How to Human

jamiemagnant10

How to Human is a brave and inclusive space where everyday people in our communities share honest, vulnerable stories to help us better understand ourselves and each other. Through these real experiences, we learn how to human—growing through our differences, connecting through shared emotions, and reimagining a more compassionate world together.

  1. 5 Apr

    Five Years Sober: The Whisper That Changed My Life

    This week’s episode of How to Human is a little different. Instead of me interviewing someone else, my partner Anne takes over the host seat and interviews me. The reason? This week marks five years since I last drank alcohol or used cocaine. In this conversation, I share more openly than I ever have on the podcast about my relationship with substances—how it began when I was a teenager, how it evolved through my twenties, and the quiet whisper that eventually told me something had to change. We talk about the messy middle of getting sober:the grief, the shame, the fear, and the courage it took to rebuild my life almost entirely from scratch. I share what it looked like to leave relationships, move in with family, face my trauma, and slowly learn how to feel my emotions without numbing them. But we also talk about what sobriety has given me:love, curiosity, community, deeper connection, and a life I truly never imagined was possible. If you’ve ever been sober curious, struggled with substances, or simply wondered what it means to come home to yourself, this conversation is for you. Sobriety, for me, has been many things.A gift.A rebirth.And ultimately, a journey home.

    58 min

  2. 29 Mar

    Befriending Pain

    Pain has a way of demanding our attention. In this solo episode, I share two recent experiences with physical pain—one involving a sudden stomach episode at work and another involving a stubborn back injury that completely disrupted my daily life. What unfolded inside those moments wasn’t just physical discomfort. It was shame. Fear. Embarrassment. The urge to power through. The familiar pull toward coping strategies that numb or distract instead of helping. And ultimately, it became an invitation to ask a deeper question: What if pain is actually trying to help us? As I navigated days of back pain that refused to go away, I began experimenting with something simple but surprisingly difficult—listening to it. Instead of fighting the sensation or trying to outthink it, I started paying attention to what the pain was asking for. Slow down.Rest.Move differently.Take care. This episode explores what happens when we stop treating pain as the enemy and start treating it as information. Along the way, I also reflect on how our personal relationship with pain mirrors something much larger—how we respond to discomfort individually, and how that response can echo in our relationships, our systems, and our collective struggles. Because maybe one of the most human things we can learn is this: What if pain isn't something to escape, but rather something to listen to? What would that change about our individual lives and the collective?

    35 min

  3. 15 Mar

    Wrestling With Evil

    What do we really mean when we talk about evil? In this episode of How to Human, I sit down again with Molly Gorney and Anne Skriba to explore one of the most uncomfortable—and deeply human—questions: what is evil, and where does it actually live? Together we unpack the ways religion shaped our earliest understanding of sin, goodness, and hell, and how those beliefs have evolved through our own journeys of deconstruction, sobriety, healing, and lived experience. We talk about harm, accountability, shame, and the systems that allow suffering to continue. We wrestle with the tension between believing humans are inherently good while also acknowledging the very real harm people cause. And we explore what it means to look honestly at our own shadow without losing our capacity for compassion. This conversation isn’t about arriving at a clean answer. It’s about curiosity, humility, and the courage to sit with complexity. Because maybe learning how to be human means recognizing that the capacity for both harm and healing lives in all of us.

    1hr 16min

  4. 1 Mar

    Blackness, Belonging, and Staying Curious

    This episode is a gift. Anne Skriba and Arianne Stinson join me with remarkable honesty and generosity, sharing their lived experiences as biracial women navigating identity, race, faith, family, and belonging in America. They speak to what it feels like to be perceived as Black — regardless of how they identify. To navigate colorism, code-switching, systemic bias, and generational history not as concepts, but as daily reality. Their vulnerability is not owed. Their stories are not hypotheticals. This conversation is an invitation to listen , not to fix, defend, or center ourselves. But to witness. To let lived experience shape us. To allow honesty to soften what certainty cannot. If we want to grow, we have to learn how to listen. This is a place to practice.

