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BEAM Stories is a show that explores the dynamic stories of motherhood and caregiving, and how those stories hold exponential power to be a driving force for change. Each week, host Amy Kugler will have deep conversations with incredible leaders about the state of motherhood that’s both personal and global. We’ll talk about the challenging and hilarious moments we rarely say out loud, and we’ll find a way forward that lifts us all up. For more, visit www.welcometobeam.com/podcast.
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Leah Burns and Natalie Swanson would tell you that every flipped bowl of cereal is an opportunity to connect, even when it feels the opposite. But that's the beauty of more than 3 decades as speech language pathologists, focusing on early intervention, Autism Spectrum Disorder and more. These two moms have been around a while and have seen how conn…
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Storyteller and news media veteran Jenna Hanchard is no stranger to advocating for herself - she's had to all her life. After giving birth to her first child in the throes of the Covid-19 pandemic, Jenna learned what building a birth and postpartum support system truly meant. She advocated for connecting and resourcing Black mothers and Black doula…
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Paid Leave for All's Founding Director Dawn Huckelbridge is many things - mom, partner, and friend being chief among those. We want to add two more titles: magic maker and advocate extraordinaire. In this episode, Dawn breaks down the drive and data behind a national paid leave policy. She shares her own mission of breaking down the political divid…
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Consultant and podcaster Stacy Heller is entering a new phase in life. With four kids in their twenties and a partner of more than 30 years, her role as a mom has shifted so much that she easily has the language of how to pivot and how to guide her family through the process. In this episode, Stacy's honesty and candor exudes joy with raw vulnerabi…
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Building the Village While Building A Family
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What does a snapshot of your life look like in this exact moment? When we look at the slices of American motherhood, it can feel fragmented and disconnected in many ways. Spurring from a conversation about how different an experience it is to raise a family now than in the 1980s (gasp!), BEAM Stories host Amy Kugler kicks off a new series for the s…
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Encore: The Messy Middle with Amy Shoenthal
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30:10
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Bringing back this episode from Season 1 because The Setback Cycle is officially here! Order it here. Wouldn’t it be nice if everything in life were a straight line, up and to the left? Always moving forward, always finding success. If only that were true. Author and Forbes contributor Amy Shoenthal has dedicated her professional and personal life …
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Capturing a Force of Nature - Kate T. Parker
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35:16
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In a world of polished images and perfected poses, photographer, author, and mom Kate T. Parker embraces the messy, wild, unpredictable, and real. In this wide-ranging conversation, Kate shares more about her journey to capture the authentic, raw everyday moments so that women and girls can see their power and be inspired by their courage. Kate's n…
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A new look, a new name...same profoundly impactful stories. BEAM Stories continues the mission that And More with Amy Kugler started, which is to amplify the intersectional stories of motherhood and caregiving so that we can find a way forward that lifts us all. With this evolution, we'll dare to ask some big questions about ambition, equity, menta…
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With so much joy and heartbreak going on in the world, how do we summon the courage to share our experiences? In this personal episode, Amy shares how we need to have the brain space and bandwidth to explore the deeper conversations about how we walk about our world. She explains some of the challenges she's faced over the past few months and how s…
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The 3 Cs to Save Humanity - Baily Hancock
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Baily is back and on a mission to break down any stigma or barrier that prevents us to connecting with ourselves and others. In the second part of Amy's conversation with Baily, they cover how community, connection and collaboration overlap, and how we can approach life from a new perspective to find some key solutions. "Everything is done with the…
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The Antidote to Loneliness - Baily Hancock
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36:40
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"Find your people" or "build your village." The many phrases that encourage us to find our community are inspiring, but how do we actually go about connecting with others when we're in the thick of so many life changes as parents? Motherhood can be isolating and it requires bravery to reach outside of our comfort zone - all of that can stop us in o…
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A Different Kind of Tired - Lindsay Scola
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36:25
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Sleepless nights are part of the caregiving package, but what happens when it veers into a whole new category of "something isn't right?" Even if we're caring for others while working in high-pressure positions, we cannot neglect our sleep health for too long. Speaker and strategist Lindsay Scola spent 19 years advocating for her own sleep health, …
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Parenthood brings up a myriad of emotions, many of which were buried deep down until a comment or an eye-roll bubbles the feelings to the surface. If you're a highly sensitive person and empath like Amy, then you know how quickly moms can go from calm to She-Hulk. (Amy's current PR: 2.5 seconds.) Rage and anger are often branded as an unspeakable t…
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What could be possible if we could build a professional life that allowed us to be ambitious and pursue dreams and also prioritize our caregiving responsibilities? What if we could find alignment within the ebbs and flows of each stage of our life, knowing that we’re living in our values and meeting our own needs so that we can show up fully and no…
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The Intentionality of Building a Full Life - Laura Sullivan
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37:00
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We've heard time and time again how raising kids doesn't have to derail your ambitions, but it's easier said than done. It takes grit, tenacity, some luck and a lot of clear-headed thinking to build a full life that includes both kids and your business dreams. In this episode, we'll hear how Laura Sullivan, co-founder of Sullivan and Sullivan Studi…
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Each new year presents a semi-blank slate and some flexibility to dream and rediscover new possibilities. We often feel the need to label our intentions for the upcoming 365 days and set goals. (Can we just agree that resolutions are so 2019?) For moms and caregivers, this sentiment can either inspire hope or add yet another item on the top of a he…
