A Braver Way

How do you get through a midterm season this tense with your integrity intact, whatever the results bring? Moni and April Lawson, your politically red and blue co-hosts, bring a survival guide: practical, evidence-backed tips for the anxiety, distrust, and exhaustion so many of us are carrying into this election. Don’t go it alone, whether in victory, defeat, or uncertainty. Decide who you&r...

Left and right agree on one thing: something’s broken in the news. So what would it take for journalism to serve *everyone* in a divided time? Moni asks two friends and partners in good trouble who’ve spent years on that question: Joy Mayer, founder of Trusting News, and Jonathan Stray, a data journalist turned conflict scholar at UC Berkeley. Together they go where journalists rarely...

How do you fight hard against someone *and* still care for them? In Republican Mesa, Arizona, Julie Spilsbury was known for her council seat and her cinnamon rolls. When she endorsed Democrats, friends and neighbors who’d known her for decades launched a historic effort to kick her out of office. The man leading it did what few others would: sit down with her and talk. In this special episod...

What do we owe each other when we can’t stand each other? Recorded live at the Braver Angels Convention 2026 — in front of 1,000 people split evenly between red and blue — this episode brings that key question to a renowned civic scholar whose work gives Moni the most hope. Yuval Levin of the American Enterprise Institute has a surprising answer to what's really threatening the c...

What do you do when someone on your own side lets you down — or a family member says their politics are “none of your business”? In our second mailbox episode, Mónica and producer Jessica Jones tackle listener questions about whether America’s founding was a failure to bridge, how to recognize our own blind spots, and what Mónica’s parents really think o...

Researcher Jaime Settle has found that just anticipating a political conversation with someone who disagrees can send your heart rate soaring — sometimes by as much as it rises during a panic attack. Will this damage a relationship? Will I be judged? Is it safer to hide what I believe? Those calculations happen fast, often pointing you toward the exit. So what does it take to make the riskie...

Moni is liberal. Travis Tripodi is conservative libertarian. Much of what he supports terrifies her… and vice versa. But when Trump returned in 2025, they knew they had to talk. In a new A Braver Way experiment, the two friends let you in on what’s become a critical exercise: bringing each other the headlines that bother them most, saying what they really believe, and having it out. T...

In this special episode, Mónica and producer Jessica Jones explore questions from curious listeners about fear, family conflict, patriotism when we’re so at odds, and the unforeseeable ways we come to believe what we believe. Also on deck: Advice to a mom caught in a political rift between father and son, what happens when Moni loses her temper, and bridging tips from Mother Nature. W...

“Happiness” is the last thing many of us expect to find on a call with a stranger from the opposite political side. But when Axel Bouchon and his team placed one very unusual phone booth in deeply liberal San Francisco, California, and another in deeply conservative Abilene, Texas, that was exactly what they were hoping to spark.  Bouchon, a neuroscientist driven to understand our...

Anne Marie Denman was the “angel” of the family: obedient, attentive, with plans to become a nun. When she came out as gay to her conservative Catholic parents, a deep rupture drove them apart. How do you stay close to people who won’t share your worldview? Can love exist while someone feels rejected? And can you invest in the relationship without condoning the other’s conv...

For most of human history, offensive speech was equal to violence, and saying the wrong thing could get your tongue chopped off. Today, we aim to use words instead of violence. But what do you do when those words really hurt? This week on  A Braver Way , Moni sits down with Greg Lukianoff, who she fondly calls “the free speech guy.” Greg is an attorney, author and president of the...

With political tensions at a new peak, the pressure to take a stand — or keep the peace — can be intense. But how do you know the difference between the move that feels right and the one that is right? In our first episode after a long break, Mónica, a liberal, talks with her conservative friend and fellow bridge builder April Lawson about what it takes to know what’s trul...

Two weeks after the 2024 election, left-right tensions are through the roof. In this special “Ask Us Anything” episode, a cross-partisan panel of Trump and Harris voters take on a fiery handful of YOUR toughest questions about how in the world we bridge political divides from here… just in time for the holidays. Join host Moni, April, and our special guests — Angel Eduardo, Shira Hoffer, and Travi...

