You Good?

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Ben is Sarah's brother, a New Yorker getting ready to get married at the time of recording, and one of this season's most generous guests. This season we wanted to bring more men into the conversation, and Ben showed up fully, sharing his experience navigating grief after losing his dad.

He talks about what it looked like to power through immediately after the loss (spoiler: it didn't work), and the moment in a car with a burrito that cracked him open. He gets into learning piano, running his first half marathon, and how having goals to work toward gave him somewhere to put everything he was feeling. There's also a really beautiful thread on how grief transforms over time, and how Ben has learned to actually welcome the sadness when it shows up now, because it keeps him connected. Tender, funny, and full of things you'll want to share with someone you love.

A gentle note: this episode deals with grief and loss throughout. Take care of yourself as you listen.

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Janine is a therapist who works with both kids and adults, a mom of two teenagers, and someone who genuinely loves this stage of parenting. If you're in the little kid years and can't imagine that being true, this episode is a hopeful peek down the road.

She shares her year of no, the Shonda Rhimes year of yes, but the opposite, and what it gave back to her. She also gets into her coping skills menu: journaling, music, Zumba, and the power of scheduling the things that fill you up before anything else gets a chance to take their spot. Janine also has a new coping skills book out, linked below.

Find Janine's book and work at copingskillsforeveryone.com, facebook.com/janinehalloranlmhc, instagram.com/copingskillsforeveryone

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Mal is Lissy's sister, a Milwaukee mom of two with a fifteen-year-old and a three-year-old, and someone who became a parent at twenty-five before most of her friends were anywhere near that chapter.

This episode is about what happens when you stop trying to prove you can do it all alone, and what self-care looks like when the wisdom of experience finally starts to kick in. Mal is warm, real, and exactly the kind of guest who makes you feel like you've been heard. A beautiful one for anyone in the thick of it who needs a reminder that good enough has always been the goal.

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Season two is here, and in this first episode it's just the two of us catching you up. Sarah and Lissy talk about where the show has been since season one wrapped in May, what they set out to do differently this time, and the personal and professional shifts that have happened for both of them along the way.

You listened to season one, and you asked for more, so this season goes wider. More men (and an honest conversation about how hard it was to find men willing to talk about caring for their own emotional wellbeing), more grief, more range across age, life stage, and occupation. Sarah and Lissy also share their own updates: Sarah's early work on a new group program for parents of little kids who want to build a real relationship with their bodies, and Lissy's move to working full time as a life planner supporting people through big life changes. Plus a grounding to start, because at this point neither of them can log on together without one. A warm, honest kickoff to a season we can't wait for you to hear.

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In the thick of a big life shift? The Full Cup Collective is the community Sarah built for exactly this. Join the waitlist now at embodiedep.com/waitlist.

Mark is a dad of two young kids, is currently on paternity leave and right in the thick of the stretch where the person you were and the person you are now don't quite line up yet. He runs on structure and routine, and two tiny kids have taken a lot of that away.

This conversation goes deep into what it means to care for yourself when your whole identity is shifting. Mark talks about how getting sober in his thirties focused his creativity and deepened his friendships. He also gets honest about the things that used to fill him up, the band, the movies, the long runs, and what it looks like to hold onto them when there's suddenly so much less time. A tender, funny, and unexpectedly moving episode about finding yourself on the other side of a big life change.

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Kelly is a former patent litigator who now helps women manage their time and mental load through something she calls the Bright Method, and she came to it the way most of us come to the things that help us most, by desperately needing it herself. She's a mom of two little kids, her partner does shift work, and her whole system has had to be built for the reality of sometimes being the only one around.

Kelly talks about taking all that invisible labor, the planning, the scheduling, the mental list that never stops running, and making it visible so it can actually be shared and appreciated. She makes the case that structure isn't rigidity; it's what makes space for presence. She also talks about redefining friendship in this chapter, why boring is genuinely good right now, and how she shows up for the people she loves even when she's stretched thin. Kelly also has a podcast, linked below.

Find Kelly's work here: website, instagram or The Bright Method Podcast. 

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This video is about Wrap up episodeIt's the season one finale and it's just the two of us. Sarah and Lissy sit down to reflect on what it was actually like to make this podcast -- the panicked voice note Sarah sent right before launch, the ragtag process that got them here, and the feedback that's meant the most. They dig into the themes that kept surfacing across every conversation: the longing for aimless, unstructured time, the universal signs that you've stopped tending to yourself, and why everyone they spoke to opened with some version of "I'm not sure why you'd want to talk to me about this."

