The Red Tent Living Podcast

We close season four with Tracy and Katy modeling what conversation during a Red Tent Dinner can look like. In this conversation, Katy shares a story about bearing witness, and Tracy engages the story from her own life as well. With a special look at what it looks like to grow community deeply and organically, this episode shows how meaningful conversation can unfold organically through a Red Tent...

Most of us carry stories that feel painful, if not impossible, to speak aloud. Stories we fear no one would believe. Stories where we or someone we loved experienced pronounced harm or betrayal. Stories that changed us forever.  What does it mean to live after a story of harm has happened?  In this special episode, Katy and Tracy reflect on the impact of stories of harm that they have na...

Far too few women feel invited to speak freely about menopause and the changes they experience in their 40s, 50s, and 60s. In this episode, Tracy Johnson and Jamie Schaub go all the places you've wondered about: offering helpful context, personal stories, and encouraging support for women wondering if there is a better, kinder way to love their bodies as they age. It's an episode not to miss! For...

Author Christy Bauman shares with Tracy and Katy from her latest work, Her Rites , about the rite of legacy. While many of us have received traditions passed down from our mothers and grandmothers, far fewer have intentional language about the meaning behind those acts and traditions. Together, Christ, Katy, and Tracy reflect on the legacies they have inherited and the ones they long to intentiona...

In this rare sister-episdoe, Katy and Allison, swap stories of different seasons in their life when they knew it was time to embrace an ending, but they felt unsure of what awaited them on the other side. In their own words, they find language for the risks they each chose to take and the way they navigated closing a sweet and familiar season they didn't want to leave, per se, but knew they had ou...

"Sorrow is the key to life," says Becky Allender. In this episode, Becky and Sandhya Oaks reflect on the nature of sorrow, the role it has in our lives, and the beauty we find because we are willing to engage the darker and more painful elements of our lives. Join Becky and Sandhya in this wide ranging conversation on living more fully thanks to the bravery of grief.  For more stories from br...

Kindred Spirits and fellow writers for Red Tent Living, Rachel Blackston and Susan Tucker take time to ponder seasons on endings, specifically in the context of motherhood. From a story shared about the ending of childhood and start of the adolescent era to a longer look at the seasons of parting with a child as they embrace their adult independance, Rachel and Susan not only find language for the...

Tracy Johnson and Beth Bruno have both spent years pouring their passion and hearts into full time ministry, and both ultimately made the choice to leave that work behind. Together, they reflect on their initial call to ministry, why they left, and the life they have found in their vocations since. A conversation full of heart, hope, grief and growth, Tracy and Beth honor the seasons of ministry a...

Surprising, poignant, and creative, Sandhya and Susan share a conversation together about practices of gratitude they have woven into the rhythms of their lives thanks to friendship. From the sacredness of a dinner table to a courageous game practiced 30,000 feet in the air, these women shine a light on the ways we can all grow more present, more thankful, and more connected to the people around u...

Does all great art flow from suffering? Does the act of creating inherently bring suffering in its wake? How do we navigate the pain and beauty of creation? In this episode Katy Stafford and Cathy Loerzel reflect on their creative endeavors, from the most significant to the most mundane. Together, they ponder, "What does it cost us to create?" While also exploring why they keep creating even when...

This week, we're taking a moment to pause from our episodes on gratitude and journal on the places where life is good. This brief reflection with Katy is intended to ground you in the blessings of your life exactly as it stands today. Enjoy! For more stories from brave, ordinary women, join us at Red Tent Living .

When it comes to living with gratitude, no one brings more wisdom to the Red Tent Living community than our beloved matriarch, Mary Jane Hamilton. Together, Mary Jane and Tracy reflect on the power of a practice of gratitude: from helping us see goodness in the day-to-day to instilling a sense of confidence and peace in the face of loss. As Mary Jane and Tracy speak on navigating different kinds o...

