you the right thing to do.” – Ruth Hogan

• “I love to explore the emotional attachment that we form with objects. And I think it's all about maintaining connections. We will give an object disproportionate significance because it relates to a person that we loved or a memory or a place. I think we all do that. all have objects and we have connections to these objects that make them much more valuable than their intrinsic worth.” – Ruth Hogan

• “In one of my other books I described my characters as being ‘cracked in the kiln’. Those are the people that I'm interested in. I'm not interested in perfect people. I'm interested in the people who are lost, who have made mistakes. I love that idea of people being repaired and being more beautiful and more valuable because of their life experience.” – Ruth Hogan

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• The Keeper of Lost Things: A Novel by Ruth Hogan - https://amzn.to/4nGYy3p

• To the Sea by Train: The Golden Age of Railway Travel by Andrew Martin - https://amzn.to/3Jl7fT5

• The Secret of Secrets: A Novel by Dan Brown - https://amzn.to/4oQTx9j

• The Golden Hour by Kate Lord Brown - https://amzn.to/4qMvslX

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.ruthhogan.co.uk/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/ruthmariehoganauthor/

Twitter - https://x.com/ruthmariehogan

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/RuthHoganAuthor/

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In this special Road Tripping episode, Jen invites her partner, actor/activist/author Tyler Merritt, to join her live after a last-minute schedule pivot. What unfolds is a night of honesty, hilarity, vulnerability, and deep connection.

Jen reads two scenes from Awake—one from the earliest days of shock and grief, and one from the chaotic, hilarious adventure of dating again at midlife. She shares the moment her body finally allowed her to grieve, the unexpected relief that followed, and how storytelling helped rebuild her life from the inside out.

Tyler joins her onstage and opens up about his own journey: discovering creativity as a kid in a sports household, what midlife has taught him, how his rare cancer diagnosis reshaped his priorities, and how their love story began on a night in New York City neither saw coming. He and Jen talk candidly about walking through illness together, finding joy even in hard seasons, and why Awake speaks to all genders—not just women.

This episode is tender, funny, surprising, and deeply human—a reminder that grief can crack us open in ways that eventually let the light back in.

★ “My body bypassed my mind and gave itself the gift of grief.” — Jen Hatmaker (reading from Awake)

★ “If creativity is in you, you can’t get rid of it. It will find its way out.” — Tyler Merritt (on discovering his storytelling voice)

★ “Middle age shortens your alphabet — you just have fewer Fs to give.” — Tyler Merritt (describing midlife clarity)

★ “You don’t just get my story of cancer — you get yours, because you chose to love me.” — Tyler Merritt (on his cancer journey and their relationship)

★ “Some of the hardest things you’ve ever been through? You made it. You’re still here.” — Tyler Merritt (reflecting on resilience and survival)

➢ Awake: A Memoir by Jen Hatmaker - https://amzn.to/4rjitZ7➢ This Changes Everything: A Surprisingly Funny Story About Race, Cancer, Faith, and Other Things We Don’t Talk About by Tyler Merritt – https://amzn.to/4ilNtnh➢ Simple Habit meditation app (referenced in the grief scene) - https://www.simplehabit.com/➢ Corey Muscara (meditation guide Jen listened to) – https://corymuscara.com/➢ The Tyler Merritt Project – https://thetylermerrittproject.com/➢ Waitress: The Musical (where Jen and Tyler first met) – https://waitressthemusical.com/

Website – https://thetylermerrittproject.com/Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/thetylermerrittproject/Twitter – https://x.com/ttmprojectFacebook – https://www.facebook.com/thetylermerrittprojectYouTube – https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPB48_JfK-VMnYQPTYyMX5Q

Jen’s Website – https://jenhatmaker.com/Jen’s Instagram – https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter – https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/Jen’s Facebook – https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy.

Thought-provoking Quotes:
Resources Mentioned in This Episode:
Guest’s Links:
Connect with Jen!

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Introducing: unPAUSED with Dr. Mary Claire Haver

Dr. Mary Claire Haver, a bestselling author, board-certified Obstetrician-Gynecologist, Certified Menopause Practitioner, and women’s health advocate, is already known for transforming conversations about midlife and menopause. Now, she is extending her reach with her new podcast, unPAUSED, to share her expertise and empower even more women.

On unPAUSED, Dr. Haver hosts candid, encouraging conversations about what it means to truly thrive during every stage of womanhood. This is about living life fully—no more pausing our lives, feeling invisible, or suffering in silence. Each weekly episode features a diverse lineup of guests, including medical experts, CEOs, and risk-takers, as they delve into universally relevant topics: from health and hormones to identity, relationships, and the experience of reinventing oneself in this next chapter. Listeners will come away from every episode feeling informed, seen, and inspired to live life unpaused.

Check out this trailer for unPAUSED and subscribe today so you don’t miss an episode. 

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• What I hear from women everyday is that they want more for themselves, yet here’s the reality – as women, we’ve been expected to serve and fade. We were raised to believe that our values lie in how much we give, how quiet we stay, and how well we put everyone else’s needs before our own. And then, when we hit midlife, the world looks away. But women are waking up and saying, ‘hell no!’” – Dr. Mary Claire Haver

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• unPAUSED with Dr. Mary Claire Haver - https://thepauselife.com/pages/the-unpaused-podcast

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://thepauselife.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/drmaryclaire/

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/drmaryclaire/

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@drmaryclaire

YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@drmaryclaire

Podcast - https://thepauselife.com/pages/the-unpaused-podcast

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In today’s mind-bending episode, prepare to challenge everything you think you know. Today, we're inviting listeners into a radically inclusive conversation that reimagines ideas about communication, consciousness, and human connection.

Award-winning filmmaker and storyteller Ky Dickens joins us to discuss The Telepathy Tapes, her viral podcast documenting the lived experiences of nonspeaking individuals who communicate in ways long dismissed or misunderstood. Through careful listening, deep respect, and investigative rigor, the series challenges entrenched assumptions about intelligence, language, and who gets to be heard—and believed.

In conversation with hosts Jen and Amy, Ky explores how nonspeakers are expanding our understanding of connection beyond spoken language, giving insight into telepathic communication and shared consciousness. The episode centers the voices of a community historically excluded from public discourse and asks what becomes possible when we widen our definition of communication, dignity, and belonging.

Rather than sensationalizing the unexplained, this conversation treats nonspeakers as authoritative narrators of their own experiences—inviting listeners to confront ableism, reexamine bias, and consider how inclusion begins with attention.

Highlights from this Episode:

• How nonspeaking individuals are redefining communication and agency

• Dismissed yet fascinating topics like energy healing, animal communication, mediumship, and near-death experiences

• “The Hill”: a shared metaphysical space described by nonspeakers as a site of connection

• What these experiences reveal about consciousness, presence, and the enduring human need to belong

This episode is a powerful act of listening—one that expands empathy, affirms marginalized voices, and challenges audiences to imagine a more inclusive understanding of what it means to communicate and connect.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “Maybe instead of fixing the brokenness in society, I should focus on fixing the brokenness in me and in humanity.” – Ky Dickens

• “I don't think it's binary that people have to be that dogmatic about science, and we don't have to believe in everything. I think most of us are somewhere in the middle. We want to really investigate and understand the truth about the non-physical world, and it's not silly or unscientific or gullible to do so. I think it's a beautiful part of being alive.” – Ky Dickens

• “One thing I have come to realize deeply is that science and spirituality are not enemies.” – Ky Dickens

• “I have not met a single non-speaker who doesn't talk about people who've passed and about the very real existence of God in an afterlife.” – Ky Dickens

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• The Telepathy Tapes – https://thetelepathytapes.com/

• BT Harman - https://btharman.com/welcome

• Dr. Diane Hennacy Powell – https://drdianehennacy.com/

• Elizabeth Gilbert – https://www.elizabethgilbert.com/

• Rick Rubin - https://x.com/RickRubin

• Gregory Shushan – https://www.gregoryshushan.com/

• Jane Goodall – https://janegoodall.org/

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://thetelepathytapes.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/thetelepathytapes/

Twitter - https://x.com/TelepathyTapes

Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPA5cHDlwkvTM7akXINZo9w

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@telepathytapes

Podcast - https://open.spotify.com/show/1zigaPaUWO4G9SiFV0Kf1c

Connect with Jen!

Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmaker

Jen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmaker

Jen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy.

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:

We’re revisiting one of our most-loved conversations from this show—an exploration of how transformation takes shape in our lives and how we can bravely meet it, even when it’s terrifying.

In this encore episode, we look back on Jen’s conversation with poet and community-builder Joy Sullivan, whose own “chosen change” became a leap toward more sanity, more love, and more joy.

After years of living according to scripts written by others, Joy found herself standing at a crossroads, feeling the pull of something deeper and more true. What followed was a radical leap into the unknown—a move that reshaped her life, her faith, and her art, including her book ‘Instructions for Traveling West’ – a collection for anyone flinging themselves into their own fresh starts.

Together, she and Jen talk about the “incremental scoots” we make before the big leap, the beauty and ache of reinvention, and how stillness can become a sacred space for clarity. Joy shares her story of walking into the unknown and learning to trust her intuition along the way.

In this episode, we reflect on:

• The difference between a change that happens to us and one we choose

• Embracing loneliness and stillness as paths to self-discovery

• Lessons that taught Joy to love herself more deeply

• Why poetry gives language to what we cannot say aloud

If you’re feeling the pull toward something new but uncertain, this encore offers a gentle reminder that change—though often uncomfortable—is where our truest selves begin to emerge.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• "If the birds know how to migrate, if bears know when to hibernate, if nature knows when to move forward, it doesn't make any sense for us to not know that also." – Joy Sullivan

• "It's so important to listen and to follow the rhythms that we're pulled to even if we don't know what we're leaping towards." – Amy Hardin

• “First you must realize you're homesick for all the lives you're not living. Then you must commit to the road and the rising loneliness.” – Joy Sullivan

• “You have to be careful what you write down—it performs this kind of beautiful, terrifying magic.” – Joy Sullivan

• “Don’t compare yourself to someone who’s mid-leap. There were probably a lot of scoots to the edge before they launched.” – Joy Sullivan

• “You don’t have to get the leap right every time. You just have to be willing to innovate midair.” – Joy Sullivan

• “I had coded into my psyche what it meant to be a good woman. When I fractured those stories, my life expanded into possibility.” – Joy Sullivan

• “If I take crumbs and call it a meal, if I stay in rooms where I’m not called beloved, then I’m in a cage of my own making.” – Joy Sullivan

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Flinging Ourselves Into Fresh Starts ft. Joy Sullivan – https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-61/flinging-ourselves-into-fresh-starts-ft-joy-sullivan/

• Sustenance ((A Community of Poets and Writers founded by Joy Sullivan) - https://joysullivanpoet.com/sustenance

• Necessary Salt (Joy Sullivan’s Substack Blog) - https://joysullivan.substack.com/

• Instructions For Traveling West: Poems by Joy Sullivan - https://amzn.to/4qZTZ7l

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://joysullivanpoet.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/joysullivanpoet/

Twitter - https://x.com/Joy_E_Sullivan

Substack - https://joysullivan.substack.com/

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy.

