Podcast Category: Self-Care/Routines

The Sacred Yes: Jen Hatmaker & Tyler Merritt on Choosing Your Body

Some yeses cost us something. Some of them save us.

Jen sits down with her partner, actor, author, and speaker Tyler Merritt, hours after his chemotherapy infusion. Tyler is midway through treatment for colorectal cancer, his second diagnosis in six years, and the two get honest about making thoughtful decisions when your body is calling every shot.

They talk about the yes Tyler gave in the middle of radiation: booking a brand-new theater tour that opens seventeen days after his last chemo, a yes he says he “arguably shouldn’t have” given, made so he’d have something beautiful to walk toward. Jen turns the lens on her own year and the yes she almost took back: getting on the plane to Me Camp after a hysterectomy, a brutal spring, and a boyfriend in chemo two thousand miles away.

Tyler also flips the mic and asks Jen whether she regrets writing AWAKE. Her answer is about closure, discretion, and the two longest weeks of her life waiting to hear what her daughter thought of the book.

Plus: how to tell your intuition from everybody else’s fear, Jen’s top three Me Camp TV experiences, one Enneagram argument, and the one yes Tyler is still too scared to say out loud.

[ENCORE] The Sacred Yes to What’s Next: Leanne Morgan on Midlife Reinvention, Second Acts, and Dreams That Are Worth Waiting For

What if your biggest breakthrough hasn’t happened yet?

In this joyful and deeply encouraging conversation, Jen sits down with comedian, author, actress, and beloved storyteller Leanne Morgan to talk about dreams, disappointment, perseverance, and the surprising possibilities waiting for us in midlife.

As part of our Sacred Yes: Reclaiming Joy in Midlife series, we’re bringing back one of our most-loved episodes because Leanne’s story embodies everything this season is about: saying yes to possibility, trusting your own timeline, and refusing to believe that life’s best chapters belong exclusively to youth.

Before sold-out tours, bestselling books, Netflix specials, and national recognition, Leanne spent decades raising children, caring for family, performing in comedy clubs, and quietly holding onto a dream that seemed increasingly unlikely. Then, in her fifties, everything changed.

With her trademark humor and warmth, Leanne shares what it was like to keep showing up long after many people would have given up. She reflects on motherhood, caregiving, marriage, becoming a grandmother, and the surprising freedom that comes with getting older.

Most of all, she reminds us that there is no expiration date on becoming who we’re meant to be.

Over this delightful hour, Leanne will regale you with charming hard-won life lessons including:

  • Why success arriving later can be a gift
  • The power of perseverance through disappointment
  • The balancing act of holding dreams, caregiving, and family life all with care
  • How humor helps us survive hard seasons
  • Why comparison is a thief of joy
  • The freedom that comes with embracing your own timeline
  • What it means to trust that what’s meant for you won’t miss you

If you’ve ever wondered whether you’ve missed your chance, whether it’s too late to pivot, or whether your most joyful years are already behind you, Leanne has a message for you:

You are not behind. You are not too late. Your story is still unfolding.

Dinner With Strangers: Jess Janz On The Friends We Haven’t Met Yet

In a world where we’re more connected than ever—and lonelier than we’d like to admit—what if the answer isn’t finding the right people, but simply pulling up another chair?

This week, Jen sits down with writer, poet, and community-builder Jess Janz to talk about her beautiful new book, The Table Where We Meet, and the unlikely social experiment that grew into the phenomenon known as Dinner With Strangers. What began as a simple gathering around a table with a few curious questions has now welcomed more than a thousand people into conversations that move far beyond small talk and into the territory we all secretly long for: belonging.

Together, Jen and Jess explore why so many of us feel disconnected, what makes a question powerful enough to crack a person open, and how vulnerability creates the conditions for genuine connection. They discuss the courage it takes to gather people, the surprising magic that happens when strangers choose honesty, and why community is less about finding your people and more about becoming the kind of person who creates space for others.

Whether you’re craving deeper friendships, navigating loneliness, or simply wondering how to build a bigger table in your own life, this conversation is a hopeful reminder that meaningful connection is still possible—and it might be closer than you think.

In this episode, you’ll hear:

  • The hidden costs of loneliness and our culture’s growing hunger for belonging
  • Why “What’s your favorite movie?” might be the wrong icebreaker question—and what to ask instead
  • What happens when one person chooses vulnerability first
  • How gathering around a table can become an act of healing, resistance, and hope
  • Why community isn’t something we stumble into—it’s something we create

When Life Outpaces You, Rest Isn’t Optional

Every summer, Jen heads off on her annual Me Camp—a month dedicated to stepping away from the noise to reconnect with herself. But this year, Me Camp isn’t a tradition or a luxury. It’s an act of survival.

