“I can take as long as I need on the edge of the chasm of the unknown,” writes Jody England Hansen. “I can experience the terror of moving into the future for however long I feel it. I can turn again to the past if I choose to deal with that pain. I can create my future, choosing to step forward on a path that I might not see until I am in the next moment, the next place I step.” In Episode 230, Jody joins Cynthia and Susan to discuss approaching whatever’s next in our lives with active hope and love. She reminds us to “create reasons to create.” This is a conversation about mercy, grace, forgiveness, and our power to face the tragic gap and walk forward anyway.

How can we know if we’re getting it right when it comes to meeting others with empathy? “Empathy is a tool of compassion,” writes Brene Brown. “We can respond empathically only if we are willing to be present to someone’s pain. If we’re not willing to do that, it’s not real empathy.” We’re living now in a time and society where people actually talk about the sin of empathy. But for followers of Jesus—charged to mourn with and comfort others—how can being present to someone else’s pain ever wear the title of “sin?” In Episode 229, Cynthia and Susan take on empathy, exploring this hot-button word and a few of the familiar ideas related to it. Why does such a simple sounding principle sometimes feel clumsy or complicated when we try to put it into practice?

For many Latter-day Saint women, a faith journey begins as their personal experiences pile up and dots begin to connect. Abby Maxwell Hansen began to see a thread of internalized misogyny in her own story emerge like this: “Every time I went to church, I had some type of message—whether it was really overt or whether it was just sitting down at conference, and they didn't come out and say women's voices aren't as important, but all the speakers were men except for two. So whether it was implied or overtly stated, I got the message over and over that women are not as important as men.” In Episode 228, Abby joins Cynthia and Susan to share some of the experiences that shaped her church life beginning in childhood, and continue to inform her journey now.