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:

Today’s guest is someone whose work has touched millions of hearts around the world. You probably fell in love with her through her luminous debut memoir ‘From Scratch: A Memoir of Love, Sicily, and Finding Home’, which was later adapted into a limited series on Netflix and became a global success.

Tembi Locke has held many roles: accomplished author, producer, screenwriter, actor, artist, caregiver, child of divorce, mother through adoption, and widow to cancer. It is through her experiences in all of these spaces that Tembi has honed her ability to write, speak, and live from that rare place where grief and grace meet—where we can hold loss and love in the same breath.

Her newest work, Someday, Now, is an immersive, breathtaking, and deeply personal audio experience that takes us on a journey back to Sicily, a place layered with memory, love, and loss for Tembi, as she prepares to send her daughter off to college. Through reflection, family, and the beauty of place, Tembi invites us to consider what it means to re-nest—to reclaim identity, purpose, and joy in a season of profound transition.

Whether you’re launching a kid, starting over, or simply remembering how to listen to your own heart again, this episode will speak to you in this season.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “Sometimes in sharing the hardest things, we actually feel less alone.” – Tembi Locke

• “Sicily is that place of myth and nectar for me. It's one of those places on the planet that is supercharged with the best of what nature has to offer: sun, wind, the sea. It’s a beautiful place. It's the place I return to when there's something I don't quite understand and Sicily makes me have to listen to it.” – Tembi Locke

• “I think when you get to midlife, you need to settle into yourself, be more present with yourself in order to show up for the big moments of change that are happening. Try to anchor in and be as present as possible.  Lean into the quiet spaces between the moments.” – Tembi Locke

• “How can we make space as families and really as mothers at this inflection point to quiet the noise and busyness of life? How can we slow down time, and really mark the moment and honor it?” – Tembi Locke

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• From Scratch: A Memoir of Love, Sicily, and Finding Home by Tembi Locke - https://amzn.to/47s3ZhN

• From Scratch on Netflix - https://www.netflix.com/title/81104486

• Attica Locke - https://www.atticalocke.com/

• Someday, Now: A Memoir of Family, Reclaiming Possibility, and One Sicilian Summer by Tembi Locke - https://amzn.to/3LLKUyA

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.tembilocke.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/tembilocke/

Podcast - https://www.tembilocke.com/podcast

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:

Tune in for this very special #JenHatmakerBookClub episode where Jen gives unprecedented access to look behind the scenes at her own writing process and collaboration that went into the publishing of “Awake”. For today’s conversation, Jen sits down with Vice President and Editorial Director for Avid Reader Press, Lauren Wein, to delve into the journey of bringing Jen's book "Awake" to the page and all the way to the New York Times bestseller list. Jen discusses the profound impact of trusting your own intuition in your writing along with the challenges in memoir-writing of prioritizing authenticity and vulnerability while honoring the privacy for those involved. Lauren pulls back the curtain on the collaborative nature of the editing process, describing the satisfaction she finds with helping authors find their voice. And Jen shares the one truth she hopes every reader of “Awake” walks away with.

Anyone who is interested in writing, or the behind-the-scenes or book-making will enjoy this episode.  Whether you're a writer or a reader, this conversation offers a unique glimpse into the creative process and the power of storytelling.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “One of the things that Awake is about is learning to trust yourself and trusting your body. I feel like that is how I edit. It's like a tuning fork. I sense when something is like, need more or need less. It's physical.” – Lauren Wein

• “Every story deserves authenticity.” – Jen Hatmaker

• “In the war of ‘you versus you’, nobody wins, because you're very hard on yourself. You have a very critical inner voice. When you hear somebody tell you something that you maybe sensed about yourself but you didn't quite know, it ignites something, it confirms something that maybe you sensed was there but the voice was too small because the other voices were just louder.” – Lauren Wein

• “Finding your voice is a journey.” – Lauren Wein

• “When this book was first announced, it was erroneously referred to as a tell-all, which was upsetting to all of us because that is absolutely not what it is. What was very important to you (Jen) was honesty, not telling it all, but being truthful and respecting other people's privacy. Now that is the hardest line to walk when you're writing your own story because your own story is not your own story entirely.” – Lauren Wein

• "Trust your intuition in creative work." – Jen Hatmaker

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• For the parents who are slogging through May – https://jenhatmaker.com/blog/for-the-parents-who-are-slogging-through-may/

• Margaret Riley King - https://www.wmebookdepartment.com/team/margaret-riley-king/

• Maybe You Should Talk to Someone: A Therapist, HER Therapist, and Our Lives Revealed by Lori Gottleib - https://amzn.to/4pUADj8

• Wild Game: My Mother, Her Secret, and Me by Adrienne Brodeur - https://amzn.to/4nywiRc

• Becoming Duchess Goldblatt by Anonymous - https://amzn.to/4o6rHpt

• Awake by Jen Hatmaker audiobook - https://amzn.to/4gU7v7P

• Lights on a Similar Path: ‘Awake’ Readers Reflect On Finding Their Way - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-64/lights-on-a-similar-path-awake-readers-reflect-on-finding-their-way/

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://editors.simonandschuster.com/editor/wein-lauren/

Twitter - https://x.com/desideratasaur

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/lauren.wein.1/

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In this heartfelt episode, Jen and Amy welcome friends, Justin McRoberts and Scott Erickson, to delve into the tender complexities of depression, creativity, and faith. Together, Scott and Justin have built a body of work around the intersection of art, prayer, and healing, including their newest project: In the Low: A Prayerbook for the Seasons of Depression. Today they share personal stories and insights on how art and spirituality can serve as companions through life's most isolating lows. 

This episode offers a compassionate perspective on navigating mental health challenges and finding hope in unexpected places. If you've ever found yourself in a season that was super dark or unbearably heavy, this conversation will bring you comfort.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “When depression eventually would lift in my life, I noticed that I'd think, ‘Where did this fruit come from? Where did this treasure come from?’ It came through going through this process. You might feel void of it when you're in it, you're just trying to get through it or be in it or be functional every day. But there is something happening.” – Scott Erickson

• “What are the comforting words I need for today? How can my conscious mind provide something for my subconscious and my soul? How can my conscious mind provide some handles for me for this day, for this week, for this moment?” – Justin McRoberts

• “Your disappointment in the religious systems you've been a part of is a gift and those systems need it. There's something really institutionally beautiful and necessary to whole swaths, thousands and thousands of people sharing the same set of disappointments. Follow that thread.” – Scott Erickson

• “You aren't wrong to feel the things you are feeling. Life is hard. The machinery is beating the snot out of you. Stay. Please stay long enough to see what might be down there and learn to breathe. My hope is not that you rise to the surface, though I do hope that. My hope is that you learn to breathe at this depth.” – Justin McRoberts

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline - https://988lifeline.org/

• Nichole Nordeman - https://www.instagram.com/nicholenordeman

• Prayer: Forty Days of Practice by Scott Erickson and Justin McRoberts - https://amzn.to/4hDMVsM

• May It Be So: Forty Days with the Lord's Prayer by Scott Erickson and Justin McRoberts - https://amzn.to/3WsKFL5

• Honest Advent: Awakening to the Wonder of God-with-Us Then, Here, and Now by Scott Erickson - https://amzn.to/3LeVIFc

• In the Low: Honest Prayers for Dark Season by Scott Erickson and Justin McRoberts - https://amzn.to/3LaIB87

• Lost Connections: Uncovering the Real Causes of Depression - and the Unexpected Solutions by Johann Hari - https://amzn.to/4nsvrAR

• Matt Haig - https://amzn.to/4o7CTlV

• Scott Erickson Paints an Honest Picture of an Advent Season of Hope - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-64/scott-erickson-paints-an-honest-picture-of-an-advent-season-of-hope/

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The number of people who have said, ‘Jen, you and John Fugelsang should have a conversation’ is approximately one thousand. So naturally, we thought, let’s have that conversation where a million listeners can tune in and enjoy it too.

Strap yourself in for a wild ride as Jen Hatmaker chats with the ever-entertaining comedian, actor and broadcaster, John Fugelsang, host of the Tell Me Everything series on SiriusXM Progress and The John Fugelsang Podcast.  In this episode, they tackle the delightful chaos of breezy topics like Christian nationalism, the real teachings of Jesus (spoiler: it's not about power), and why love trumps all—literally. With his signature blend of humor and razor-sharp insight, John dishes on his book, "Separation of Church and Hate," and why it's time to take back the Bible from the fundamentalist fun police. Get ready for a conversation that's as enlightening as a Sunday sermon, but way more fun.

Whether you consider yourself religious, spiritual, atheistic, or just allergic to hypocrisy, THIS is the episode for you.  Tune in, laugh, and maybe learn a thing or two!