Remember Election Day — before we knew the outcome and we were all on pins and needles, worried about what might happen if the other side won?  On that day, dozens of pairs of Trump and Harris voters stood outside polling places in different parts of the country, shoulder to shoulder with their political opposites. With half our country in pain, and the other half feeling relief, what can we learn...

How can you navigate this election with integrity? No matter who wins… no matter what? In this special election week episode, Moni and April roll out a survival guide that lends wisdom to all this anxiety. Drawing inspiration from A Braver Way guests like somatic therapist Luis Mojica, trans activist Kai Cheng Thom, conservative podcast host Wilk Wilkinson, and many more, your politically red and...

Many Americans expect bitterness and mistrust between Democrats and Republicans on Election Day. Here’s something they won’t expect: hundreds of everyday liberals and conservatives pairing off at polling places nationwide to try to show voters — and themselves — that whoever wins, our union can’t lose. What’s motivating these Trump and Harris voters to stand side-by-side in front of anxious voters...

It’s easy to feel overwhelmed by the flood of election headlines and opinions. But does following the news have to drive us crazy…or drive us even further apart? Mónica talks with Isaac Saul, the founder of Tangle — a political newsletter that’s earned trust across the political spectrum — to ask how we the people can take control of our news habits for a clearer, less polarizing view of the campa...

It might have been the prayer, the land acknowledgment, the Pledge of Allegiance, or the moment everyone started sharing their pronouns. But opening rituals that disagree with you can leave you feeling shut out. So what do you do when the culture of a group you want to belong to goes somewhere you can’t follow? We talk with Braver Angels leader Steve Saltwick about the clashes that come up for con...

How do you talk across the political divide with someone who might exclude you, fear you, or even believe you shouldn’t exist? And what if it’s your beliefs that seem to paint someone else out of the picture? Award-winning writer, performer, and trans activist Kai Cheng Thom has wrestled with these questions in a more visceral way than most… and in a more universal way than you might expect. Kai s...

Who is responsible for building the future we deserve? For making sure that no matter who wins the presidential election, our country won’t lose? With so many liberals and conservatives  believing that defeat on their side would spell disaster and despair,  Moni — with a little help from American Enterprise Institute Senior Fellow Yuval Levin and Washington Post columnist Amanda Ripley — makes the...

Getting mad can get results… or get way out of hand. So when everything’s an outrage, how do you navigate your political anger? After 9/11, our guest Wilk Wilkinson found himself incensed by the other side and sinking into a personal crisis. The host of the Derate the Hate podcast shares how he took charge of his anger before it took charge of him. Then, April and Mónica trade notes on the cycles...

“It didn’t turn into a fight!” When a family relationship takes a political hit, recovery can be rocky, and every little step counts. So how do you take the first one? We share five real stories from families who have taken risks and seen results — including one where recovery came just in time, and another ongoing struggle where the virtue in highest demand is patience.   See omnystudio.com/liste...

This week, we’re going to re-share the most personally vulnerable interview Mónica’s recorded for this podcast. As the election creeps closer and closer, we’re hearing daily from listeners who struggle to talk politics with family on the other side. In this special episode first aired in season 1, Mónica — a liberal — joins the two people she’s argued with most — her conservative parents — for a c...

If you want to push for change in politics, it can feel like you have to choose either activism or dialogue. But what if that’s a false choice? Following up on last week’s conversation with Shira Hoffer, a Jewish rising senior building bridges at Harvard, we hear from Jadd Hashem, a student leading Arab-Israeli dialogue at the University of Texas at Austin who is also a proud Palestinian-American...

If you’re strongly on one side of a high-stakes issue — like the conflict in Israel and Gaza — why should you listen to the other? And if you don’t know where you fall, or even what to think, how do you begin to learn without inviting attack? As a Harvard undergrad, our guest Shira Hoffer started an anonymous text hotline after October 7 that gives people of all perspectives a non-judgmental place...