As Holy Week arrives, Kate talks with theologian, poet, and former Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams about joy that doesn’t erase sorrow. Together they explore longing, grief, music, gratitude, hope, and the strange, defiant way joy can sit right beside pain without denying what’s true.

SHOW NOTES


George Herbert, “The Pulley”


Nick Cave


Hannah Coulter by Wendell Berry


Tour dates & tickets: katebowler.com/joyfulanyway


Watch the live conversation on YouTube


Join Kate Bowler on Substack for the season of Lent: katebowler.substack.com

As Holy Week arrives, Kate talks with theologian, poet, and former Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams about joy that doesn&rsquo;t erase sorrow. Together they explore longing, grief, music, gratitude, hope, and the strange, defiant way joy can sit right beside pain without denying what&rsquo;s true.
<hr>
SHOW NOTES
<ul data-pm-slice="3 3 []">
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
<a href="https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44370/the-pulley">George Herbert, &ldquo;The Pulley&rdquo;</a>
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
<a href="https://www.nickcave.com">Nick Cave</a>
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
<a href="https://bookshop.org/p/books/hannah-coulter-wendell-berry/173f40bc83390d48?ean=9781593760786&amp;next=t&amp;&amp;utm_source=google&amp;utm_medium=cpc&amp;utm_campaign=dsa_nonbrand&amp;utm_content=%7Badgroupname%7D&amp;utm_term=dsa-19959388920&amp;gad_source=1&amp;gad_campaignid=12440232635&amp;gbraid=0AAAAACfld43f-qCcOSINhBBx4Bt7a0c0k&amp;gclid=CjwKCAjwvqjOBhAGEiwAngeQnY5dakZxTq_qbs34NERV6j9bnHeesF-6XkDIs3T34EwD50zmmghfDBoCsr8QAvD_BwE">Hannah Coulter by Wendell Berry</a>
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
Tour dates &amp; tickets:<a href="https://katebowler.com/books/joyfulanyway/">&nbsp;katebowler.com/joyfulanyway</a>
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
Watch the live conversation on&nbsp;<a href="https://www.youtube.com/@katecbowler">YouTube</a>
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
Join Kate Bowler on Substack for the season of Lent:&nbsp;<a href="https://katebowler.substack.com/">katebowler.substack.com</a>
</li>
</ul>

Are you living your best life now? Not always? This is a podcast for you. Duke Professor Kate Bowler is an expert in the stories we tell about success and failure, suffering and happiness. She had Stage IV cancer. Then she didn’t. And since then, all she wants to do is talk to funny and wise people about how to live with the knowledge that, well, everything happens.  Find her online at @katecbowler.

Sales and Distribution by Lemonada Media https://lemonadamedia.com/

Are you living your best life now? Not always? This is a podcast for you. Duke Professor Kate Bowler is an expert in the stories we tell about success and failure, suffering and happiness. She had Stage IV cancer. Then she didn’t. And since then, all she wants to do is talk to funny and wise people about how to live with the knowledge that, well, everything happens.  Find her online at @katecbowler.
Sales and Distribution by Lemonada Media <a href="https://lemonadamedia.com/" data-stringify-link="https://lemonadamedia.com/" data-sk="tooltip_parent">https://lemonadamedia.com/</a>

Honest conversation about life's less-shiny moments.

Everything Happens with Kate Bowler

The Strange Gift of Joy with Rowan Williams

There’s a particular kind of pressure that creeps in when we start measuring our lives—where we thought we’d be by now, who we imagined we’d become, how things were supposed to feel. The instinct is to fix it. Optimize it. Get moving.

But what if the invitation is something else?

Kate Bowler sits down with writer and speaker Suleika Jaouad (Between Two Kingdoms, The Book of Alchemy) for a conversation about living inside unresolved questions—especially the ones that ache. Together, they talk about ambition and exhaustion, chronic illness and uncertainty, and the quiet shifts that happen when nothing seems to change.

They explore the tension between momentum and meaning, the limits of self-improvement, and what it looks like to keep going without pretending everything is fixable.

