How To!

By Slate Podcasts

Education Business

What's How To! about?

You’ve got questions. Together, we get answers.
Each week on How To!, Amanda Ripley (bestselling author of High Conflict: Why We Get Trapped and How We Get Out, The Unthinkable, and The Smartest Kids in the World) takes on listeners’ toughest problems and, with the help of experts, finds the answers to questions you’ve always wanted to ask, but couldn’t. Until now.

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LAST EPISODE

How To Love Your Face

01.24.2023

Earlier this year, our listener, Rell, nearly failed a promotion. Not because she was unprepared or unqualified, but because she didn’t maintain enough eye contact with the interviewers. Rell’s eye hasn’t been fully receiving information since she was born, a ...

How To! episodes:

01.24.2023 How To Love Your Face Earlier this year, our listener, Rell, nearly failed a promotion. Not because she was unprepared or unqualified, but because she didn’t maintain enough eye contact with the interviewers. Rell’s eye hasn’t been fully receiving information since she was born, a ...
01.17.2023 How To Stick to Your New Year’s Resolutions January is barely two weeks old and already some of our ambitious New Year’s resolutions may be starting to fade. No shame! Approximately 90% of resolution makers don’t reach their goal. Which means there’s gotta be a better way. Our ...
01.10.2023 How To End Political Violence (From an Ex-Gang Leader) In the wake of the anniversary of the January 6th insurrection, and now similar riots in Brazil’s capital, we’re picking up our conversation about how to reduce political violence. In the first episode of our two-part series, we heard from ...
01.03.2023 How To Prevent Another Jan. 6 It’s been two years since the January 6th riot at the US Capitol in Washington DC. Over 900 people have been criminally charged, but political violence continues to be a threat. Well, here at How To!, we are not content ...
12.27.2022 Our Favorite Advice of 2022 Here at How To! headquarters, we give and receive a lot of good advice. This year we saved the planet, unbroke the news, discovered our style, sat in silence, found pleasure, put a small town on the map, learned to ...
12.20.2022 How To Forgive Someone Who Isn't Sorry TJ has spent years trying to heal herself and put her childhood behind her. Both of her parents struggled with addiction, which made for a very complicated, unstable upbringing. After sacrificing her own childhood to raise her siblings—TJ feels deeply ...
12.13.2022 How To House Everyone in Your City This week, Los Angeles’ newly elected mayor Karen Bass declared a state of emergency to help address the city’s homelessness crisis. It’s an overwhelming issue that has left a lot of Angelenos wondering how they can help, including this week’s ...
12.06.2022 How To Throw a Party They’ll Remember ‘Tis the season of gathering with friends and family. It’s also a time where some of us yearn for a closer community, like this week’s listener. Morgan is looking for a way to hang out with friends in a consistent, ...
11.29.2022 How To Know When to Quit Your Job Victor’s job—at its core—is to change the world. But he feels like he’s plateaued within his large humanitarian and development organization, and is now on the verge of jumping ship. On this episode of How To!, Annie Duke, author of ...
11.25.2022 Atlas Obscura: Louie Mattar’s Fabulous Car In this episode from our friends at The Atlas Obscura Podcast, you'll visit the San Diego Automotive Museum in California to hear about one man’s dream of creating the ultimate road trip car. Their podcast is an audio guide to ...
11.22.2022 Encore: How To Write a Bestseller Lauren already knows the plot of her bestselling novel—the problem is she hasn’t written a word. Paralyzed by self-criticism and an earlier rejection, this former English major has spent years journaling instead of attempting the scary, difficult work of creative ...
11.15.2022 How To Make a Huge Decision In 60 Minutes... Or Less To move or not to move? That is the question for Tiffani. She is desperate to get out of her hometown in rural Oregon and find a place with affordable housing, better dating prospects, and a ballroom dance studio nearby… ...
11.11.2022 Sponsored: How Can We Use Our Success to Empower Our Communities? Season 3 of The Relentless is all about moving fearlessly. We’re kicking things off with two guests who not only embody that mindset, they’re growing businesses in ways that also empower their communities. First, we talk to Kathryn Finney, a ...
11.08.2022 How To Parent Your Depressed Teen As Kate’s teenage son, Sam, approached college she noticed him withdrawing. He wasn’t excited about his future and started to show symptoms of major depression. It came to a crisis point one summer night before Sam was set to leave ...
11.01.2022 How To Talk Politics With Your Dad (Without Yelling) Pt 2 Today we’re going to see if one American family can flip the usual, tortured and tedious script for arguing about politics and do something more interesting. Jenn and Todd Brandel sit down with their dad, Bruce, to see if they ...
