We Can Do Hard Things

1. The two disagreements between Brandi and Glennon that started, and cemented, their friendship. 2. Brandi’s lifelong quest to continuously “calibrate” herself so that her outsides are in tune with her insides. 3. The trait Brandi loves most about Catherine—and the sticky note on Glennon’s desk with the same message.  About Brandi: Brandi Carlile is a six-time GRAMMY Award-winning singer, songwri...

1. How do we make a new thing with our life? 2. What is your fingerprint on the world? 3. Who does history try to erase and why? 4. What does pain do to our bodies? 5 .What is our capacity for transformation? About ALOK: ALOK (they/them) is an internationally acclaimed writer, performer, and public speaker. As a mixed-media artist their work explores themes of trauma, belonging, and the human cond...

“The days that I feel most beautiful are the days that I am most afraid.” “What feminine part of yourself did you have to destroy in order to survive in this world?” “Why have we been taught to fear the very things that can set us free?” About ALOK:  ALOK (they/them) is an internationally acclaimed writer, performer, and public speaker. As a mixed-media artist their work explores themes of trauma,...

1. Amanda shares the story of Séamus, the newest addition to her family–and how he has ruined her “religion” of the spreadsheet.  2. Why Glennon says that Honey and Hattie are the only “people” who truly understand her–and what each of them teach her about love. 3. The ways we hilariously project emotions onto our pets–and how Abby has fallen for Tish’s pet hamster, Biscuit.

For their first (of hopefully many) podcast double dates, Abby and Glennon sit down with the icons, activists, and Olympians Megan Rapinoe and Sue Bird. In this honest and hilarious conversation, we find out: 1. The delightfully awkward moment Megan and Sue first met; 2. What’s hard for each of them right now; 3. The boundaries they’re working on together; 4. How they communicate and deal with jea...

Today, Glennon, Abby, and Amanda continue their conversation about Glennon’s eating disorder relapse and the Next Right Thing for their family.    CW // eating disorders

Today, Glennon shares about her recent eating disorder relapse.   If talk about eating disorders and mental illness helps: Listen today.   If it triggers: Skip today.     CW // eating disorders

1. Glennon explains her “soundaries”—and why a lack of audiorial yield in public places is her biggest peeve. 2. Abby’s struggle, as a bonus parent, adjusting to a kid-filled life with zero personal space and personal property boundaries. 3. Why Amanda is allergic to the word “fine”—and why she’s stopped saying “I didn’t have time.”

1. Glennon reenacts her first emotional and hilarious email exchange with Sarah Paulson about the Untamed TV show.    2. Sarah contemplates how she will prepare for the role of Glennon–and why she’s “never been more excited about anything truly ever. ” 3. Glennon, Sarah and Abby discuss who will play Abby–and how they will recreate the “There She Is” moment.  About Sarah:  Sarah Paulson’s acting w...

1. Why it’s important to prioritize our own needs, wants, and feelings–and how that creates freedom and peace for those we love. 2. What Glennon says was the hardest thing about telling her kids that Craig and she were getting a divorce–and how truth telling frees us all. 3. Martha’s helpful strategy for how to choose freedom over fear when we’re faced with a tough decision. About Martha: Dr. Mart...

1. How do we tap back into living by our inner compass after living by consensus and following outer voices for so long?  2. What Martha said to Glennon and Abby when they told her they were in love but scared to move forward—and how that advice changed their lives.  3. How to make a plan to cultivate joy when it feels like you are army-crawling through life.   About Martha: Dr. Martha Beck is a N...

1. How chronic social isolation throughout the pandemic has impacted our friendships–and why that’s affecting our mental health and cravings for connection. 2. Glennon, Amanda, and Abby each make a Next Right Thing plan for prioritizing friendship in their lives. 3. How we grieve a friendship ending when there’s no cultural template or ritual to acknowledge that deep loss.

1. Why the connection of friendship is emerging as the single best thing for your wellness—and three things that define a healthy friendship. 2. How friendship has changed for Abby since retiring from soccer—and why Glennon fears commitment in friendships more than other relationships. 3. How to recognize ambivalent relationships—and why they can be just as bad for us as toxic ones. CW // eating d...

