Thinking Out Loud | Kimberly

EP26: Would You Love Me If I Was a Worm? What are we really asking for when we say we want a “ride or die”?  Is it loyalty?  Or is it the hope that someone will stay beside us when life becomes heavy, messy, painful, or lonely?  In this deeply personal episode, Kimberly explores loneliness, emotional exhaustion, grief, friendship, unconditional support, trauma, and the human need to feel emotional...

EP25: You Communicate Someone into Caring What if healthy communication isn’t actually about saying things perfectly?  In this episode, Kimberly explores the pressure many people feel to communicate “correctly” in order to deserve being heard. From overexplaining and emotional self-erasure to boundaries, accountability, emotional capacity, and the difference between honesty and impulsivity—this co...

EP24: 80/20 in Relationships What happens when a relationship slowly stops feeling emotionally safe? Most relationships don't fall apart overnight. The shift is often gradual—a little less consistency, a little more tension, a little more uncertainty. Until one day, you realize you're spending more energy managing the relationship than enjoying it. In this episode, Kimberly explores the idea of th...

In this episode Kimberly talks with Audra Phelps — coach, former LDS member, and mom — about the messy, courageous work of disentangling faith, identity, and family life. Audra shares her journey leaving the Mormon Church, how she rebuilt community and purpose, and practical tools for emotional regulation, boundary-setting, and deciding what to keep or let go. Whether you’re questioning, staying,...

EP23: When Life Gives You Lemons… Now What? “When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.” But what happens when you don’t want lemonade? What happens when the lemons represent grief, infertility, disappointment, burnout, loss, or a life that didn’t turn out the way you imagined? In this episode, Kimberly explores the pressure to “look on the bright side” and how resilience has slowly become confuse...

EP22: Mom Shaming   “Should we bring mom shaming back?”  It’s a question that’s been showing up more and more online—usually from people carrying real pain from childhood. But does shame actually create better parenting… or just better hiding?  In this episode, Kimberly explores the difference between accountability, punishment, and projection. She talks about the emotional weight mothers carry, t...

EP21: Breaking the Cycle of Harm   When does understanding become enabling?  In this episode, Kimberly explores the difficult space between compassion and accountability. What happens when someone’s harmful behavior becomes a pattern instead of a mistake? And how do we hold empathy for people’s pain without ignoring the impact they leave behind?  Through personal reflection, parenting experiences,...

EP20: With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility What does power actually reveal about people? In this episode of Thinking Out Loud , Kimberly explores how power shapes relationships, parenting, family systems, race, religion, mental health, and personal accountability. From childhood experiences of emotional imbalance to the realities of adulthood and parenting, this episode reflects on how powe...

Episode 19: Respect is a Feeling, Not an Action What happens when respect becomes a weapon instead of a virtue? In this episode of Thinking Out Loud, Kimberly navigates the complexities surrounding the concept of respect and how it often gets misconstrued in our interactions. She challenges the notion that respect is simply an action to be given or earned and argues instead that it is a profound f...

Episode 18: Stitching Yourself Back Up   How do you begin to heal after recognizing the toxicity that shaped your identity?  In this continuation of the journey on Thinking Out Loud, Kimberly explores the aftermath of breaking free from harmful relationships and the complex emotions that follow. She grapples with the feelings of grief for the connections lost and the version of herself that felt c...

Episode 17: Death By a Thousand Cuts   What happens when you realize that the relationships meant to support you have instead imprisoned you?  In this episode of Thinking Out Loud, Kimberly delves into the painful journey of acknowledging the emotional manipulation that kept her tethered to a toxic relationship. She reflects on the moment of clarity that shattered the illusion of being "the proble...

EP16: When the Story Stops at “I Changed” What happens when someone changes—but never repairs the harm they caused?  In this episode of Thinking Out Loud , Kimberly explores the difference between growth and accountability, and why they aren’t the same thing. While people can evolve and build healthier patterns over time, that growth doesn’t automatically address the impact they had on the people...

EP15: Me Too – And the Silence After   Trigger warning: This episode discusses sexual assault and its emotional aftermath.   What happens when you don’t just survive the assault—but the silence that follows?   In this deeply personal episode, Kimberly shares her experience with sexual assault, the confusion that came after, and the long, painful process of recognizing what actually happened. But m...