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For the last new And More episode of 2023, we brought back certified mental health coach & Daring Way Facilitator (and speed-dial friend) Mandy Jankus. In this conversation, Mandy talks about the new podcast she's started, why it's so important to talk about the "both/and" of our many emotions, and what she's learning by sharing her story. Listen t…
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The Dance of Caregiving, Grief, and Self-Compassion - Marisa Renee Lee
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35:17
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We talk a lot about self-compassion and grief. We even have cute sayings like "put your oxygen mask on first," as a way to stave off burnout and fatigue. What happens when you've been in seasons of deep heartbreak, loss, and joy? How do you incorporate grief as a part of the normal ebb and flow of life? Grief advocate, entrepreneur, and best-sellin…
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It's December, which means we hear a common refrain in personal and professional circles. How are you going to "end the year well?" In a society obsessed with optimizing productivity and making every minute count, there's an endless litany of End of Year challenges and strategy sessions to ensuring that you're off to the races once the calendar yea…
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The Power of Moms - Kristin Rowe-Finkbeiner
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How do we know we're actually making a difference in our world? When it's hard to see the progress we've made toward equity for moms and caregivers, I turn to those who can see both the 50k view and the nitty-gritty details. In this episode, we have Moms Rising cofounder and executive director Kristin Rowe-Finkbeiner to share her very keen insight …
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How do we find the “stories beyond the stories” as author Megan Stielstra so aptly says? How do we overcome the barriers of sharing the deeper truths that are really on our hearts? How do we come to a deep breath about all that is going on in the world today? In today’s solo episode, Amy talks about the stories we’ve heard from And More guests so f…
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Shaping the Narrative of Menopause - Jill Angelo
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35:09
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What prompts an experienced Microsoft executive to leave her established tenure to disrupt women's health? For Gennev Founder and CEO Jill Angelo, it all started with an eye-opening conversation about how underserved women's healthcare was during menopause. In this episode, Jill shares about how much progress she's seen in menopause conversations s…
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Charting a New Course with Paid Leave - Kristin Marchese and Shelley Knisley, Armoire
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If half of a women-led small business executive team can feel supported while going on maternity leave at the same time, why is it challenging for other businesses to also make it happen? This was a question posed to Armoire's executive team this year. The best part: the Seattle-based clothing rental service had already instituted a robust paid lea…
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The Greatest Tool for Caregivers - Suzanne Weller
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34:21
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Caregiving isn’t relegated just to moms. We’re helping older parents and loved ones. We’re standing alongside friends going through health battles or relationship snafus. We’re even mentoring those in our professional circles and lifting them up. In this episode, we’ll hear from Suzanne Weller, founder of Weller Collaboration and host of The Courag…
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Digging Deeper into the Questions - Jessica Grose
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33:43
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When you discover you’re pregnant, it can feel like the world shifts on its axis. After New York Times opinion writer Jessica Grose had her first child, the experience set her on a new path to examine and excavate questions of what motherhood would entail - both the perception and the reality. In this episode, we discuss her book SCREAMING ON THE I…
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There’s one thing we know for certain. Life changes - it’s not a matter of if, but when and how. Where we find ourselves is how we ride that wave of change. As moms and caregivers, our strength and resilience is also tested in how we hold space for our families to do the same. In this episode, Cara Cynkar shares how she not only grew as her family …
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The Superpower of Being an Advocate - Sehreen Noor Ali
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34:25
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Building a family should come with a few additional titles: advocate, investigator, superhero, and diplomatic negotiator. Sleuth co-founder Sehreen Noor Ali donned those roles as she watched her young daughter miss developmental milestones. After quitting her full-time role, she and her co-founder took on the task of building a seamless way to leve…
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Giving Ourselves Permission - Mandy Jankus
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33:23
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Being a mom is about handing yourself a million permission slips each day. Certified mental health coach & Daring Way Facilitator Mandy Jankus knows this full well. In this episode, we learn how Mandy launched into her calling for coaching others while healing from trauma, and how she encourages others to have vulnerable, authentic conversations in…
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Wouldn’t it be nice if everything in life were a straight line, up and to the left? Always moving forward, always finding success. If only that were true. Author and Forbes contributor Amy Shoenthal has dedicated her professional and personal life to exploring the trajectory of our life and trying to understand more about how we overcome those setb…
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The Stories that Change Us - Jessi Hempel
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34:46
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Within the span of five years, the world as Jessi Hempel knew it shifted on it’s axis. When exploring the prospect of parenthood, the award-winning journalist and podcast host had to wade through her own fears from her past, the echo chamber of what the world shared a parent should be, and decide how she wanted to move forward. In this show, Jessi …
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Onward and Upward: Unveiling “And More with Amy Kugler”
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29:02
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We all have stories to tell about the multitudes we contain as mothers and caregivers - it’s up to us to share! In the premiere episode of “And More,” Amy sits down for an intimate conversation about the power our stories hold and how we access the strength to tell them. She also gives a preview of what to expect for this new season of in-depth dis…
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Introducing "And More with Amy Kugler" - Premiering Sept. 13
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Introducing And More with Amy Kugler! And More with Amy Kugler is a show that explores the dynamic stories of motherhood and caregiving, and how those stories hold exponential power to be a driving force for change. We’ll have deep conversations with incredible game-changers (moms, and colleagues, and leaders, and operations gurus, and ... more...)…
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