10.25.2022 How To Talk Politics With Your Dad (Without Yelling) Pt 1 Jenn and Todd Brandel have a close, loving relationship with their father, Bruce. But one thing makes their blood boil: his political chain emails. The messages are often forwarded commentary written in a provocative tone, and are an unwelcome reminder ...
10.18.2022 Encore: How To Not Be Scared Becca is 6-feet tall, bold and strong-willed. She’s also easily startled and paralyzed by fear — even a children’s haunted house can reduce her to tears. In this episode of How To!, we bring in sociologist Margee Kerr, author of ...
10.11.2022 How To Put Your Town on the Map If you’ve ever vacationed on the beaches of Delaware, chances are you drove right by Smyrna. It’s a small but charming town that’s been bypassed by the main highways. Which is why Mike, a small business owner on the town ...
10.04.2022 How To Do Divorce Right After three decades of marriage, Bernadette wasn’t exactly blindsided when Rodney asked for a divorce. Things had been rocky for awhile, but she always assumed they’d live the rest of their lives “unhappily ever after.” Now Bernadette is facing an ...
09.27.2022 How To Be Yourself in an Interracial Relationship When Dana and Luke first started dating at the office they kept their relationship a secret. Most of their colleagues didn’t know they were a couple until they got engaged. They didn’t want any undue pressure or outside judgment. That’s ...
09.20.2022 How To Pick a College (And Actually Afford It) College application season is approaching fast—too fast—for 16-yr old Maya and her mother, Melissa. The problem? Maya has no idea where to go or what to study. It doesn’t help that there are thousands of schools to choose from, and ...
09.13.2022 How To Make the Leap to Your Dream Job When Trish first started working in corporate recruiting, she had wonderful co-workers, a supportive manager, opportunities for growth—it was “bliss.” But the bliss evaporated in 2020 when she got laid off during the pandemic. She’s since found a different job ...
09.06.2022 How To Have a Healthier News Diet In the second of a two-part episode on reimagining the news we continue our conversation with Nicole Lewis, Senior Editor of Jurisprudence at Slate, and a longtime reporter on the criminal justice beat; and David Bornstein, co-founder/CEO of the Solutions ...
08.30.2022 How To Unbreak the News About five or six years ago, host Amanda Ripley started noticing that her normal news diet left her feeling depleted and depressed. She tried mixing up her news habits, even avoiding it for awhile, but nothing helped. It felt like ...
08.23.2022 How To Survive a Silent Retreat When Clare decided on a resolution for the year, she was looking for a new challenge. Instead of running a marathon like her partner, Clare—who “talks for a living”—decided to go completely silent. She signed up for a silent retreat. ...
08.16.2022 How To Restore Nature in the Heart of a City When Swiss Ambassador Jacques Pitteloud moved to Washington DC, his residence was perfect. Too perfect. The Swiss ambassador’s residence sits on six acres on a hill with an awesome view of the Washington Monument. “I was amazed by the beauty ...
08.09.2022 How To Save the Planet, Starting With Your Yard In the last 24 years, Judy has moved approximately 16 times for her husband’s military career. But her family has finally settled down in a lovely house with a yard near Annapolis, Maryland. Now Judy is hoping to transform her ...
08.02.2022 How To Be an Artist and Not Starve Elaine picked up watercolor painting during her two year, cross country RV adventure with her family. She quickly fell in love with gorgeous nature scenes and found the creative process meditative and healing. But now she’s wondering if her art ...
07.26.2022 How To Stop Being an Emotional ATM Last week, our expert Arthur Brooks gave us some surefire advice for resetting the parent-child relationship so your kids don’t treat you like an emotional ATM. On this episode of How To!, he’s going to teach our listener, Karen, how ...
07.19.2022 How To Parent Less Every time Karen gets a phone call from her adult children her heart sinks. Even at age 23 and 21, they’re usually calling with a problem. She’s received calls for everything from flat tires to mental health emergencies. While she ...
07.12.2022 How To Become a Parent Overnight For a lot of would-be parents, adoption isn’t the first path that comes to mind. But that’s how Victoria, a PhD student, is leaning right now. Even though she’s not planning to have a family for a few more years, ...
07.05.2022 How To Orgasm In 2019, Brenda took a year off from their PhD program to try to feel pleasure again…with anything. Brenda has come a long way since then but there’s one thing that’s still elusive—they’ve never experienced an orgasm. Whenever they try, ...