They also get into what they want to explore in season two: men and self-care (yes, really), couples navigating their own needs alongside each other's, grief, sobriety, and older guests with decades of perspective. Plus, as always, a small moment of joy each, including a May snowstorm in Colorado and a Starbucks compliment that was very much not meant for Sarah's husband.

If these conversations have been landing for you, The Weekly Exhale is Sarah's newsletter on nervous system regulation, burnout, and showing up for yourself in the small ways that actually matter. Sign up here.

If a big life change has you wondering what comes next, LifePlans (a company Lissy supports in an advisory role) offers personalized expert guidance to help you think it through and move forward with confidence. Learn more at ourlifeplans.com.

Loved this season? Leaving a review and sharing the show with someone who needs it is the best way to help us grow into season two. Thank you so much for being here.

Steph spent decades working jobs that paid the bills but never quite fit who she was, iincluding a painful stint in the music industry where the pressure to be someone she wasn't eventually pushed her out entirely. Now, turning 50, she's a costuming and makeup teacher at a Los Angeles high school with a performing arts program, making foam wigs for Seussical, teaching kids to embroider their denim, and fielding a hundred students who call her Miss A like she's the person they've been waiting for. This episode is for anyone who has ever wondered if they'll ever get to do the thing that actually feels like them.

Steph talks about what it means to finally have work that hits every one of her delivery mechanisms: creativity, community, and her kids getting to watch her do something she loves. She shares why that in itself has become one of her most essential forms of self-care. She also shares the story of the student who got into Princeton writing about quilts they made together for families displaced by the LA fires. A warm, funny, deeply human episode about following the winding road to yourself.

If this conversation resonated, The Weekly Exhale is Sarah's newsletter on nervous system regulation, burnout, and showing up for yourself in the small ways that actually matter. Sign up here.

If a big life change has you wondering what comes next, LifePlans (a company Lissy supports in an advisory role) offers personalized expert guidance to help you think it through and move forward with confidence. Learn more at ourlifeplans.com.

Loved this episode? Leaving a review helps more people find us -- and it means the world to us. Thank you.

Lainey lives in Brooklyn with her husband, two toddlers, and Morty the dog who commutes to the office with her and works the subway car for pets from strangers. She's an extrovert who can hold a lot, until she can't and she came into this conversation ready to admit that her Oura ring has never once changed her behavior. This one is for anyone who feels like they're running a well-oiled machine that is also one small thing away from falling apart.

Lainey talks about what it actually looks like to be a working mom whose days are back to back meetings, mode-switching, and very little give in the system. She gets honest about the false urgency that keeps her from taking a five minute walk around the block, why evening work time has become her unexpected form of self-directed space, and what it feels like to realize you genuinely cannot remember the last time you wandered somewhere without a destination. She also makes a compelling case for the one hour workout as the only truly protected time in a very full day and what it took to actually show up for it when work was pulling her back.

If this conversation resonated, The Weekly Exhale is Sarah's newsletter on nervous system regulation, burnout, and showing up for yourself in the small ways that actually matter. Sign up here.

If a big life change has you wondering what comes next, LifePlans (a company Lissy supports in an advisory role) offers personalized expert guidance to help you think it through and move forward with confidence. Learn more at ourlifeplans.com.

Loved this episode? Leaving a review helps more people find us -- and it means the world to us. Thank you.

Elana Jacobs is the artistic director of a performance company, a Pilates studio owner, and someone who has spent her whole life figuring out how to keep creativity alive through every season of life, including the ones that make it feel nearly impossible. This conversation is for anyone who has ever felt like the version of themselves that made art, moved freely, or had time to think is still in there somewhere, just waiting for an opening.

Elana talks about her practice of moving with ease, not doing less, but finding the route with the most flow and how that principle guides everything from her creative work to how she shows up as a parent. She shares the concept of the invisible basket, a way of collecting ideas and inspiration throughout daily life even when a formal creative practice isn't possible, and why having a project on the horizon -- even a distant one -- keeps her grounded. She also reads aloud the Yes No Manifesto, a reframing of perfection, planning, and control that honestly applies as much to parenting and self-care as it does to making art.

If this conversation resonated, The Weekly Exhale is Sarah's newsletter on nervous system regulation, burnout, and showing up for yourself in the small ways that actually matter. Get it here.

If a big life change has you wondering what comes next, LifePlans (a company Lissy supports in an advisory role) offers personalized expert guidance to help you think it through and move forward with confidence. Learn more at ourlifeplans.com.

Loved this episode? Leaving a review helps more people find us -- and it means the world to us. Thank you.