Description:Many of us were taught that strength looks like independence. Don’t need too much. Don’t ask for help. Don’t lean on others. And then—somewhere along the way—we find ourselves lonely, exhausted, or quietly resentful, wondering why connection feels so hard and so heavy at the same time. We want closeness, but we’re afraid of needing too much. We want support, but we don’t know how to ask for it without losing ourselves.

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:Today’s guest, Suleika Jaouad, first captured our collective hearts with her searing memoir Between Two Kingdoms — a book that traced her diagnosis of leukemia, the brutal treatment that followed, and the long, complicated journey of coming home to herself again. It was a Jen Hatmaker Book Club selection back in March 2023, and it has stayed with so many of us.

Suleika is an Emmy Award–winning journalist, bestselling author, speaker, and artist whose work asks some of the biggest questions humans ever face: What does it mean to live when life has been shattered? How do we hold hope and devastation at the same time? What does healing actually look like when recovery isn’t linear, or even guaranteed?

She is also the founder of The Isolation Journals, a global creative community of more than 100,000 writers, artists, and curious souls who use storytelling and imagination as tools for transformation. Her latest book, The Book of Alchemy, feels is a continuation of her journey — filled with essays, prompts, and reflections from over 100 contributors across disciplines. It’s an invitation to explore how we turn pain into meaning, uncertainty into beauty, and our lives into art.

Suleika speaks so generously about what it means to live in the middle — between diagnosis and remission, despair and joy, isolation and connection — and how storytelling helps us metabolize what we’ve lived through. Whether you’re a writer, an artist, someone who’s walking through your own valley, or simply trying to make sense of your story, this episode will speak to you. 

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• There is no right or wrong way to journal. There are no rules. You don’t have to be a good writer. I think it's why journaling appeals to me so much. – Suleika Jaouad

• I really try to make the journal a sacred space where I get to be my most unedited, most chaotic self. – Suleika Jaouad

• When I'm not trying to be efficient or productive is when I often end up having my best ideas because I’m not controlling, I'm not pushing, I'm not muscling my way through. – Suleika Jaouad

• When I stop making certainty or perfection the goal, it releases me from measuring myself against how far I am from that goal. And I get to be more present in what's happening now. – Suleika Jaouad

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• American Symphony documentary on Netflix – https://www.netflix.com/title/81728930

• The Book of Alchemy: A Creative Practice for an Inspired Life by Suleika Jaouad – https://amzn.to/3KPqWTD

• The Art of Survival | In living with cancer, Suleika Jaouad has learned to wrench meaning from our short time on Earth by Jennifer Senior | The Atlantic – https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2024/06/suleika-jaouad-writer-health-cancer/678210/?utm_campaign=the-atlantic&utm_content=edit-promo&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook

• Between Two Kingdoms: A Memoir of a Life Interrupted by Suleika Jaouad – https://amzn.to/48KO9y5

• The Isolations Journals on Substack – https://theisolationjournals.substack.com/

• Jon Batiste – https://www.jonbatiste.com/

• Piano for Super Bowl LIX 2025 – https://noma.org/exhibitions/jaouad-batiste-piano/#exhibition-works
  

Guest’s Links:

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

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

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

Substack - https://theisolationjournals.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:

In this live, wide-ranging conversation, Jen Hatmaker is joined by bestselling author and civic educator Sharon McMahon (Sharon Says So) for an honest, funny, and deeply grounding discussion about truth, courage, faith, and what it means to stay awake in uncertain times.

Beginning with Sharon joining Jen on stage, the two explore everything from dating after divorce and the wisdom of grandmothers, to how fear and misinformation shape our public life. They reflect on history as a guide, the importance of joy as resistance, and why living fully—especially in anxious seasons—is not a betrayal of others’ suffering.

Jen also shares hard-won insight about friendship in midlife, faith after certainty, and the real cost of telling the truth. Together, Jen and Sharon remind us that while waking up is disruptive, staying asleep costs more—and that we don’t have to navigate this moment alone.

Thought-provoking Quotes:

• “You are not helping anybody by being paralyzed in a state of fear and joylessness.”— Sharon McMahon

• “There have been people who came before us who lived through so much—and they left their lanterns on the path.” — Sharon McMahon

• “You do not owe the world a state of paralyzation and fear.”— Sharon McMahon

•  “One friend can love you back to life. One is enough.” — Jen Hatmaker

• “Too hard is living asleep at the wheel.”— Jen Hatmaker
•  “I don’t see good fruit from this tree.”  — Jen Hatmaker
•  “God is not constrained to a building. I didn’t lose Jesus.” — Jen Hatmaker

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

                 ➢ Awake by Jen Hatmaker

➢ Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris

➢ The Middle Place by Kelly Corrigan

➢ Works by Anne Lamott

➢ Harriet Tubman (historical reference)

Guest’s Links:

Sharon’s Website– https://sharonmcmahon.com/

 Sharon’s Instagram –  https://www.instagram.com/sharonsaysso

Sharon’s Substack –  https://thepreamble.com/

Sharon’s Podcast – https://sharonmcmahon.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