In the wake of major surgery, while carrying the weight of parenting adult children, navigating family crises, supporting loved ones through illness, and trying to hold together a life that was once built for two people, Jen found herself physically, emotionally, and mentally depleted. She almost didn’t go.

In this deeply personal solo episode, Jen shares what finally convinced her to leave anyway, why asking for help has become one of the hardest—and holiest—lessons of this season, and what she’s learning about the difference between escaping your life and stepping away long enough to return to it whole.

If you’re the dependable one, the fixer, the person everyone else calls in a crisis, this conversation is a gentle but urgent invitation to loosen your grip, let people show up for you, and remember that rest isn’t a reward for finishing the work. Sometimes it’s the very thing that makes it possible to keep going.

In this episode, Jen explores:

  • What happens when life outpaces your capacity
  • Why asking for help feels so uncomfortable (especially for capable people)
  • The hidden cost of believing you’re indispensable
  • How codependency can disguise itself as responsibility
  • Why retreat can be an act of courage—not avoidance
  • The simple invitation to “choose the lake chair anyway”

Whether you’re recovering from something visible or carrying burdens no one else can see, this episode offers permission to stop white-knuckling your way through life, receive the care that’s available to you, and trust that stepping away for a moment can be the very thing that helps you step back into your life with renewed strength.

Sacred Yes: Reclaiming Joy in Midlife Starts Here

Welcome to the first episode in our summer series, Sacred Yes: Reclaiming Joy in Midlife.

After years spent saying yes to obligations, expectations, responsibilities, and everyone else’s needs, what happens when we finally learn to say yes to ourselves?

In this deeply personal solo episode, Jen takes us to the place where this journey began: Me Camp. What started as a spontaneous trip to coastal Maine during one of the hardest seasons of her life became an annual practice of restoration, adventure, healing, and joy. Six summers later, as she arrives in a tiny lakeside town in Ontario for another month of Me Camp, she’s reflecting on the small word that changed everything: yes.

But not every yes is created equal.

Jen explores the difference between the “obligated yes” that leaves us depleted and resentful and the “sacred yes” that reconnects us to ourselves. Along the way, she shares hard-won wisdom about boundaries, people-pleasing, midlife exhaustion, and why so many women find themselves carrying responsibilities that were never meant to belong to them alone.

Most importantly, she makes a compelling case for something many of us have forgotten how to practice: unproductive joy. The kind of joy that doesn’t earn a paycheck, check off a to-do list, or justify itself with results. The kind that nourishes our spirits simply because it delights us.

Whether your version of Me Camp is a month by the water, a Friday afternoon reserved for lunch with friends, a stack of library books, or an hour spent doing something that makes you feel alive, this conversation is your invitation to begin.

This month, we’ll be exploring what it means to reclaim joy, embrace rest, honor our desires, and create lives that are not just productive—but deeply satisfying.

It’s time to discover your own Sacred Yes.

Molly Sims on Midlife Confidence (That Doesn’t Come From Perfection)

This week, Jen and Amy sit down with actress, model, entrepreneur, and Lipstick on the Rim host Molly Sims for a conversation that starts light and breezy—backstage at a Hello Sunshine Shine Away event—and quickly moves into something deeper: what it’s like to live in a body that’s been watched, evaluated, and monetized for decades… and how your relationship to that body inevitably changes over time.

Molly has spent most of her life being seen. But what she shares here is what it’s taken to actually see herself.

Today, the discussion centers around the quiet (and sometimes jarring) shift into midlife. Molly opens up about figuring it out in real time, what surprised her most about this chapter, and the unexpected places where things have gotten easier.

There’s also an honest look at what it means to keep showing up in an industry with very loud opinions about women’s bodies—and how Molly now navigates beauty, skincare, procedures, and wellness without losing herself in the process. Where’s the line between empowerment and pressure? And who gets to decide?

But this conversation doesn’t stay theoretical. It lands in real life—in marriage, in motherhood, in the everyday negotiations of confidence and insecurity, and in the intentional ways Molly is trying to give her daughter a different starting point than the one she was handed.

Along the way, the discussion turns to influence, identity, and the kinds of conversations Molly is creating now that she wasn’t having earlier in her career. And in one of the most tender moments of the episode, she reflects on what she would say to her younger self—not to fix her, but just to sit beside her with a little more perspective.

This one feels like sitting across from someone who’s done a lot of living—and is finally comfortable telling the truth about it.

The New Perimenopause: What’s Actually Happening to Your Body with Dr. Mary Claire Haver

For years, women in their late 30s and 40s have walked into doctors’ offices saying the same thing: “I don’t feel like myself.”

They’re exhausted but can’t sleep. Gaining weight but eating less. Anxious, foggy, irritable, disconnected. And too often, they’re told it’s stress. Aging. Depression. Just part of being a woman.

