MeaningMaker Podcast Jana and Charlene

In a continuation of the failure discussion from S2/E2, we talk about shame - which touches all of our lives at some point. It's about what happens when shame is deeply internalized and allowed to become the narrator of a life story. It's about the inability to set boundaries, the acceptance of a story told by others as your own, and the belief that who you are at your core - and who you are becoming - is your biggest failure.

In an unexpected episode - recorded just after Episode 1 of Season 2 - we turned the mics back on to capture a conversation about what we weren't planning to talk about. Two divorce stories playing out with much different outcomes - one much more common than the other. Not every story has a happy ending. Some endings feel like failures. Sometimes you learn that the real work is just accept the ending that you have so that something new can begin.

More and more, we’re each learning that the podcast has been a journey to owning for ourselves both the hard and beautiful aspects of our story. One year after taking a one-year break from podcasting, we’re “beginning again” after experiencing a profound moment of closure. In this first episode of the new season, we talk about that moment, why we’re back, what has changed over the last year, our regrets from the first season, and what it is that we don’t want to talk about anymore.

As mothers and wives with young families, we knew there would be no right time and no right way to open the closet door.  Listen as we talk about some of the things that inspired courage in us, that guided us to the eventual decision and that we had to consider - including the losses we would likely face. 

Over these 23 episodes, we’ve chronicled our coming out story — and our life in the decade after that. We’ve honoured and loved and struggled to make meaning of all that came before — and so much of what has followed. These real and raw conversations every other week have healed and changed us both. And recently, they’ve left us with another unexpected gift. The realization that as much as the podcast has been about telling the story — it has also been about letting go of it.

The past is gone but, so often, it defines the present. After reliving this many-faceted coming out story over more than 20 episodes, we talk about why it’s been important to make meaning of what happened in those initial coming out years. How we needed to find a truth about those events which is true for each of us, individually. How we discovered that our understanding of the truth continues to evolve and change over time. And, how all of this has pushed us to re-examine faith, flaws and even how we imagine the future.