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I have been hiding from you, Totes Pod fans! Now I’m back with updates on the past year, just in case you haven’t already heard them from me.

Get excited!

Warning: this contains discussion of suicide and suicidal thoughts and suicide attempts. If you’re experiencing any of these yourself please call 988 in NYC or talk with your therapist. In extreme cases where your life is at risk please call 911, or please go to the emergency room you trust most.

Listen as I cry and give a special tribute to the one who’s always been too good to be true. I suggest you revisit the episode I made called “Challenging My Pedestals” as a charming companion to this episode. Also, Anderson Cooper’s podcast I mention in this episode is called “All There Is with Anderson Cooper”…. You must listen to it! It’s brilliant, and made me fall ever more deeply in love with him.

An update.

Was cut off rudely by my reminder to move my car (lol), please enjoy the 2nd part of my Astoria Park walk! Beautiful bird sounds in the background enhance the experience here.

Life is NOT fair (and I’m telling myself to get over it), and Astoria Park has a running track!

Loves it. Abi Totes shares some updates. She is so exhausted, notice how she signs off at the end!

Get excited! I share how I was inspired to choose a word of the year (thank you to the incomparable Priscilla Hummel!!!!!)…. And I talk a lot about my journey with gratitude. Notes: The Calm app: https://www.calm.com Book: Self-Compassion by Kristin Neff (You NEED THIS. If you already own it, you NEED TO ACTUALLY READ IT NOWWWW!) Podcast: A Slight Change of Plans. The episode you need to hear where she interviews Kristin Neff is called “The Science of Self-Compassion” On Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/a-slight-change-of-plans/id1561860622?i=1000617332975 On Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/23TYfdiKuafk6OH3laAEaz?si=m23CBi30S26epgLouz0kWA

A glimpse into an evening of public crying, mostly on the C and N trains. A cool, rainy, magical evening of releasing pain and feeling the ghosts of my life ever presently as I traversed the city’s underbelly. Yet another love letter to my city.

In this episode (I’m back, BTW!!!) I share more attempts at self compassion. I reveal some things about myself that I wasn’t fully noticing… and do my best to forgive myself, even though it is not easy! Corn Flakes do actually factor into the whole thing—more than you’d expect! (Not an ad for Corn Flakes. They happened to be on sale in a big way—a GIANT SIZE box for $5.99!!!!!!—at my local bougie grocery store and I got really excited about that.)

Wow, I just looked up “receive” and the first google result says, as part of the second definition: “suffer, experience, or be subject to (specified treatment).” WOW. Now I need to also do an entire episode on how receiving is also suffering, haha! Anyway- THIS episode is centered on a “letter from love” that I wrote to myself just now. Please see: Elizabeth Gilbert’s Letters from Love Substack: https://elizabethgilbert.substack.com/p/welcome-to-letters-from-love We Can Do Hard Things podcast episode with Liz Gilbert as guest where Abby Wombach reads her “letter from love” (Abby + Abi = yay!)… Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/47ZDTvAG9dGK1CMmL5Nekc (This is episode #268) Thanks for being here with me!

Lately I’ve noticed a large (or larger than I’d like) gap between how I care for others and how I care for myself. I put a tremendous amount of love and kindness into my efforts and words given to those I love, but when it comes to myself I’m often mean, harsh, and pushy. I’m really my own bully. This is a reminder for you and for me that we must see ourselves as worthy of love no matter what. Our self love must not be conditional. It’s not easy, it’s hard. Disclaimer: I recorded this episode while on a walk in New York City, so the sound quality is not as good as I’d like it to be. This is my purposefully imperfect episode (I’m challenging myself, as a perfectionist, to be ok with real life and imperfection). Thank you for being here! Please follow/subscribe and leave comments/rate the podcast! If you have suggestions for episode themes, please wrote them in your comment/review. Thank you!

Recently I’ve been telling someone I love very much that multiple things can be true, all at once. Even though it doesn’t feel that way, even though it feels hard and confusing. I’m now trying to tell this thing to myself. And to you. Here are some references for things I’ve included in this episode: Brené Brown quote (about joy) from Unlocking Us, episode about her book The Gifts of Imperfection (where she has a convo with her sisters about the book): “The most vulnerable emotion that we experience, the one that really pricks us the most, is joy. Joy is a hard emotion to let ourselves experience.” John Mulaney youtube clip, called “Psychologists Analyze Comics | John Mulaney Presents: Everybody's In L.A. | Netflix Is A Joke”: https://youtu.be/PkJ6gjKp8go

Getting supes intense about being an artist, since I am finally making it my highest priority in my life! Hope you enjoy. Thank you for being a Totes Pod fan.