But what if it’s something else?

This week, Jen and Amy sit down with board-certified OB-GYN and menopause expert Dr. Mary Claire Haver to talk about what’s really happening in perimenopause — the hormonal transition that can begin years before your final period and affect nearly every system in your body.

Drawing from her new book The New Perimenopause, Dr. Haver explains:

  • Why the brain may be the first organ to notice hormone shifts
  • Why antidepressants are often prescribed before hormones are even discussed
  • The dangerous legacy of outdated research and underfunded women’s health
  • How bone density, cholesterol, muscle mass, mood, libido, and cognition are all connected
  • And why midlife is not a decline — but a powerful window of opportunity

This is not just a conversation about hot flashes. It’s about the “Zone of Chaos.” It’s about medical gaslighting. It’s about reclaiming your body as your ally, not your enemy.

If you’ve ever whispered, “What is wrong with me?” or spent your sleepless nights up Googling dramatic questions like “is my brain broken?” — this episode is for you.

You’re not broken. You’re not weak. And you are definitely not alone.

Shannan Martin on Counterweights: Holding Grief and Joy in the Same Hands

What do we do when the world feels like too much?

When the headlines won’t let up, when grief and uncertainty sit heavy in our bodies, when we’re carrying more than we ever thought we could—how do we keep going without numbing out or falling apart?

This week, Jen sits down with beloved writer and friend Shannan Martin to talk about her new book Counterweights, a tender, practical guide for living with hope in a heavy world.

At the center of Shannan’s work is a deceptively simple idea: when life gets heavy, we don’t eliminate the weight—we learn to carry something equally weighty in the other hand. Not balance. Not denial. But both/and.

Together, Jen and Shannan explore what it means to hold grief and joy at the same time, to resist despair without turning away from reality, and to find steady ground in the middle of it all. They talk about community as survival, faith that evolves and expands, and the small, ordinary moments that become lifelines when everything feels overwhelming.

This conversation is a fitting close to our Wilderness & Wonder exploration—because if the wilderness strips us down to what’s real, Shannan helps us ask: what will hold us up now?

If you’ve been feeling stretched thin, worn down, or just plain tired of carrying it all alone, this episode is for you.

What If Desire Is the Map? A Wilderness & Wonder Conversation with Jay Stringer

Many of us were taught that desire is dangerous—something to manage, suppress, or feel ashamed of. But what if desire isn’t the problem at all? What if it’s not just about sex or attraction, but about the places we feel most alive?

Today, Jen and Amy sit down with FTL fan-favorite Jay Stringer, a licensed therapist and author whose work helps people understand the deeper stories shaping their desires—especially the ones we’ve been taught to hide, or silence. Drawing from his powerful new book Desire, Jay reframes desire not as a moral failure or impulse to eliminate, but as a signal worth listening to—one that points us toward what formed us, what wounded us, and what we are still longing for beneath the surface.

Jay shifts the focus from behavior modification to understanding the story behind desire—for intimacy, success, escape, creativity, or belonging—shaped by early attachment, trauma, and unmet needs. The conversation moves from “What’s wrong with me?” to “What happened to me?” turning desire from shame into meaning. This is not a conversation about labeling or fixing yourself. It’s about understanding yourself—how your story formed you, and how listening to what brings you to life can lead toward freedom, wholeness, and deeper connection. 

This episode also serves as the opening doorway into our Wilderness & Wonder series. In a season when many of us are navigating uncertainty—spiritually, relationally, or internally—this episode grounds us in the idea that exploration isn’t aimlessness, but formation. That the wilderness can be a teacher. And that desire itself may be one of the quiet guides helping us stay awake, curious, and present as we learn how to live inside the questions.

This is a gentle conversation, but it’s also a brave one. And we’re really glad you’re here for it.

The Wake-Up Call: What Changes in Midlife—and Why You’re Not Imagining It

What happens when the life you’ve been managing no longer fits?

In this powerful and honest conversation, Jen Hatmaker is joined by four trusted voices—Nedra Glover Tawwab, Emily Nagoski, Kobe Campbell, and Kate Bowler—for a wide-ranging discussion about what it really means to wake up in midlife.

Together, they explore the places awakening often shows up first: our relationships, our bodies, our mental health, and our faith. This isn’t a conversation about fixing yourself or rushing toward answers. It’s about noticing—naming what’s shifting, understanding why it feels so disruptive, and realizing you’re not alone in it.

From boundaries and burnout to body shame, anxiety, trauma, and faith after certainty, this episode offers language, compassion, and clarity for women navigating midlife change with honesty and courage.

If you’ve ever thought, Something’s changing—and I don’t know what to do with it, this conversation is for you.

In This Episode, We Discuss

  • Relationships
  • Bodies & Burnout
  • Mental Health
  • Faith