EP14: When “Sorry” Isn’t Enough Have you ever had someone apologize…  and somehow it felt like you were the one expected to move on immediately?  Like the apology came with unspoken rules:  don’t bring it up again,  don’t hold a grudge,  don’t make it uncomfortable.  In this episode, I’m breaking down the difference between acknowledgment and true accountability—and why they’re not the same thing....

EP13: Remember Who the Enemy Is It feels like war is always around the corner lately… but is it really inevitable?  Or are we missing something bigger?  In this episode, I explore the patterns behind conflict—looking at history, human behavior, and even The Hunger Games —to ask a deeper question:  are we fighting the right enemy… or just the easiest one to name?  From propaganda and power to fear,...

EP 12: Who’s the Problem… or What’s the Problem? Instead of asking “who’s the problem?”… what if we asked a different question?  What if the goal isn’t to assign blame, but to understand what’s actually happening underneath the conflict?  In this episode, we sit with that uncomfortable in-between space — where things are not black and white, where emotions are real but so are patterns, and where c...

EP11: Love Without Repair Conflict doesn’t end relationships.  What ends them is the lack of repair.  In this episode, we sit with the uncomfortable truth that every relationship will have conflict — but not every relationship will have repair. And that difference changes everything.  Because when conflict happens without acknowledgment, accountability, or change… it doesn’t disappear. It lingers....

EP10: The Space Between Knowing and Questioning What if the most honest thing you could say right now is:  “I don’t fully know what I believe anymore.”  In this episode of Thinking Out Loud , Kimberly explores what happens when certainty starts to crack—and whether that’s actually a problem, or the beginning of something deeper.  Through reflections on family, faith, systems, identity, and persona...

EP9: Both Can Be True Why do we act like caring about both sides means standing for nothing?  In this episode of Thinking Out Loud, Kimberly reflects on the growing pressure to pick a side—and what gets lost when we reduce complex issues into teams.  We’re often taught that conviction means certainty. That if you’re not fully for something, you must be against it. But real life doesn’t always fit...

EP8: When Loyalty Becomes Self-Abandonment At what point does loyalty stop being love—and start becoming self-abandonment?  In this episode of Thinking Out Loud, Kimberly reflects on the quiet ways loyalty can shift from connection into imbalance—especially within family and long-standing relationships.  We’re often taught that staying, enduring, and holding on is what love looks like. But what ha...

EP7: What If Health Isn’t About Purity? What if health isn’t about purity—but about balance?  In this episode of Thinking Out Loud, Kimberly reflects on how the conversation around food and health has become increasingly driven by fear, extremes, and the pressure to “get it right.”  From labels like “toxic” and “clean” to constantly shifting rules about what we should or shouldn’t eat, it’s easy t...

EP6: When Labels Start Replacing People When did labels stop describing us—and start replacing us?  In this episode of Thinking Out Loud, Kimberly reflects on how quickly we sort people into categories, assumptions, and sides—and what gets lost when we do.  In a world that often pushes for certainty and quick judgments, labels can feel like shortcuts to understanding. But they can also create dist...

EP5: Middle Ground Does Not Mean Moral Neutrality What if middle ground thinking isn’t about staying neutral—but about knowing exactly where your line is?  In this episode of Thinking Out Loud, Kimberly explores the tension between nuance and accountability in a world that often pushes us toward extremes.  Taking time to understand context doesn’t mean lowering your standards. Listening doesn’t me...

EP4: Survival Isn’t a Character Flaw in Motherhood Why do we judge mothers for the ways they survive? In this episode of Thinking Out Loud , Kimberly reflects on how quickly survival choices in motherhood—feeding, birth, recovery, and daily coping—are turned into judgments about character instead of being understood in context. Motherhood isn’t lived in perfect conditions. It’s lived in exhaustion...

EP3: Most Of What Upsets Us Isn’t Personal — It’s Unexamined Meaning What if most of what upsets us isn’t actually personal? In this episode of Thinking Out Loud , Kimberly reflects on how often our reactions come from the meaning we assign to situations rather than the situations themselves. From traffic frustrations to social invitations, rejection, and the pressure to say the “right” thing, man...