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “I think the largest growing demographic we don't talk about is people who were raised religious but now consider themselves spiritual. They're not turned off to spirituality or God or Jesus or belief. They love the great mystery, but they're really turned off to the hypocrisies and the cruelties and the meanness of so many church communities in this country.” – John Fugelsang

• “ was raised to believe that Christianity was about the stuff that Christ taught and commanded: service to others, humility, love, acceptance, empathy, forgiving your enemies, turning the other cheek, replacing eye-for-an-eye. And the teachings of Jesus in Matthew 25, that individuals and nations are going to be judged by how they care for the poor, care for the sick, welcome the stranger, and care for the incarcerated. That's the stuff Jesus actually talked about.” – John Fugelsang

• “American Christians have been manipulated with all this homophobia, all this hatred of immigrants and none of that comes from Jesus and it's been done by a political movement that is only about power. Conservative Christian power, not the teachings of Christ, not the religious freedom, not fighting Satan, conservative Christian power.” – John Fugelsang

• “If Jesus spoke in parable and metaphor, why is it so hard to view the Bible as parable and metaphor? We get so hung up on proving the facts of the Bible that we miss the truth of the Bible. And the Bible has a lot of truth. It does not have a lot of facts.” – John Fugelsang

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Separation of Church and Hate: A Sane Person's Guide to Taking Back the Bible from Fundamentalists, Fascists, and Flock-Fleecing Frauds by John Fugelsang - https://amzn.to/4husQF3

• Tell Me Everything with John Fugelsang on SiriusXM - https://www.siriusxm.com/blog/tag/john-fugelsang

John’s Links:

Website - https://www.johnfugelsang.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/johnfugelsang/

Twitter - https://x.com/JohnFugelsang

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/john.fugelsang.9

Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/@JJbirdsong1

Substack - https://johnfugelsang.substack.com/

Podcast - https://www.johnfugelsang.com/podcast

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:

For a special treat this week, we’re bringing you some highlights straight from Jen’s recent Awake book tour in a limited series we’ve dubbed “Road Trippin’ with Jen”.  Every tour stop, audience, and special guest brought its own kind of magic, so we’re excited to share some of the best moments with you here on the podcast.

On this Road Trippin’ stop, Jen shares the stage with two powerhouses. In Houston, board-certified OBGYN and best-selling author, Dr. Mary Claire Haver, shares her journey and insights into women's health, particularly around menopause and midlife. She unpacks our burning questions—why brain fog shows up before periods change, why sleep matters, and how a “menopause toolkit” can set us up for strength, longevity, and joy. This conversation delves into the complexities of menopause, the importance of nutrition, sleep, and movement, and the power of community and connection.  Together we learn how to thrive in mind, body, and spirit during this transformative phase of life.

Then we head to the Music City of Nashville, where comedian and truth-teller Heather Land talks about using humor to survive whatever garbage life throws at us, pivoting careers in midlife, and choosing honesty as a way to create belonging. Heather reminds us that laughter can be holy too, and when every other thing fails, humor has a way of breaking us open just enough to let the light in. Tune in for an evening that was equal parts comedy set, revival, and group therapy.

…

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• Perimenopause brain changes show up well before your periods go sideways.” — Dr. Mary Claire
  

• “Strength training is non-negotiable if you want to keep bone and muscle.” — Dr. Mary Claire
  

• “If you don’t laugh, you’ll cry—and sometimes the laughing saves you.” — Heather Land
  

• “Honesty is freedom. If people don’t like it, that’s on them.” — Heather Land
  

• “Staying awake isn’t just serious business—it’s about finding delight in unexpected places.” — Jen Hatmaker

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• The Ultimate Menopause Toolkit - https://bit.ly/3WkYsDo

• The New Menopause: Navigating Your Path Through Hormonal Change with Purpose, Power, and Facts by Dr. Mary Claire Haver - https://amzn.to/4qBg8bU

• For the Love Episode 21: Series 64 - Reinventing Yourself with Heather Land - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-64/reinventing-yourself-with-heather-land/

Dr. Mary Claire Haver — Board-certified OB-GYN, bestselling author, leading voice on perimenopause/menopause care, and educator advocating science-based, compassionate treatment for women in midlife and beyond.

Heather Land — Comedian, writer, and speaker whose viral wit opened the door to deeper storytelling. Known for pairing humor with honesty about faith, family, recovery, and midlife reinvention.

Dr. Mary Claire Haver’s  Links:

Website - https://thepauselife.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/drmaryclaire/

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/drmaryclaire/

Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/@drmaryclaire

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@drmaryclaire

Substack - https://drmaryclairehaver.substack.com/

Podcast - https://thepauselife.com/pages/the-unpaused-podcast

Heather Land’s Links:

Website - https://www.heatherlandofficial.com/

Instagram -https://www.instagram.com/heatherland_iaintdoinit

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/iaintdoinit/

Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCs4omp2klYLTOqqY56j-8Ag

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@heatherlandofficial

Podcast - https://open.spotify.com/show/1c9HiacYhJDBWa2UneL7Ae?si=19c9414ec4f74953

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

Meet the guests

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

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Description: In this episode of the Matriarchy series, we explore how deeply ingrained patriarchal narratives can create a policing effect on the behavior of women. 

Author, Elise Loehnen, discusses her book "On Our Best Behavior" which examines how concepts like the seven deadly sins have historically been used to restrict women's behavior and police their adherence to an idealized form of "goodness." Loehnen unpacks the insidious ways women are culturally conditioned from a young age to suppress normal human drives like anger, ambition, and sexuality. And how disrupting rigid gender stereotypes is important when raising the next generation in order to build a more compassionate world. 

…

Thought-provoking Quotes:

★ “Women are trained for goodness; men are trained for power.” – Elise Loehnen

★ “Patriarchy isn’t just out there in systems and structures — it’s in us. It’s the air we breathe.” – Elise Loehnen

★ “A ‘good woman’ never needs anything. She has no wants, no anger, no appetite. She exists to meet everyone else’s needs — and calls it virtue.” – Elise Loehnen

★ “We are so conditioned to police ourselves that we end up policing each other.” – Elise Loehnen

★ “I hold everything I think with loose hands. This is what I know now. But I’m open to the me who might think differently later.” – Jen Hatmaker

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

➤ On Our Best Behavior by Elise Loehnen - https://bit.ly/44tz41D

➤ Goop - https://goop.com

➤ For the Love of Being Seen and Heard ft. Lori Gottlieb - https://bit.ly/4b8YT9C

➤ Maybe You Should Talk to Someone by Lori Gottlieb - https://bit.ly/3JO7FOn

➤ Evagrius Ponticus (Fourth Century Christian Monk) - https://bit.ly/4b7zEV5

➤ Pope Gregory on the 7 Deadly Sins - https://bit.ly/3y1J1XK

➤ Harvey Weinstein Abuse Cases -  https://bit.ly/4b5ktM5

➤ Carol Gilligan - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carol_G...

➤ In a Different Voice by Carol Gilligan - https://bit.ly/3JQ9IBh  

➤ Human Voice by Carol Gilligan - https://bit.ly/3UQ1Rcn

➤ Andrew Tate - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_...

➤ Order, Disorder, Reorder (An idea Developed by Richard Rohr) - https://bit.ly/44xzHqK

➤ For the Love of The Enneagram ft. Richard Rohr - https://bit.ly/3QzzZaW

➤ Loretta Ross - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loretta...

Guest’s Links:

➤ Website: https://www.eliseloehnen.com/

➤ Facebook:   / eliseloehnen  

➤ Instagram:   / eliseloehnen  

➤ Twitter:   / eloehnen  

➤ LinkedIn:   / elise-loehnen-b867523  

➤ Podcast: https://www.eliseloehnen.com/episodes

➤ Blog: https://eliseloehnen.substack.com/

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

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If you have ever lost your cool with your kids and then felt the crushing wave of guilt that comes sweeping in after—this episode is for you.

This week, Jen and Amy sit down with psychotherapist and emotions educator Hilary Jacobs Hendel, author of ‘It’s Not Always Depression’ and the new book ‘Parents Have Feelings, Too’, to talk about what happens when we stop ignoring our own emotions and start bringing more calm, curiosity, and compassion into our families.

Hilary shares her groundbreaking Change Triangle model—a simple but powerful tool that helps us move from anxiety, shame, and reactivity to understanding what’s really underneath: our core emotions like anger, sadness, fear, and joy. Together, they unpack:

• How to break cycles we inherited from our own parents

• What “open-hearted parenting” looks like in real life

• How to repair when we’ve said or done something we regret

• And why healing our emotions may be the greatest legacy we give our kids

It’s a conversation full of science, self-compassion, and deep sighs of relief—a reminder that parents have feelings too, and that tending to them isn’t selfish; it’s sacred work. Whether you’re parenting toddlers, teens, or even adult children, there is something to serve you in this episode and it’s a great one to share with a friend.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “It's always possible for relationships and the brain to change, and they happen hand in hand, so it is never too late.” – Hilary Jacobs Hendel

• “What I needed to do was slow everything down and get curious. Get to know this kid, say, ‘tell me a little bit more about what's going on.’ Question my own values and the ways I thought it was going to be, all these fantasies that I came in with at the expense of my kid when I thought I was helping.” – Hilary Jacobs Hendel

• “Self-awareness is an investment that comes back in dividends and capital gains beyond anything that we can imagine. And it's so much more relaxing to parent this way.” – Hilary Jacobs Hendel

• “I can shout from the rooftops that emotions education is important, just like reading and math is important. In high school biology we learn we have a heart, lungs, and pancreas, but emotions affect us far worse. Every single day of our lives. You'd think somebody would want to pay attention to teaching us a little bit about them.”– Hilary Jacobs Hendel

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Parents Have Feelings, Too: A Guide to Navigating Your Emotions So You And Your Family Can Thrive by Hilary Jacobs Hendel and Juli Fraga - https://amzn.to/4h3wtlf

• For The Love Of Reconnecting Episode 03: Making Good Use of Our Emotions: Hilary Jacobs Hendel - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-32/making-good-use-of-our-emotions-hilary-jacobs-hendel/

• It's Not Always Depression: Working the Change Triangle to Listen to the Body, Discover Core Emotions, and Connect to Your Authentic Self by Hilary Jacobs Hendel - https://amzn.to/3L3an6f

• The Change Triangle - https://www.hilaryjacobshendel.com/whats-the-change-triangle

• Awake: A Memoir by Jen Hatmaker - https://amzn.to/4nCb9pi

• Simple Habit meditation app - https://www.simplehabit.com/

• The Change Triangle YouTube Channel - https://www.youtube.com/c/thechangetriangle/videos

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.hilaryjacobshendel.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/hilaryjacobshendel/

Twitter - https://x.com/HilaryJHendel

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/AuthorHilaryJacobsHendel

Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/c/thechangetriangle/videos

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In this moving episode, listeners share their own tender and personal stories inspired by Jen's bestselling book, "Awake," which debuted at number three on the New York Times bestseller list. The touching and heartrending voicemails coming in from readers of “Awake” highlight our yearning to build our lives on solid foundations, our propensity to reach for community and friendship, and the shared human experience we feel around suffering and pain. In this deeply emotional episode, listeners recount overcoming stories of adversity and finding hope, often describing "Awake" as a "life raft" during their own challenging times and Jen gets to hear the profound impact that “Awake” is having on readers everywhere. Tune in for an inspiring journey through the voices of those touched by "Awake."

