NTM 546: Who They Were Depends on Where You Stood; Family, legacy, and the limits of knowing the people we love cover art

NTM 546: Who They Were Depends on Where You Stood; Family, legacy, and the limits of knowing the people we love

NTM 546: Who They Were Depends on Where You Stood; Family, legacy, and the limits of knowing the people we love

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In this episode, Bridget shares her experience of her grandfather’s passing, and the reflections that surfaced in the aftermath. Together, Julie and Bridget explore how our understanding of the people we love is always shaped by proximity, role, and family narrative.

We unpack the idea that we never truly know a whole person; only the version revealed to us through relationship, family dynamics, and shared stories. This conversation gently examines legacy, memory, and the quiet humility required to accept that every life is larger and more complex than the slice we are given. It’s a reflection on grief, inheritance, and the ways family both connects us and limits what we can see, without needing answers, conclusions, or neat meaning-making.

In this episode we discuss:
- What it’s like to lose a grandparent and sit with what remains unspoken
- How family stories shape who someone is allowed to be in memory
- The idea that we only ever know people through our own relational lens
- How different family members can hold entirely different versions of the same person
- Why legacy is never the full truth of a life; just a fragment
- The tension between intimacy and unknowability in close relationships
- How grief can soften certainty rather than create clarity
- What it means to honour someone without needing to define them
- The humility of accepting partial knowing
- Allowing complexity to exist without trying to resolve it


Want support on this journey? Come join us inside Honey Club - where we melt these blocks together, one breath, one practice, one deep remembering at a time. Find out more at julietenner.love or visit: https://julie-tenner.newzenler.com/courses/honeyclub


Reach out to Bridget for 1:1 coaching - bridgetwood.life

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