06.28.2022 Encore: How To Get Your Dog to Stop Eating Your Daughters’ Underwear With Jenny Slate Erin thinks her dog Chief has the most embarrassing habit—he keeps eating her daughters’ underwear. This has happened several times, resulting in multiple costly surgeries. If she doesn’t put a stop to it, it could eventually kill Chief. How can ...
06.21.2022 How To Dress with Confidence Coming out of the worst of the pandemic, a lot of us need to relearn how to socialize, from what to say to what to wear. Our listener, Kristen, is headed back to the office and wants to feel like ...
06.14.2022 How To Run for Office Without Being an A**hole We all know the country is deeply fractured right now, and that’s especially true in our politics. There is vitriol, bitter partisanship and an expectation that in order to succeed you need to beat up on your opponent. So is ...
06.07.2022 Encore: How To Stand Up for Your Kid When Society Won’t Karin always thought of herself as the mom of two boys—that is, until last year when her oldest child told her they were nonbinary, meaning they don’t identify as either male or female. Karin loves her kid deeply, but she’s ...
05.31.2022 How To Raise a Future College Athlete Elizabeth’s son Lucas is a talented athlete who wants to compete in track and field at an NCAA Division One school. But so far he’s been running away from doing any research or planning. His mother, Elizabeth, wants to help ...
05.24.2022 How To Ditch the Apps & Actually Find a Date Daniel seems to be the whole package. He’s smart, social, and has lots of friends. He even organizes a beach volleyball league in Berlin. But he can’t seem to land a date despite his best efforts. On this episode of ...
05.17.2022 How To Make Sexual Consent Sexy After experiencing multiple instances of sexual assault, Julia often feels sexually disconnected from her own body. She wants to be aware of her boundaries and find pleasure in new relationships going forward. On this episode of How To!, we bring ...
05.10.2022 How To Be a Lazy Genius When Samantha and her husband moved from a condo to a fairly large house, they knew they’d have a lot of updating and upkeep to do. But they had no idea how much time their new chores would gobble up. ...
05.03.2022 How To Bounce Back From Burnout When Betsy joined her last workplace, she thought it was a perfect fit. It was on a list of Best Places to Work and she got to be creative while helping people. But as the startup rapidly grew, the company ...
04.26.2022 How To (Really) Help Refugees When the Taliban took over Afghanistan in August, the Female Tactical Platoon, a unit of elite Afghan soldiers, knew they had to evacuate. “If they were captured, they would be killed,” according to a Green Beret who worked alongside them ...
04.19.2022 How To Change a Mascot Without Tearing Apart Your School The town of Dartmouth, Massachusetts is in the middle of a mascot debate that’s escalated quickly. Our listener Keith grew up there and his kids attend the high school in question. He’s been vocal about his support for changing the ...
04.12.2022 How To Solve Your Own Medical Mystery When Mike was wracked with a series of unexplained headaches in 2017, he initially chalked it up to being a stressed out grad student. But the pain became debilitating and his symptoms only multiplied from there. His doctors are stumped ...
04.05.2022 How To Start Writing (w/ Anna Quindlen & John Dickerson) You’ve probably heard about the importance of journaling, putting thoughts on paper to help process the daily vicissitudes of life. But it’s easy to stall once you see a blank page or get self conscious about what exactly you’re writing. ...
03.29.2022 How To Speak Up So Others Listen If you were to pop by Mary Ann’s PhD discussion group, you’d most likely find her quietly, but intently, listening to the debate going on around her. But when it comes time to actually throw in her two cents, she ...
03.22.2022 How To Stand Up To a Workplace Bully When a fellow employee started bullying Christy at her workplace she took the situation to her supervisor, Human Resources, and even filed grievances with her union. But the situation never improved. In fact, it got worse to the point where ...
03.15.2022 How To Make Friends... Like a Man After Zach heard our “How To Make Friends as an Adult” episode, which coincidentally featured all women, he and a few other male listeners wrote in questioning how useful it was for men. He wondered if we could address the ...
03.08.2022 How To Have Happy Regrets Courtenay has more than a few regrets, starting with her career. Despite her accomplishments as an opera singer, she wishes she’d prioritized her professional goals, become more proficient on the piano and with foreign languages. Then there are the personal ...
03.01.2022 How To Stop ‘Having It All’ (Before You End Up With Nothing) Janey is the very definition of a woman trying to “have it all.” She’s an occupational therapist by day, a ghost writer for influencers by night and in between co-hosts a podcast. On top of that, she has two sons ...