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “These listener voicemail episodes are so resonant. I love them. Y'all always say the truest, most beautiful, hardest things. Honestly, I'm always grateful for your courage to come on this show and say your thing out loud.” – Jen Hatmaker

• “I didn’t know Jen was about to curl up in my cave and hold me close. I didn’t know her story, which I expected to be irrelevant to mine, would tell me that I am okay, normal, and I won’t stay this way.” – Anonymous reader/listener

• “The best teachers don’t tell, they show. Although you say this book is not prescriptive and you’re not telling us what to do, you’ve shown us how to live a life and get through hard things with integrity, honesty, discretion, and strength. You’ve shown us how to take responsibility and ownership of our own shit. Your friends have shown us how to show up fully and unconditionally. Beautiful examples of love and friendship. Your family has shown us how to be there as an unwavering and loving presence to get through their hardest things.” Reader/listener, Denise

• “My life broke apart too and thankfully I had friendships to fall back on. It wasn’t a thing where I was grateful in hindsight. I was able to be grateful for it in the moment, which is not typically how stories unfold.” – Anonymous reader/listener

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Awake: A Memoir by Jen Hatmaker - https://amzn.to/3KDAalt

• 107 Days by Kamala Harris - https://amzn.to/47aZ6tb

• Poems & Prayers by Matthew McConaughey - https://amzn.to/473gy1Q

• Fierce, Free and Full of Fire: The Guide to Being Glorious You by Jen Hatmaker - https://amzn.to/48jrtXg

• Emily P. Freeman Podcast episode 374: Tell the Whole Truth with Jen Hatmaker - https://emilypfreeman.com/podcast/374/

• For the Love Podcast: A Lantern for Others in Dark Spaces: Jen Hatmaker on Sharing Her Most Tender Story - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-64/a-lantern-for-others-in-dark-spaces-jen-hatmaker-on-sharing-her-most-tender-story/

• 7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess by Jen Hatmaker - https://amzn.to/4mTSzrM

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:

Sometimes you  read a book that just wrecks you in the best possible way — the kind of story that stays in your bones long after you close the last page. Go As A River is exactly that kind of book. It is a lyrical and haunting coming-of-age novel set amid the rugged beauty of Colorado’s Western Slope in the late 1940s through the mid-20th century. Inspired by true events—the disappearance of the small ranching town of Iola beneath the Blue Mesa Reservoir—Shelley Read crafts a story that is both intimately personal and richly symbolic. 

Shelley is a fifth-generation Coloradan who has spent her life in the Gunnison Valley, and you can feel that connection to the land in every line of this novel. Shelley has spent decades teaching writing and literature, but with this debut (now an international bestseller) she’s given us something timeless — a story about love, loss, and the courage to keep moving forward like the river itself.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “I deeply value the long journey to becoming ourselves, especially as women, and the complexities of that journey.” – Shelley Read

• “I think,so often, young people are boxed in and alienated from the very beginning to who their true self is and what their true journey is. And, I thought [as a teacher] that I could save these young people a whole lot of pain going forward and just help them discover who they are now, to follow their most authentic selves.” – Shelley Read

• “I'm not so sure that I set out to actively reclaim my creativity and my writerly self as much as Victoria Nash, bless her heart, the main character of my novel. She came to me in whatever magical way. I didn't go seeking her. She came and claimed me in some way and she is who turned me back to my writing life because she came to me with such power and such insistence that I had to write her story whether I had time to do it or not. Little by little by little I started accepting this journey of coming back to my writerly self.” – Shelley Read

• “I think the more generous we can be as writers with process and allowing the story to unfold over time, in the most authentic way, then we really get into the story that we really need to be telling.” – Shelley Read

• I had to turn the story and the journey in this novel toward hope. I had to. Because ultimately, this deep well of strength and resilience and this ability to bear the seemingly unbearable that all of us carry. Hope is what's going to drive us to rise each time, and to continue to rise.” – Shelley Read

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Go as a River: A Novel by Shelley Read - https://amzn.to/4lIly0Y

• Film Rights to Shelley Read’s Global Bestseller ‘Go as a River’ Head to Fifth Season, Mazur Kaplan - https://variety.com/2023/film/news/go-as-a-river-movie-shelley-read-book-1235667430

• The River’s Daughter by Bridget Crocker - https://amzn.to/3Jy78mE

• Awake: A Memoir by Jen Hatmaker – https://amzn.to/4n3WpPy

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.shelleyread.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/shelleyread.author

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/shelley.read.50

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Sometimes the deepest growth comes from the hardest seasons. An untreatable diagnosis, a painful divorce, the loss of hard-earned savings—when life tears apart the script we imagined for ourselves, we’re left to wrestle with who we are, what we value, and how to begin again.

In this special encore episode, poet and bestselling author Maggie Smith joins Jen for a tender, hopeful conversation about finding light in the aftermath of loss. Jen shares how she first discovered Maggie’s work (spoiler: Shauna Niequist played matchmaker), and together they swap stories of navigating divorce, rediscovering hope, and daring to rebuild.

Maggie opens up about the unexpected end of her marriage, the daily pep talks she wrote just to survive, and how those words became lifelines for thousands of others. Along the way, she reminds us that even when our script gets flipped, we can trust “future us,” make peace with uncertainty, and emerge stronger, more grounded, and ready for what comes next.

If you’ve ever felt adrift in the dark or questioned your worth in the wake of loss, this encore episode will remind you that you are loved, worthy, and capable of carrying on—step by step, word by word.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “Growth unfortunately often comes from the most uncomfortable or painful parts of life. I don’t want this to be true, and yet here we are.” – Jen Hatmaker

• “My marriage ended… and part of what helped me stay anchored was writing. I was in too much pain to really write poems, so I started writing myself a little pep talk every day. What I found was that all these other people started sharing them… and that sense of purpose, and that sense of shared community, at a time when I felt completely alone, was everything.” – Maggie Smith

• “Hope is imaginative—it allows you to envision what might be up ahead even when you see nothing.” – Jen Hatmaker

• “I was lost at sea, adrift in the dark, but even one small light on the horizon showed me I was still on the right path.” – Jen Hatmaker

• “I’ve built up a tolerance to ambiguity. Ten years ago, it would’ve undone me. Now, it’s a skill I’m grateful for.” – Maggie Smith

• “We didn’t choose this. The script was flipped for us. But what we do with it—that belongs to us.” – Jen Hatmaker

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Shauna Niequist - https://www.shaunaniequist.com/

• Keep Moving: Notes on Loss, Creativity, and Change by Maggie Smith - https://amzn.to/41YsuAb

• Good Bones: Poems by Maggie Smith - https://amzn.to/469P6jA

• Goldenrod: Poems by Maggie Smith - https://amzn.to/3Iwh7ZB

• You Could Make This Place Beautiful: A Memoir by Maggie Smith - https://amzn.to/46r9CuZ

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://maggiesmithpoet.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/maggiesmithpoet/

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:

The day has finally arrived—Awake is officially out in the world. In this episode, Jen Hatmaker opens up about a story she's held tightly for years, a story she's finally ready to share.

Jen takes us behind the scenes of writing Awake—a memoir told in vivid vignettes and written in real-time, as if each scene was recounted the very day it happened. The book is broken into three parts: The End, The Middle, and The Beginning, tracking Jen’s own process of healing and awakening to a number of realizations and truths.

Jen walks us down that path of recovery while honoring the many women who held up lanterns along the way and gave her the courage to keep going. She reflects on the process of confronting the deep-rooted systems of patriarchy, purity culture, body shame, and the shaky foundation that once defined her marriage.

This book isn’t just about the patterns, behaviors, codependency, and attachment wounds that shaped Jen’s story—it’s also about the joy of stepping into a new beginning. And most of all, it’s about you. Because it was your presence, your listening, and your courage that made her brave enough to tell it.

Now, it’s yours.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “I was in the pitch black, dark night of the soul. Everything was so shrouded in grief and loss and fear but I could see all these little lanterns from my community going, ‘Keep going. We're here. We're with you.’ I'll never get over that as long as I live.” – Jen Hatmaker

• “Awake is the lantern I am holding up.for women everywhere who need someone else to tell them, ‘Keep going. You're not alone. I understand your feelings. I understand your fear. I understand your trauma. Maybe also a teeny bit, I understand your future. I understand what you are capable of. What is possible for you. I understand your resiliency. I understand that no matter what you have lost, what has changed, what has shifted, no matter how brokenhearted you are, I still believe some of your best days are ahead of you.’” – Jen Hatmaker

• “I can trust you, the reader, to do what you need to do with the information. I can trust you to take exactly what you need out of each and every moment, memory, everything, and to alchemize that into your own life, into your own story. I don't have to tell you what to do with it. I don't have to tell you what to think about it. I don't have to tell you how to process it.” – Jen Hatmaker

• “The fits this book gave me, trying to write in real time! You know, writing an eighth grade memory took me a third of the book to finally get the tense of all my verbs right. I kept writing it in the past tense because it's in the past. The amount of times I had to comb back through and change all the verb tenses to present instead of past was every single paragraph.” – Jen Hatmaker

• “If I'm gonna tell the story, then let's tell the story. Not like the shinier version of it or the less humiliating version of it or the one that would never indict me, only my partner. There's no integrity in that.” – Jen Hatmaker

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Awake: A Memoir by Jen Hatmaker - https://amzn.to/4pduwXb

• Bumble – https://bumble.com/en-us/

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Her book is packed with practical tools, honest storytelling, and a powerful message: this phase of life isn’t something to endure — it’s an opportunity to reinvent, reconnect, and rise. From demanding better healthcare to breaking the silence in the workplace, Tamsen is helping women turn midlife into a movement.

In today’s enlightening conversation, we unpack:

Whether you’re in the thick of it or just beginning to notice the shifts, this episode will leave you informed, inspired, and ready to take action. Share this episode with a woman you care about!