1. The simple exercises Laurie conducts with her students at Yale to help them reset their brains and restructure their days in order to access happiness.   2. Why being “time famished” is one of the most common obstacles to happiness, the signals our bodies give us that we are starved of unstructured time, and what we can do to build more of it.   3. How understanding that our brains are wired as...

1. One easy thing we can do to increase our happiness by 1% when we’re feeling tired and overwhelmed. 2. Our misconception that happiness is about our circumstances–the next promotion, the new relationship–and the reality that often people with fantastic circumstances are miserable. 3. Why our emotions flow directly from our thoughts–and how we can improve our wellbeing by changing our mind’s inte...

1. How do we build a squad of friends–people we can trust our truth and imperfection with, and who take responsibility for one another’s care? 2. How to know when it’s time to let a friendship go–and how we release one another without the hard feelings.   3. Why when we have a problem trusting others, it sometimes has to do with a lack of trust in ourselves.    4. Why Luvvie says her friends have...

1. A hilarious, profound take on judging people, and why Luvvie’s telling the world–and has often told Glennon–to: “Fix your face.” 2. How to prepare for hard conversations with those we love–including the lists Luvvie brings to those talks that help keep her calm and vulnerable. 3. The importance of sitting with the fear behind the questions: “Who am I when I am not giving something to somebody?”...

1. What if we stop trying to figure out whether our feelings and intuition are “right” or “wrong”– and instead, just acknowledge them as real–and move toward them? 2. How Glennon is experiencing a little shift in peace, joy, and non-reactivity through her newfound relationship with meditation. 3. Why a lot of our suffering exists in the space between the Knowing and the Doing–and how life is at it...

1. Why do we spend our lives trying to become what our culture ascribes as “good” only to burn ourselves out, wake up, and realize: I thought it would all be more beautiful than this? 2. Why Glennon says that stillness has been her greatest teacher–and how she was able to find it in her most rock bottom moments.  3. How listening for and committing to the next right thing then leads us to the next...

1. What we should STOP saying to people who are struggling—and what to say, or do, instead.  2. How Kate received the support she needed because people were willing to embarrass themselves in their attempts to show up—and why we shouldn’t be scared of doing it wrong. 3. Kate offers some words to a Pod Squader feeling anticipatory grief—and how to accept that we can’t always make it okay for the pe...

1. Kate describes the overwhelming feeling of love—not anger—that she felt when she was sure she was near death.  2. Why it’s time we throw out expressions like “Everything is possible” and “What doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger,” and rewrite our cultural cliches.  3. Why Kate delights in celebrating the holidays—and how to survive the holiday season when there’s grief and loss and fear in all...

1. What if we deleted the picture in our head of how it’s “supposed to be,” and looked at “what is” right now, as enough? 2. What makes a good apology–and why we shouldn't pretend that it is possible to reorder what we did to people. 3. Glennon describes “the ache”–and how it’s really love, coming and going, and making life more beautiful.

1. Glennon, Abby, and Amanda share how opening up and being vulnerable on the podcast has changed their lives.  2. What your preparation style says about your personality—and how some people bring their “magic” while others bring index cards.  3. Abby recalls “the biggest bomb of her life”—and why she was nervous to join Glennon and Amanda on We Can Do Hard Things.

1. Why Ashley says we have to talk about what hurts if we’re ever going to heal. 2. Glennon asks Ashley about the power of apologizing—and why Ashley says we must begin apologizing to the people we love. 3. How many of us are really good at loving other people, but often struggle to let ourselves be loved. 4. Why Ashley says that nothing has ever given her more peace and power than knowing that sh...

1. How to find a way to live in peace: to actually love complicated parents without compromising our love for ourselves. 2. How we can’t change our past—and why Ashley says that forgiveness is accepting the fact that the past is never going to be different. 3. The importance of being able to hold two truths at the same time: that, for some of us, our parents did the best they could—and it wasn’t c...