Older episodes

How To!

What's How To! about?

Download our free app to listen on your phone

How To! episodes:

How To Love Your Face

How To Stick to Your New Year’s Resolutions

How To End Political Violence (From an Ex-Gang Leader)

How To Prevent Another Jan. 6

Our Favorite Advice of 2022

How To Forgive Someone Who Isn't Sorry

How To House Everyone in Your City

How To Throw a Party They’ll Remember

How To Know When to Quit Your Job

Atlas Obscura: Louie Mattar’s Fabulous Car

Encore: How To Write a Bestseller

How To Make a Huge Decision In 60 Minutes... Or Less

Sponsored: How Can We Use Our Success to Empower Our Communities?

How To Parent Your Depressed Teen

How To Talk Politics With Your Dad (Without Yelling) Pt 2

How To Talk Politics With Your Dad (Without Yelling) Pt 1

Encore: How To Not Be Scared

How To Put Your Town on the Map

How To Do Divorce Right

How To Be Yourself in an Interracial Relationship

How To Pick a College (And Actually Afford It)

How To Make the Leap to Your Dream Job

How To Have a Healthier News Diet

How To Unbreak the News

How To Survive a Silent Retreat

How To Restore Nature in the Heart of a City

How To Save the Planet, Starting With Your Yard

How To Be an Artist and Not Starve

How To Stop Being an Emotional ATM

How To Parent Less

How To Become a Parent Overnight

How To Orgasm

Encore: How To Get Your Dog to Stop Eating Your Daughters’ Underwear With Jenny Slate

How To Dress with Confidence

How To Run for Office Without Being an A**hole

Encore: How To Stand Up for Your Kid When Society Won’t

How To Raise a Future College Athlete

How To Ditch the Apps & Actually Find a Date

How To Make Sexual Consent Sexy

How To Be a Lazy Genius

How To Bounce Back From Burnout

How To (Really) Help Refugees

How To Change a Mascot Without Tearing Apart Your School

How To Solve Your Own Medical Mystery

How To Start Writing (w/ Anna Quindlen & John Dickerson)

How To Speak Up So Others Listen

How To Stand Up To a Workplace Bully

How To Make Friends... Like a Man

How To Have Happy Regrets

How To Stop ‘Having It All’ (Before You End Up With Nothing)

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