Thought-provoking Quotes:

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.tamsenfadal.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/tamsenfadal/

Twitter - https://x.com/TamsenFadal

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/tamsenfadal/

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@tamsenfadal

Substack - https://tamsenfadal.substack.com/

Podcast - https://www.tamsenfadal.com/the-tamsen-show-podcast

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

● The biggest myths about menopause we need to bust● How to become your own best advocate in the doctor’s office● Why midlife isn’t an ending — it’s a beginning★ “The truth is there are a lot of doctors who, through no fault of their own,  are not informed about menopause. Doctors don't go into this profession not wanting to help, but unfortunately a lot of them, by their own admission, were not trained in medical school. And I think we've got to do something about that one.” – Tamsen Fadal★ “Women are thriving. They're bolder, smarter, wiser, they’re more open about their lives, healthier in a lot of ways, they’re in relationships that they want to be in versus relationships that they felt like they had to be in.  I look at this as a celebration in some ways.” – Tamsen Fadal★ “I really think that we have to start looking at this stage of life in a different way.  Women could celebrate this time in life, what I've been calling the bolden years instead of the golden years, instead of dreading these years.” – Tamsen Fadal★ “If you're dealing with the symptoms of perimenopause and you don't know what's going on, it can be so stressful. You're having heart problems. You feel like you're going crazy. You can't sleep, and now you can't function at work. I wanted women to be able to know what to do. It’s a chaotic time that can feel confusing unless we simplify it.” – Tamsen Fadal★ “It is so nice to feel normal at this stage of life. It is just such a relief to realize not only how many of us there are, but how many solutions exist. We are not helpless and this is not inevitable. Menopause is, but the suffering isn’t.” – Jen Hatmaker➢ How to Menopause: Take Charge of Your Health, Reclaim Your Life, and Feel Even Better than Before by Tamsen Fadal – https://amzn.to/4mIbMx5➢ The M Factor: Shredding the Silence About Menopause – https://themfactorfilm.com/➢ Midi Health - https://www.joinmidi.com/➢ The Men’s Guide to Understanding Menopause – https://www.tamsenfadal.com/mens-guide-to-understanding-menopause

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Have you ever found yourself at odds with someone you deeply care about—unable to agree on something that really matters? Is it possible to stay connected, even when your beliefs clash? This seemed like an important question to answer, so we decided to go back into our archives to bring forward this 2021 conversation about one of the most challenging forms of reconnection: loving and staying in relationship with people who see the world differently.

To help us navigate this complex emotional landscape, we're joined by Rozella Haydée White—also known as the Love Big Coach. A theologian, spiritual life coach, and leadership consultant, Rozella is passionate about helping people cultivate love that is both healing and justice-rooted. In this encore episode,  Rozella and Jen explore how to show up in hard conversations without losing yourself, and how to make space for compassion when disagreement feels like a wall. Rozella offers this powerful reminder: “If we believe that people are created in the image of God, then I don't really have a choice but to believe in people.”

This conversation unpacks: 

• What it means to stay in a relationship when we do not see eye to eye

• How we keep loving family and friends when our values don’t align anymore

• What do we do with our fractured families without creating havoc and disruption

• How we can hold two things that are true at once

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “If we believe that people are created in the image of God, then I don't really have a choice but to believe in people, because I don't believe that God creates anything but that which is life-giving, that which is creative, that which is good and holy.” – Rozella Haydée White

• “When I talk about love, I'm talking about that which is creative, that which is justice-seeking, and that which is ultimately sustaining for our mind, heart, bodies, and soul.” – Rozella Haydée White

• “Love does not mean absence of consequence or absence of conflict.” – Rozella Haydée White

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Love Big Coach - https://www.rozellahwhite.com/

• A Rhythm of Prayer: A Collection of Meditations for Renewal by Sarah Bessey - https://amzn.to/466mtT3

• Glennon Doyle’s For The Love Episode - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-02/finding-beauty-in-the-mess-with-glennon-doyle/

• Brené Brown’s For The Love Episode - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-02/getting-vulnerable-with-dr-brene-brown/

• Love Big: The Power of Revolutionary Relationships to Heal the World by Rozella Haydée White - https://amzn.to/3Vrm6Oh

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.rozellahwhite.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/lovebigcoach/

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/lovebigcoach

Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/@lovebigcoach

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@lovebigcoach

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

As a luminary in contemporary literature, Elizabeth Gilbert’s writing has shaped the zeitgeist through adventure, spiritual exploration, creativity, and what it means to live a life of integrity. Her work consistently resonates with a global audience, prompting introspection and inspiring personal journeys of self-discovery.

In this episode, Elizabeth Gilbert delves into the intricate narratives woven within her latest book, All the Way to the River: Love, Loss, and Liberation.  Liz traces the evolving nature of her bond with Rayya Elias, illustrating how the relationship transitioned from a cherished best friend to a trusted neighbor, then blossomed into a profound creative muse, and ultimately became a romantic partner—her "person."  This deeply significant relationship unfolded against the harrowing backdrop of Rayya’s terminal pancreatic cancer diagnosis and her courageous, yet often arduous, battle with addiction. 

In a conversation full of heart and unabashed vulnerability, Liz reflects on her own struggles with people-pleasing, addiction, and finding emotional and spiritual sobriety, discussing what it looks like to take accountability for one's own well-being to write a life story that ends with dignity.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “If you're very lucky, you might just meet one person in your life who you can go all the way to the river with.” – Elizabeth Gilbert

• “There's not a jury in the world who wouldn’t have agreed that I had every right to see myself as a victim in that story but I still didn't see my role in the insanity. It took me years of grieving and anger and processing to see it.” – Elizabeth Gilbert

• “There is no such thing as a relationship between an incredibly healthy person and an incredibly dysfunctional person. There's an incredibly dysfunctional person and a person who is very far from themselves engaging in that relationship with that incredibly dysfunctional person.” – Elizabeth Gilbert

• “I’ve used people as though they are drugs, to shore up my incredibly gaping insecurity wound. So I'm going to either use someone as a sedative, somebody who makes me feel really safe, or I'm going to go find somebody to use as a speed ball of excitement and danger, somebody who's very bad for me. I would just try to find the person who could make my levels feel right.” – Elizabeth Gilbert

• “Like many humans, I am extremely faulty at knowing what's going to make me happy.. I anticipate that something will make me happy and it almost kills me.” – Elizabeth Gilbert

• Emotional sobriety, for me, is taking complete accountability for my own nervous system and not ever accusing anybody of disrupting it. A simple thing that I've learned to say is not ‘You need to stop behaving the way that you're behaving’, but ‘I love you and I need to go.’” – Elizabeth Gilbert

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Today’s episode is an absolute treat. Catherine Newman, the beloved author of both fiction and nonfiction writing, known for her sharp wit, emotional resonance, and profound insights into everyday life, sits down with Jen to talk about our August JHBC selection, Sandwich, which quickly gained national attention for its honest, tender, and hilarious reflection on real life in the messy middle years. 

In this discussion that feels like a conversation between lifelong friends, Jen and Catherine delve into the unique challenges faced by the Sandwich Generation.  Catherine writes so beautifully about the ache of watching our kids become adults—still ours, but not really, meanwhile exploring what it looks like to engage in the caretaking and slow grief of watching our parents age. And with hilarious candor, she peels back the curtain of what it’s like to endure all of this in the throes of menopause.  It’s a book that feels like it crawled inside our minds, hearts, and lives. 

Catherine also gives glimpses into how many of the characters and storylines were inspired by real life experiences, which is perhaps why it tugs so tenderly on our heartstrings and strikes such a raw and honest chord with its readers.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “I became like a total writing-for-money whore. I couldn't believe you could write for money. It was so intoxicating to me and I started writing everything I could if they would pay me for it and I did this until last year. And it didn't really matter what they would pay me for it. And I wrote everybody's alumni magazines. I wrote advertorial copy for websites. I wrote the etiquette column for Real Simple Magazine for 10 years, like a billion different things. And here I am.” 

– Catherine Newman

• “Talk about ‘sandwich’. I'm the filling that's slowly extracting itself. I'm like the bologna creeping out the back door while the sandwich takes care of itself. An incredible system.” – Catherine Newman

• “How did I not know this stuff? I thought menopause really was the cessation of your period. Like it was a train you got on when you were 12 and then you just stepped off of it when you were 50. Not that you stepped off this train and entered this hellscape.” – Catherine Newman

• “I stopped reading the Goodreads reviews for Sandwich — somebody did call the book ‘grinding and plotless’. It was a three-word review and I loved it so much, like this is the slow drip of shame and hubris for me…. I want that on my tombstone ‘grinding and plotless’, like ‘tell me about it, you only had to read about it, this is my actual life.’” – Catherine Newman

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Description:

Today, Jen has a discussion with her longtime friend, brilliant thought-leader and activist, Austin Channing Brown. You probably know Austin from her viral first book, I’m Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness, which flew off shelves in 2020 following the murder of George Floyd, as we were witnessing worldwide protests, calls for police reform, and a radical change to our racial justice systems. Countless people trusted Austin to help them unpack and understand the racial reckoning going on in our country at that time.

Now, Austin is releasing a new project that shares some of her hard-fought learnings gained since that tumultuous time. Full of Myself: Black Womanhood and the Journey to Self-Possession is a love letter to the black women, like Austin herself, who are exhausted from being everything to everyone but themselves. Across essays titled “I Love Myself When I Am Laughing,” “When I Am Awkward,” “When I Am Failing,” and more, Austin celebrates the fullness of her humanity. Each chapter becomes a mirror, asking women—especially Black women—to consider where they’ve given themselves away and what it would mean to live with self-possession instead.

Highlights from this conversation include:

• What it means to Austin to be “full of herself”—a phrase she reclaimed as an act of resistance, dignity, and spiritual integrity

• What happens in our bodies when we operate out of alignment with ourselves

• What it means to be a Black woman striving to live fully in a world that often demands her silence, her labor, and her conformity

• And the inspirational, life-saving advice that Austin received from activist, Tarana Burke

This is such a good conversation starter and one to be shared, for sure.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “I'm sick of white people telling me I have to remain in unhealthy workplaces, unhealthy worship spaces, unhealthy towns in order to save them. Everywhere I go, I'm told I should sacrifice myself for the possibility of whiteness getting its shit together.” – Austin Channing Brown

• “I grew up in an era that we called racial reconciliation. ‘Racial justice’ was too hard. It implied that there were two people who had both done wrong and needed to come together. And the way that was often phrased for people of color was that we needed to teach, we needed to offer grace, we needed to bend over backwards, we needed to touch hearts and minds, endless patience, we needed to watch our tone, we needed to be open and inviting. It was all about what we needed to do.” – Austin Channing Brown

• “There is an integrity, accountability, and power that comes with being full of myself. And there is a lack of needing to please anybody else. Because I'm full of me.” – Austin Channing Brown

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Full of Myself: Black Womanhood and the Journey to Self-Possession by Austin Channing Brown - https://amzn.to/4k0SQI1

• I'm Still Here: Reese's Book Club: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness by Austin Channing Brown - https://amzn.to/4jElqyn

• Nikki Giovanni, poet - https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/nikki-giovanni 

• Zora Neale Hurston - https://www.zoranealehurston.com/

• I Love Myself When I Am Laughing And Then Again When I Am Looking Mean & Impressive by Zora Neale Hurston - https://amzn.to/3FVpGvA

• Tarana Burke - https://www.taranaburke.com/

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://austinchanning.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/austinchanning/

Twitter - https://x.com/austinchanning

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/austinchanningbrown

Substack - https://substack.com/@austinchanning

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy.