    1hr 14min

  5. 22 Feb

    How to Have Compassion Without Collapse

    In this episode of How to Human, I sit down with my friend Molly G — a sober mother of three, a seeker, and someone deeply committed to unlearning. We talk about what it means to practice compassion in a time when harm feels loud and constant. We explore the tension between empathy and accountability. Between shame and growth. Between staying informed and staying regulated. Molly shares about getting sober while raising children, unpacking the religious and cultural systems that shaped her, confronting her own complicity in racism, and learning how to parent from repair rather than perfection. We ask hard questions: How do we hold compassion for people causing harm without endorsing that harm? What is the difference between shame and responsibility? How do we raise white children in a racist country without collapsing into guilt? And what does repair — with our kids, with ourselves, with our communities — actually look like? This conversation weaves sobriety, shadow work, parenting, white fragility, and grief into one central inquiry: How do we stay human — without numbing, without denying, without hardening? This is a tender one.And a necessary one.

    1hr 20min

  6. 15 Feb

    Staying Human in the Face of Harm

    Content note: This episode includes discussions of sexual violence, trauma, and systemic harm. Please listen with care. In this solo episode of How to Human, Jamie returns after a long season of quiet to speak from a place of humility, grief, and reckoning. Reflecting on winter as a time of inward listening, Jamie shares why words have felt insufficient—and why they now feel necessary. Inspired by recent conversations on We Can Do Hard Things and the release of the Epstein files, this episode becomes a kind of meditation: on sexual violence, power, denial, accountability, and what it means to stay human in the face of harm. Jamie speaks openly as a survivor of sexual violence, tracing parallels between personal trauma and collective systems of oppression. She shares her experience as a young volunteer with the Peace Corps in Uganda, including the aftermath of an attempted rape, institutional invalidation, and the long arc of retraumatization that so often follows reporting harm. This episode explores: The ripple effects of violence and silence White saviorism, power, and unintended harm Shame, substance use, and survival The cost of denial—personally and collectively What accountability, repair, and grief might ask of us More than a story, this is an offering—to survivors, to listeners willing to sit with discomfort, and to anyone asking how we choose differently without losing faith in our shared humanity.

    50 min

  7. 09/11/2025

    Embracing Change and Curiosity: A Conversation About Living & Healing

    Embracing Change and Curiosity: A Conversation with Carol Roller In this heartfelt and thought-provoking episode of How to Human, Jamie Magnant sits down with Carol Roller—a 71-year-old coach, lifelong learner, and sober woman—to explore what it really means to stay curious, connected, and open-hearted through every season of life. Carol shares the wisdom she’s gathered over decades of personal growth, from her work in ontological coaching to her own journey through sobriety and healing. Together, Jamie and Carol discuss the evolving nature of our values, the sacred importance of community, and the often-overlooked need for ritual spaces to process grief and release trauma. With humor, honesty, and grounded insight, Carol reminds us that it’s never too late to grow, to heal, and to rediscover what it means to be human. Her reflections invite us all to embrace aging not as a decline, but as a deepening—a chance to live with curiosity, compassion, and courage, no matter our age. ✨ Key Themes: The lifelong power of curiosity and self-discovery Building and sustaining community through change and sobriety The importance of ritual and shared space in healing Embracing aging as an invitation to keep learning and softening

    1hr 7min

  8. 10/10/2025

    How We Met: Sobriety, Self-Discovery, and Learning to Love Authentically

    How to Human: Episode 8 In this deeply personal episode of How to Human, Jamie sits down with her partner, Anne Skriba, to share the unfolding story of how they met—through sobriety, honesty, and the courage to be seen. What began as two women showing up vulnerably in a recovery meeting became an unexpected journey of friendship, attraction, and profound growth. Together, they reflect on their early conversations about queerness, unlearning religious shame, navigating anxious and avoidant attachment styles, and learning how to show up in love without losing themselves. With tenderness and humor, Jamie and Anne unpack what it means to build a healthy relationship while still healing—and how love can be both a mirror and a teacher on the path to becoming more fully human.

    44 min
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About

How to Human is a brave and inclusive space where everyday people in our communities share honest, vulnerable stories to help us better understand ourselves and each other. Through these real experiences, we learn how to human—growing through our differences, connecting through shared emotions, and reimagining a more compassionate world together.

Information

  • Creator
    jamiemagnant10
  • Years Active
    2025 - 2026
  • Episodes
    15
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © jamiemagnant10
  • Show Website
    How to Human