We kick off season 4 with this sweet, New Year's reflection between Katy and Tracy as they process relationships coming to a close and relationships being birthed, all through the lens of gratitude. With a focus on embracing our own humanity and leaning into our shortcomings and the hard moments, Katy and Tracy look for the ordinary magic that makes the day to day worth living.  Join us for t...

It's Christmas Eve and our time of advent is drawing to a close as we turn our hearts and minds to the arrival of Jesus and celebrate light breaking forth in the darkness. This week, Tracy and Katy reflect on God as love, pondering how the Christmas Season invites us to remember that Love is With US and to risk extending love.  For this is the story of Christmas: that God chose to embody love...

When it comes to the thin spaces of our lives where we are laboring to birth life,  it's difficult to overstate the power of a midwife, or wise woman, who has walked the journey before us and can offer her hope, peace, and courage along the way. For this week of advent, Katy and Tracy discuss the places where they have labored for life, and needed the guidance of another woman and where they...

“Carrying” life of any kind is a personal journey for each life bearer. As we carry life within us, nurturing it until it is ready to be born into this world, we come to understand our motivations, our hopes, our fears, and our purpose in new ways. The same was true for Mary. For the second week of Advent, Katy and Tracy reflect on what carrying life meant to Mary, what shalom looks like in the wo...

Welcome to the first week of Advent. This is a season of waiting and anticipation: a season of leaning into the hope that God is with us and God comes to us again and again. In the coming month, Katy and Tracy reflect on what advent means for us today. Inspired by Mary's journey as a pregnant mother, we examine advent through the various stages of carrying and birthing life into the world (whether...

This week, Eliza and Haley reflect on their individual journeys to embracing their call to spiritual leadership as women of color. Together, Eliza and Haley bring wisdom and grace as they share stories of navigating spaces where they have not always been welcomed or celebrated. And, they give perspective on how to keep showing up with courage, clarity, and truth, no matter the context where you ar...

To be human is to have a body. We each negotiate our relationships with our bodies: at times fraught, and at times more self-accepting. Mother/Daughter Duo Tracy and Katy reflect on their own relationships with their bodies, particularly in their current seasons of post-menopause and pregnancy. Together, they approach their bodies with curiosity and gratitude. Join them for a different kind of con...

Most of us who have attended or are attending church regularly have faced questions and tensions about what it means to be a part of a body of Christian believers. Churches are spaces filled with diverse opinions and convictions about what it means to follow Jesus well and who belongs at the table of God. At their best, these diverse opinions serve to refine love for one another with gentleness an...

Motherhood is a journey, unfolding with lessons and transformations as we care for our children and grow into the parents they need. Together, Tracy and Lyndsey reflect on their own journeys of motherhood and how profoundly their ideas of motherhood have shifted from when they initially embarked on that road to the way they mother today. Tearful, hilarious, and tender, join  this candid conve...

How often do we think of bravery as the courage to "go and do" when in reality it often takes just as much courage to choose to stay put? Therapists and mothers, Heather and Rachel share stories with each other of courageous moments when they chose to stay put. Mindful of the care they offer themselves and the stories they live out in front of their children, these two women consider the less obvi...

What are rituals and why do they matter in our everyday lives? Host Tracy Johnson sits down with therapist and ritual maker Heather Stringer to explore to power of rituals in drawing us into the present, helping us mark moments of significance, and orienting the people we love toward what's happening in our lives. Challenging our preconceptions of ritual, Tracy and Heather share a heartfelt and em...

In this conversation therapist and advocate Danielle Castillejo connects with host Katy Stafford to consider how we best show solidarity for one another. Bridging their own experiences (and missteps) along their journeys of honoring difference, engaging culture and race, and owning their own impact, Katy and Danielle reflect on how solidarity begins with engaging your own story truthfully. Tune in...

The gift of a lifelong friendship is a rare and precious gift. This week, host Tracy Johnson and special guest Becky Allender reflect on two of their longest friendships together. With a poignant conversation that touches themes of loyalty, memory, laughter, and also grief, Tracy and Becky practice gratitude for the women who have enriched their lives over decades. Join us for a sacred conversatio...