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s conversation might have you clutching your pearls and purity rings. Jen and Amy sit down with Dr. Celeste Holbrook—sexologist, educator, and author of Missionary Position: A Slightly Irreverent Guide to Sex After Purity Culture—for the candid, hilarious, and healing “sex talk” you never had but always deserved.

From busting purity culture myths to unpacking women’s complicated relationship with pleasure, Dr. Holbrook shares the four “inner missionaries” that shape our approach to sex, why sexual shame runs so deep, and how to reclaim intimacy as the joyful gift it was always meant to be.

Highlights include: 

• Unpacking women' s complicated relationship with pleasure

• Dr. Holbrook prescribes the best sexy-time soundtrack

• Review of the four inner missionaries (the Analyst, the Assassin, the Healer, and the Explorer) – the archetypes that define our individual approach to sex 

• Celeste reveals a surprising fact that both golf carts and ejaculate have in common

• How the combination of purity culture, patriarchy and capitalism are the oppression cocktail for sex

• And the conversation veers off course when the trio discusses an exercise that uses Jason Mamoa to evaluate their sexual ethics

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “When I say sex education saved my relationship, I am not being bombastic. It really did help me find myself.” – Dr. Celeste Holbrook

• “We view sex through a patriarchal lens. Media tells us how to feel about sex and what is sexy. So what is sexy has been historically white, thin, able-bodied, young… And the way that we view ourselves then says, well, what if I'm not all of those things? Am I still sexy? Is my body still OK?” – Dr. Celeste Holbrook

• “The work for us, especially as women, is to anchor into our body to experience sensuality in order to experience sex instead of perform sex.” – Dr. Celeste Holbrook

• “We need to be inside the system in order to take down the system.” – Dr. Celeste Holbrook

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Jen Hatmake’s Sex MeCourse: SexEd For the Rest of Us - https://shop.jenhatmaker.com/products/sex-101

• Pantsuit Politics - https://www.instagram.com/pantsuitpolitics/

• Missionary Position: A Slightly Irreverent Guide to Sex after Purity Culture by Dr. Celeste Holbrook - https://amzn.to/46StjOa

• For the Love of Men by Liz Plank – https://amzn.to/41JtRSS 

• Say Yes to Pleasure: How to Talk About Sex and Rekindle Intimacy in Midlife with Vanessa Marin – https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-64/say-yes-to-pleasure-how-to-talk-about-sex-and-rekindle-intimacy-in-midlife-with-vanessa-marin/

• A Tribe Called Quest – https://atribecalledquest.com/blogs/discography

• The Pleasure Club - https://www.drcelesteholbrook.com/https/thepleasureclub

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.drcelesteholbrook.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/drcelesteholbrook/

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/DrCelesteHolbrook/

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Dr. Sara Kuburic, an existential psychotherapist and author behind The @Millennial.Therapist, offers profound insights into taking ownership of our lives. Dr. Kuburic champions the idea that we are free and responsible agents, shaping our own development through our choices. While it's easy to blame external forces for unhappiness, she encourages us to embrace the amazing opportunity to engage in life fully. She poses a crucial question: how much of what we face is inflicted by us, and how much just happens? As a therapist, she equips people with tools to navigate life’s challenges, asking: “what can you change or how can you change your attitude so the situation is less painful for you?” Beyond existential thought, Jen and Dr. Kuburic explore self-loss and how we can unknowingly deceive ourselves into believing we're living the life we desire, even as our bodies signal distress through depression, anxiety, and panic.

Jen and Dr. Kuburic get honest about:

• The difference between loving the "idea" of who you are versus who you actually are, and how to stop self-deception.

• The point when avoiding change becomes more painful than embracing it.

• Acknowledging our physical limits: how our bodies send red flags like anxiety, fear, or panic, even when we feel strong.

• How an all-consuming dedication to making something work, even if it's not right for us, can lead to our weakest moments if we don't face the truth.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “We get to engage in life; we can take ownership, we can take responsibility, we can make choices, and I think that that’s really how I see human suffering. My question is always, ‘how much of it happened to you? How much of it did you inflict on yourself?’” – Dr. Sara Kuburic

• “Life happens to us but that’s not all that happens. We also happen to life.” – Dr, Sara Kuburic

• “The most pain I experienced actually came from my own participation, which included avoidance and self-deceit. I am not hard on myself because it came from such a pure place. I can’t be mad at myself. But, I also understand that it’s not something that serves me.” – Dr. Sara Kuburic

• “The truth is there regardless of whether or not you choose to see it. It will dictate your life until you see it. So are you safe enough in yourself to handle the truth that you are resisting or avoiding? That’s a really delicate question that we need to honor.” – Dr.  Sara Kuburic

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Dr. Sara Kuburic’s “For the rest of 2025” Instagram post - https://www.instagram.com/p/C_WjH0mzF9z/

• It’s On Me: Accept Hard Truths, Discover Yourself and Change Your Life

• by Dr. Sara Kuburic - https://amzn.to/3Uf40yf

• Dr. Sara Kuburic’s USA Today Column - https://www.usatoday.com/staff/7586635002/sara-kuburic/

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.sara-kuburic.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/millennial.therapist/?hl=en

Twitter - https://x.com/SaraKuburic

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/sarakuburic/

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In Part 2 of this episode, we push even deeper — into the personal, the creative, the brave, and the sometimes scary places we go when we dare to  tell the truth. This time, Tyler Merritt has turned the tables on Jen and he’s asking the questions! 

We talk about what it’s like to be seen, judged, misunderstood — and still choose honesty. We talk about Awake and the vulnerability involved with retelling the painful and unvarnished parts of your story. We talk about fear. And we talk about the joy we’ve found in the middle of it all. So let’s jump back in.

In this second installment:

• Jen talks about the last time that she felt truly brave and what it felt like to unearth and expose some of the most tender and personal moments of her life in such an honest and examining way

• Tyler asks Jen who was her best model of kindness at a young age

• Jen shares the song that is reflecting her current vibe in the world

• And Tyler asks Jen what she wishes more people understood about her

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• "Our stories, though they may seem new, are the things that change the world." - Jen Hatmaker

• “What I asked myself when deciding to include or exclude something was, am I going to be proud of this five years from now? So that's five years further down the road. I'm going to be five years more mature, five years more healed, five more years of distance. Will I be proud of what I say five years from now? And I let that be my guide.” – Jen Hatmaker

• “It's been weird to be at that center of people's judgment for quite a long time now.  I've evolved a lot in the public eye, which is weird for everybody. It's weird for me. It's weird for people to watch. At all points along the way, I can say sincerely, I have really and truly been trying to do my best. I just wish people knew that.” – Jen Hatmaker

• “My story is not special and I think that's what makes it important. I hope that the readers will see their own story inside of it somewhere in some way on some level and then decide to take from mine what they need for theirs. So I can't wait to find out.” – Jen Hatmaker

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Depoe Bay, Oregon – https://visittheoregoncoast.com/cities/depoe-bay/

• Awake: A Memoir by Jen Hatmaker - https://amzn.to/40MYuXs

• Jen shares the first line from Awake – https://www.instagram.com/reel/DMrDdj4sCaQ/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igsh=ZzdzZGdvM3h5Mmd6

• This Changes Everything: A Surprisingly Funny Story About Race, Cancer, Faith, and Other Things We Don’t Talk About by Tyler Merritt – https://amzn.to/4m135Oj

• Brené Brown – https://brenebrown.com/

• Before You Call The Cops by The Tyler Merritt Project – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGu_xGBekpo

• I Take My Coffee Black: Reflections on Tupac, Musical Theater, Faith, and Being Black in America by Tyler Merritt – https://amzn.to/47by9Gf

• Luna Sea Fish House in Yachats, Oregon – https://www.lunaseafishhouse.com/

• Buy My Own Drinks by Runaway June – https://open.spotify.com/track/40p6WybX0YvcLdMlLja3oL

• A Door Made for Me by Tyler Merritt – https://amzn.to/4mv4jBd

• A Long December by Counting Crows - https://open.spotify.com/track/1tjKIXd7DYNklhVSgBxREi

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://thetylermerrittproject.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/thetylermerrittproject/

Twitter - https://x.com/ttmproject

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/thetylermerrittproject

Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPB48_JfK-VMnYQPTYyMX5Q

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy.

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In Part 1, Jen and Tyler share stories from their MeCamp adventures — including a whale-watching excursion that got a little too close for comfort, and a near-death boat ride they’ll never forget. They also reflect on the power of personal storytelling, how vulnerability has shown up in their lives and work, and why telling the truth (even when it’s awkward) can be both healing and hilarious.

Discussing the impact of Tyler's viral video "Before You Call the Cops" to Jen's reflections on her upcoming book "Awake," this conversation reveals the transformative potential of embracing vulnerability. Tune in to discover how opening up about our most personal stories can not only heal us but also inspire others to see themselves in our narratives.

• Tyler talks about the most awkward moment he’s ever had because he opted to be vulnerable and honest instead of protecting his pride

• He and Jen discuss the hardest truths they’ve ever had to tell themselves

• And Tyler goes back into the annals to reveal his most embarrassing moment as a performer on stage

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “The spirit of MeCamp almost got us killed.”– Tyler Merritt

• “I'm aware that it's not every day that most people see a six foot two black man with dreadlocks crying in real life. I have never regretted a single moment in my life of being transparent about how I feel emotionally with somebody. Vulnerability has never kicked back at me in a negative way.”– Tyler Merritt

• “I think vulnerability begets vulnerability. Because I was saying who I am and I was allowing myself to be open to the world, the world was willing to take that. What it did within the black community is it allowed a lot of other black people to begin making their own videos going, before you call the cops, I just want you to know this about me. So it opened up a door of vulnerability that really allowed that to kind of echo.”– Tyler Merritt

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Depoe Bay, Oregon – https://visittheoregoncoast.com/cities/depoe-bay/

• Awake: A Memoir by Jen Hatmaker - https://amzn.to/40MYuXs

• Jen shares the first line from Awake – https://www.instagram.com/reel/DMrDdj4sCaQ/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igsh=ZzdzZGdvM3h5Mmd6

• This Changes Everything: A Surprisingly Funny Story About Race, Cancer, Faith, and Other Things We Don’t Talk About by Tyler Merritt – https://amzn.to/4m135Oj

• Brené Brown – https://brenebrown.com/

• Before You Call The Cops by The Tyler Merritt Project – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGu_xGBekpo

• I Take My Coffee Black: Reflections on Tupac, Musical Theater, Faith, and Being Black in America by Tyler Merritt – https://amzn.to/47by9Gf

• Luna Sea Fish House in Yachats, Oregon – https://www.lunaseafishhouse.com/

• Buy My Own Drinks by Runaway June – https://open.spotify.com/track/40p6WybX0YvcLdMlLja3oL

• A Door Made for Me by Tyler Merritt – https://amzn.to/4mv4jBd

• A Long December by Counting Crows - https://open.spotify.com/track/1tjKIXd7DYNklhVSgBxREi

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://thetylermerrittproject.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/thetylermerrittproject/

Twitter - https://x.com/ttmproject

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/thetylermerrittproject

Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPB48_JfK-VMnYQPTYyMX5Q

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy.

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Chris’ personal story deeply informs his bestselling novels, including We Begin at the End and our July JHBC selection, All the Colors of the Dark, resonating with readers worldwide through their authenticity and heart.

Join us as we explore his remarkable journey—from pain to page—and the healing power of storytelling.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “I didn't set out to write such a sprawling, massive book. I had a simple, top line pitch and then I began writing it and it evolved into like this just epic book.” – Chris Whitaker

• “I thought the book's probably not going to fit neatly into a genre because life never does, you know? There might be a crime in it, but it's the least interesting thing in the book. It's going to probably be a coming of age story, definitely a story of friendship, definitely a look at family and first love and, and pirates and beekeepers as well. Obviously.” – Chris Whitaker

• “I wanted everything to lead somewhere. Everything that you think is a throwaway in the story, every line that seems like it doesn't quite fit, it leads somewhere. The entire story is a network that is leading you towards the answer.” – Chris Whitaker

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Jen’s post about reading All The Colors of the Dark while on a ski trip – http://bit.ly/4kVA5qt

• We Begin at the End by Chris Whitaker - https://amzn.to/4lrONFL

• Amy Einhorn, Editor - https://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/industry-news/people/article/93078-amy-einhorn-named-fiction-publisher-at-crown.html 

• The Last Child: A Novel by John Hart - https://amzn.to/4nyXcsT

• Nita Prose, author - https://www.nitaprose.com/

• Tall Oaks by Chris Whitaker - https://amzn.to/40dYSOc

• A Prayer for Owen Meany: A Novel by John Irving - https://amzn.to/4kb8UH9

• Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow: A Novel by Gabrielled Zevin

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://sites.prh.com/chriswhitaker

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/chriswhitakerauthor/

Twitter - https://x.com/whittyauthor

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Our guest, Mary Katherine Backstrom, knows this journey well. Once rooted in evangelical certainty, her world began to unravel—her marriage, career, and faith all shaken. In her raw and hilarious memoir, Not That Wheel Jesus, MK shares what it was like to question everything, wrestle with purity culture’s impact, and walk through the grief of lost certainties.

As she puts it: “I walked through the rubble, I danced in the fire pits with my friends, and I've emerged into this quiet post-apocalyptic space where I can hear my own voice.”

Whether you’re navigating your own faith shift or just curious, this conversation will resonate. And don’t forget—you can leave us your thoughts at jenhatmaker.com/podcast!

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “Everybody I speak to that's been on a growth journey of any sort—spiritual, emotional, whatever—you get to a point where you realize that confidence comes from not knowing everything and being at peace with what you can't figure out.” – MK Backstrom

• “It felt like I was looking at my life and feeling  like there's so much loss here, especially my sexuality. My church robbed me of joy. And that's the opposite of what was promised. Once I realized I participated in that behavior, I was able to make amends.” – MK Backstrom 

• “When I walk into that [church] space, it feels like going into a home where a child experienced abuse. I don't know that that's going to leave my body for a very long time. And it doesn't mean that I'm never gonna go back, but I also listen to myself better now and I'm not going to go somewhere where my body feels like it's on fire.” – MK Backstrom

• “My body is still responding to everything it's experienced for 40 years in the church. And I'm finally getting to the place where I'm starting to understand what my baseline feels like.” – MK Backstrom

• “If there is a God worth worshiping and there's a life worth living, those things can stand up to your big questions. No God is so fragile that your human curiosity is going to break this to pieces. No problem is so big in your life that you're not gonna get up and keep moving. There's a lot of freedom after the fear. Trust the process, ask questions.” – MK Backstrom

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Holy Hot Mess: Finding God in the Details of this Weird and Wonderful Life by Mary Katherine Backstrom - https://amzn.to/3ZV5GAi

• Not That Wheel, Jesus!: Stories From a Faith That Went Off-Road in the Best (and Worst) Possible Ways by Mary Katherine Backstrom - https://amzn.to/45KbY9v

• Rachel Held Evans - https://rachelheldevans.com/

• Searching for Sunday: Loving, Leaving, and Finding the Church by Rachel Held Evans - https://amzn.to/4lxKkRY

• Dallas Willard - https://dwillard.org/

• Sarah Bessey - https://www.sarahbessey.com/

• Sex MeCourse - https://shop.jenhatmaker.com/products/sex-101

• Dr. Celeste Holbrook - https://www.drcelesteholbrook.com/

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.mkbackstrom.com/

Twitter - https://x.com/mkbackstrom

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/MKBackstrom

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@marykatherinebackstrom

Substack - https://marykatherinebackstrom.substack.com/

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy.

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Description:

We’ve got an absolute legend in the house. She's a country music powerhouse, a Grammy winner, a TV star, a best-selling cookbook author, and honestly, probably the only person who could out-sing you and out-cook you on the same day — we’re talking about the one and only Trisha Yearwood.

You know this queen’s voice from classics like 'She's in Love with the Boy' and 'How Do I Live' — songs that have made us cry, and belt in our cars, and maybe text someone we shouldn’t. And now, she’s back with a brand new album called The Mirror — and let us tell you, it’s not just a comeback, it’s a reflection, literally. It’s raw, it’s real, and it’s perhaps her most vulnerable project yet. The Mirror is Trisha’s first album where she’s co-written every song, stepping into new creative territory as both a singer and songwriter. It’s a window into Trisha’s life at this moment—a culmination of decades in the spotlight, but told on her own terms. It’s not just an album—it’s a statement of identity, and an invitation to look at yourself with courage and compassion.

We’re talking about life, love, growth, and how Trisha continues to reinvent herself while staying grounded in what matters. So grab a coffee, or something stronger, and get comfy — because Trisha and Jen are inviting us into their conversation on how we let go of the things that no longer fit who we are so we can embrace the things putting fresh wind at our backs.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “There’s something in me that really believes in me. It has to be or I wouldn't be sitting here doing these things.”– Trisha Yearwood

• “I've never been a person who could answer the question, ‘where do you see yourself in the next five years?’ I just know that I'm open to the opportunities.”– Trisha Yearwood

• “For a long time. I let the approval part of me drive the car. I drove that car to plenty of places I was out of alignment with. I don't think I'll ever be completely rid of that voice, but she's in the backseat now. She's not driving the car anymore.”– Trisha Yearwood

• “Songwriting makes you instantly intimate because you're having to be really vulnerable.”– Trisha Yearwood

• “From a young age, a lot of women are taught that we don't get to write our own story and we don't get to take control. But you get to decide what the truth about you is and how you want your life to be.”– Trisha Yearwood

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• The Mirror Album by Trisha Yearwood - https://trishayearwood.lnk.to/TheMirror

• Trisha’s Southern Kitchen on Food Network - https://www.foodnetwork.com/shows/trishas-southern-kitchen

• Dry Needling - https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/treatments/16542-dry-needling

• Frozen Shoulder in Menopause - https://bit.ly/44NNOJi

• Awake: a Memoir by Jen Hatmaker - https://amzn.to/40Og791

• Walkaway Joe - https://open.spotify.com/track/5pzoq7ggrA0GN3SMjy0NT8

• She’s in Love with a Boy - https://open.spotify.com/track/4EJvW4NHAk7TrIeX44jjXF

• The Song Remembers When - https://open.spotify.com/track/4dS7TYCTGKyhs9ZDt8iPcT

• The Bluebird Cafe - https://bluebirdcafe.com/

• TalkShopLive - https://talkshop.live/channels/trishayearwood

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.trishayearwood.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/TrishaYearwood

Twitter - https://x.com/TrishaYearwood

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/TrishaYearwood

Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCw0Nn2LTsXGB0rP53Z0ACWQ

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@itstrishayearwood

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy.

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Priyanka talks about the power of perseverance, trusting your instincts, and embracing failure as part of success. She reminds us that it's never too late to start again—and you’re always allowed to say yes to your dreams.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “There is something profoundly wonderful about blooming a little later in your story. It's never too late. Everything you've done is a foundation for what you'll do next. It might not come up for a couple of years, but you will find out eventually, that made my life richer. This made my skillset better. Like nothing is ever wasted if you're doing something you're passionate about.” – Jen Hatmaker

• “I am at a much more confident place that the insecurities of my past don’t affect me anymore.” – Priyanka Chopra 

• “Anything is a possibility. You can make a career out of anything. When I was growing up, there were like five career options – you could become a doctor, or an engineer, or a lawyer, or an accountant… But now, it’s endless. It’s such a great time for all of us with ambition and desire, no matter where you are, or what your circumstances are, to invest in your dreams.” – Priyanka Chopra Jonas

• “My feminism is equal-opportunity, the freedom to make the choices I want to make for my individual  life, just the way men have enjoyed for such a long time. That’s why its so important for us as women to talk about and normalize ambition for girls.” – Priyanka Chopra Jonas

• “I truly believe that today is my investment for tomorrow. I hope with all of the decisions that I’m taking now, and will take in the next ten years, the girl I am at that time will be happy. That’s really my quest in my life, is the pursuit of happiness. I feel joy in my job, I feel joy in home, I feel joy in my family. I feel joy in being able to create. And I just look at it as, if you’re not happy, don’t do it. Step away from it.” – Priyanka Chopra Jonas

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Ambition is a Girl’s Best Friend: Priyanka Chopra on Reconnecting with Our Dreams - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-32/ambition-is-a-girls-best-friend-priyanka-chopra-jonas-on-reconnecting-with-our-dreams/

• Unfinished by Priyanka Chopra Jonas - https://amzn.to/2Zf5ps8

• 73 Questions with Priyanka Chopra, Vogue - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dOUV2rwMr1g

• Priyanka Chopra on the For the Love podcast (Youtube) - https://youtu.be/G1k83Tx6U34

• It’s Okay To Be a Late Bloomer: Forbes Magazine’s Rich Karlgaard - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-17/its-okay-to-be-a-late-bloomer-forbes-magazines-rich-karlgaard/

• Late Bloomers: The Power of Patience in a World Obsessed with Early Achievement by Rich Karlgaard - https://amzn.to/4kvW1IC

• Miss World 2000 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miss_World_2000

Guest’s Links:

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/priyankachopra/

Twitter - https://x.com/priyankachopra

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/priyankachopra

Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/user/PriyankaChopraLive

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@priyankachopra.fp

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy.

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Key highlights from this conversation include: 

• How radical tenderness can be an act of resistance

• Why are many people living  radicalized lives without realizing it, and often for things they don't truly care about

• How homesteading is a rebellion against modern food practices

• Reimagining masculinity and what it could look like in a better world

• Building community and friendship as a vital source of joy and support in life

• How anger and joy are companion emotions

• The sacredness of everyday practices

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “I did not want to have an email job and I did not want to be in meetings that could have been emails. I did not want to be on Slack. I just didn't want that to be what I was spending my time doing. I loved caring for people, and I loved creating and writing, and I got to do that within the church world.” – David Gate

• “It's just very hard not to be cynical about everything and what I found was that I was cynical because I really, really cared. And, because I really, really cared, everything was just so overwhelming, and the easiest way to deal with that was to shut down and be cynical and be snarky. But, I realized that I had to press through and embrace what was behind that cynicism. so I had to really embrace my own earnestness and my own care in the world and concentrate on what I wanted to build rather than what I wanted to tear down.” – David Gate

• “It’s a constant battle to speak the truth. Even things we all know It can be difficult to say, if it's not something that is normally said, and it's not something that is normally expressed, so you have to fight for that and you have to fight for your experience of the truth. You have to fight for your story. You have to fight for all of that.” – David Gate

• “I think it's very, very difficult for men to reach for emotional honesty because everything tells you that you're failing if you do that. But it's the most important work right now. And so much of what men are actually looking for in this world, intimacy, a sense of place, a sense of belonging, companionship, adventure, excitement, is on the other side of reaching for that emotional honesty.” – David Gate

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• A Rebellion of Care: Poems and Essays by David Gate - https://amzn.to/4jjf87X

• Good Soil: The Education of an Accidental Farmhand by Jeff Chu - https://amzn.to/3GnS21w

• Cultivating Belonging and Evolving Faith with Jeff Chu - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-64/cultivating-belonging-and-evolving-faith-with-jeff-chu/

• Sarah Bessey - https://www.sarahbessey.com/

• Armando Veve, Illustrator - https://www.instagram.com/armandoveve/

• Awake: A Memoir by Jen Hatmaker - https://amzn.to/3YHKgpw

• Sinners film (2025) - https://www.imdb.com/title/tt31193180/

• Malaprop's Bookstore, Asheville - https://www.malaprops.com/

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.davidgatepoet.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/davidgatepoet/

Substack - https://substack.com/@davidgatepoet

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Jennie Garth is best known to Gen-Xers for her iconic role playing Kelly Taylor on the megahit television series Beverly Hills 90210.  Fans of the show may remember Kelly’s pivotal “I Choose Me” episode (airing thirty years ago this past May) when she stood between dreamboats Brandon and Dylan and declared that she was choosing herself. 

Jennie shaped an entire era of pop culture, and now, at fifty-two, she is embracing an incredible new chapter of life—one filled with bold conversations about aging, empowerment, self-love, and the beautiful messiness of midlife. Through her thought-provoking “I Choose Me” podcast and a forthcoming memoir of the same name, Jennie is using her platform to champion other women over fifty by challenging outdated narratives around aging and sparking empowering conversations.

Today, Jennie, Jen and Amy talk about what choosing yourself looks like on a normal day, and what it means to be graduate beyond our growing family years into a more independent space where a new age of self-discovery is possible because, as Jennie reminds us, choosing “you” isn’t selfish—it’s the most powerful act of self-respect.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “It was through my conversations with fans, whether it was on social media. or at autograph events that I kept hearing, ‘I didn't know I could choose me until Kelly Taylor told me it was an option.’” – Jennie Garth

• “If I had gone to college and lived a normal life, then I would have learned things that I didn't actually end up learning until I was in my forties and fifties. So now I'm just searching like, ‘What did I miss and how can I be better? How can I learn more about myself?’” – Jennie Garth

• “You look around on social media and you see other people's lives and think, ‘My God, they have it all figured out.’ And I just never felt like that personally.” – Jennie Garth

• “Loving yourself is a journey and it’s imperative to your wellbeing.” – Jennie Garth

• “I don’t want to please people by being what they want me to be or fitting into this character's shoes. I love acting and I'll never not love acting. But I had to take the bull by the horns and take control of my life.” – Jennie Garth

• “Competition amongst women was real. It was just part of the  world I grew up in. I had to be better than the next girl. What a waste of so much precious time and energy. I used to be intimidated by other women's success or knowledge or position. I kick myself for all the years of lost opportunity of that kind of camaraderie and connection with other women. I feel it so strongly now. It's something that can never be quieted again,” – Jennie Garth

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Beverly Hills, 90210 (1990-2000) - https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0098749/

• Tori Spelling - https://www.instagram.com/p/DKAANczu145/?hl=en

• I Choose Me Women’s Summit 2025 - https://jenniegarth.com/pages/i-choose-me-movement

• I Choose Me: Chasing Joy, Finding Purpose & Embracing Reinvention by Jennie Garth - https://amzn.to/44d8eMM

• Me by Jennie Garth QVC Collection - https://jenniegarth.com/pages/me-by-jennie-garth

• Feeding America - https://www.feedingamerica.org/partners/entertainment-council/jennie-garth

• American Heart Association - https://www.heart.org/en/health-topics/at-the-heart-of-it-with-nancy-brown/the-power-of-positivity-with-jennie-garth

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://jenniegarth.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/jenniegarth/

Twitter - https://x.com/jenniegarth

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/jenniegarth

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@officialjenniegarth

Podcast - https://jenniegarth.com/pages/i-choose-me-podcast

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. 

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

As a former TV producer turned novelist, Sophie Cousens’ books have been published in over 20 languages. Her previous novels—including This Time Next Year and Before I Do—have delighted readers around the world with their warmth, humor, and honest portrayal of love in all its messy, beautiful forms.

Today, we sit down with Sophie to discuss her decade of experience producing some of our favorite TV shows like The Graham Norton Show and Big Brother and how that valuable experience behind the scenes in television shaped the way she now tells stories as a novelist, allowing her to thread the needle between heartfelt and funny, heartwarming and satirical. We talk about her approach to writing—does she prefer to start with a character or a plot?--as well as how she brilliantly employs a variety of  familiar rom-com setups (friends-to-lovers, missed connections, etc.) yet, they never feel overt or cliché.

If you’ve ever tried to date post-divorce, juggled motherhood with figuring out who the heck you even are anymore, or questioned whether love in your 40s is even worth it—you’re going to enjoy today’s conversation about our June JHBC selection, Is She Really Going Out With Him?  With nods to fairy tales, dating apps, and the iconic Joe Jackson song that inspired the title, the book asks: how do you start over when you’re not 22 anymore—and how do you know when it’s real?

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “I’ve been a producer on shows that were much more produced—you've got a script, you've got a plan, you know exactly what you're getting; whereas with [Big Brother] we were just dealing with real people and real people's emotions and the experience of being in this slight madhouse.” – Sophie Cousens

• “Tropes are enduring because they are beloved. Sometimes, that word has a negative connotation but, in this case, it’s not true. These are story tropes that readers love. I love how you talk about them and go, no, I’m not going to steer away from them or try to reinvent them or try to avoid them. I’m going to go full-in.” – Jen Hatmaker

• “I absolutely love films of that 90s and 2000s era. That’s very much the tone in which I write. I think there’s something pure and simple about that era of films, which is why so many of them are enduring.” – Sophie Cousens

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Russel Howard’s Good News - https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00phwkz

• The Graham Norton Show - https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006xnzc

• Big Brother - https://www.cbs.com/shows/big_brother/

• Notting Hill (1999) - https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0125439/

• Bridget Jones’s Diary by Helen Fielding - https://amzn.to/4dJsJ6y

• Just Haven’t Met You Yet by Sophie Cousens - https://amzn.to/45IC4tt

• And Then There Was You by Sophie Cousens COMING NOVEMBER 2025 - https://amzn.to/3Fq5SR4

• Romy and Michelle’s High School Reunion (1997)  - https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120032/

• Claudia Jessie (Eloise Bridgerton) - https://www.instagram.com/claudiajessies/?hl=en

• Atmosphere: A Love Story by Taylor Jenkins Reid - https://amzn.to/4mYRzUk

• Great, Big, Beautiful Life by Emily Henry - https://amzn.to/43IRYTp

• Julia Whelan, audio narrator - https://jmwhelan.com/narrator/

• The Husbands: A Novel by Holly Gramazio - https://amzn.to/4dQnNx5

• Holly Bourne, author - https://hollybourne.co.uk/

Guest’s Links:

Website - https://www.sophiecousens.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/sophie_cousens/

Twitter - https://x.com/sophiecous

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/sophiecousensauthor

Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/

Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/

Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker

The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy.

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Bishop Budde gained national attention for boldly speaking out against the Trump administration, including condemning the 2020 photo-op at St. John’s Episcopal Church and, more recently, offering a prayer for LGBTQ+ justice with President Trump and Vice President Vance seated before her. Her calm, courageous leadership has made her one of the most trusted voices in public faith today.

In this conversation with Jen, Bishop Budde shares her journey from a small Minnesota congregation to the national stage—and how she finds the courage to speak truth to power and stand with the marginalized, even when the cost is high.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “I think, in some ways, vocations choose you as much as you choose them.” – Mariann Edgar Budde

• “It's not as if the world stopped on January 21st. So much is happening every single day and there are consequences to the decisions being made.” – Mariann Edgar Budde