SHOW NOTES


Suleika Jaouad’s Isolation Journals (Substack)


Between Two Kingdoms — Suleika Jaouad


The Book of Alchemy — Suleika Jaouad


Tour dates & tickets: katebowler.com/joyfulanyway


Watch the live conversation on YouTube


Join Kate Bowler on Substack for the season of Lent: katebowler.substack.com

There&rsquo;s a particular kind of pressure that creeps in when we start measuring our lives&mdash;where we thought we&rsquo;d be by now, who we imagined we&rsquo;d become, how things were supposed to feel. The instinct is to fix it. Optimize it. Get moving.
But what if the invitation is something else?
Kate Bowler sits down with writer and speaker Suleika Jaouad (Between Two Kingdoms, The Book of Alchemy) for a conversation about living inside unresolved questions&mdash;especially the ones that ache. Together, they talk about ambition and exhaustion, chronic illness and uncertainty, and the quiet shifts that happen when nothing seems to change.
They explore the tension between momentum and meaning, the limits of self-improvement, and what it looks like to keep going without pretending everything is fixable.
<hr>
SHOW NOTES
<ul>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
Suleika Jaouad&rsquo;s <a href="https://theisolationjournals.substack.com">Isolation Journals</a> (Substack)
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
<a href="https://bookshop.org/p/books/between-two-kingdoms-a-memoir-of-a-life-interrupted-suleika-jaouad/7b9b08059bab2526?ean=9780399588600&amp;next=t">Between Two Kingdoms</a> &mdash; Suleika Jaouad
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
<a href="https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-book-of-alchemy-a-creative-practice-for-an-inspired-life-suleika-jaouad/1f7a561e34f2384b?ean=9780593734636&amp;next=t">The Book of Alchemy</a> &mdash; Suleika Jaouad
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
Tour dates &amp; tickets:<a href="https://katebowler.com/books/joyfulanyway/">&nbsp;katebowler.com/joyfulanyway</a>
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
Watch the live conversation on&nbsp;<a href="https://www.youtube.com/@katecbowler">YouTube</a>
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
Join Kate Bowler on Substack for the season of Lent:&nbsp;<a href="https://katebowler.substack.com/">katebowler.substack.com</a>
</li>
</ul>

Living the Questions (Without Fixing Yourself) with Suleika Jaouad

What if Lent isn’t about giving something up, but about learning how to sit with what’s already gone? In this episode, Kate talks with poet, priest, and theologian Malcolm Guite about the kind of faith that can hold contradiction—the yes and the no, belief and doubt, beauty and sorrow. Malcolm, a Life Fellow at Girton College, Cambridge and author of Sounding the Seasons and Lifting the Veil, reflects on prayer as attention, poetry as a language spacious enough for ambivalence, and why faith might need less forced resolution and more honesty.

SHOW NOTES


Sounding the Seasons by Malcolm Guite


Lifting the Veil by Malcolm Guite


Seamus Heaney, Station Island


George Herbert, “Prayer”


Gerard Manley Hopkins, the “terrible sonnets” (including “No worst, there is none”) and The Wreck of the Deutschland


T.S. Eliot, Four Quartets


C.S. Lewis, “Blue Spells and Flowered Spheres”


Tour dates & tickets: katebowler.com/joyfulanyway


Watch the live conversation on YouTube


Join Kate Bowler on Substack for the season of Lent: katebowler.substack.com

What if Lent isn&rsquo;t about giving something up, but about learning how to sit with what&rsquo;s already gone? In this episode, Kate talks with poet, priest, and theologian Malcolm Guite about the kind of faith that can hold contradiction&mdash;the yes and the no, belief and doubt, beauty and sorrow. Malcolm, a Life Fellow at Girton College, Cambridge and author of Sounding the Seasons and Lifting the Veil, reflects on prayer as attention, poetry as a language spacious enough for ambivalence, and why faith might need less forced resolution and more honesty.
<hr>
SHOW NOTES
<ul data-pm-slice="3 3 []">
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
Sounding the Seasons by Malcolm Guite
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
Lifting the Veil by Malcolm Guite
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
Seamus Heaney, Station Island
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
George Herbert, &ldquo;Prayer&rdquo;
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
Gerard Manley Hopkins, the &ldquo;terrible sonnets&rdquo; (including &ldquo;No worst, there is none&rdquo;) and The Wreck of the Deutschland
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
T.S. Eliot, Four Quartets
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
C.S. Lewis, &ldquo;Blue Spells and Flowered Spheres&rdquo;
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
Tour dates &amp; tickets:<a href="https://katebowler.com/books/joyfulanyway/">&nbsp;katebowler.com/joyfulanyway</a>
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
Watch the live conversation on&nbsp;<a href="https://www.youtube.com/@katecbowler">YouTube</a>
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
Join Kate Bowler on Substack for the season of Lent:&nbsp;<a href="https://katebowler.substack.com/">katebowler.substack.com</a>
</li>
</ul>

What If Prayer Isn’t What You Think It Is? with Malcolm Guite

We live in a world that wants life to be fair. Work hard, make good choices, believe the right things—and things should turn out okay. But what happens when they don’t? In this live conversation, Kate talks with sociologist Mark Rank, author of The Random Factor, about the role of chance in our lives. From the lottery of birth to the timing of a missed phone call, Mark’s research shows how much of what we call success—or failure—comes down to forces we never chose.

SHOW NOTES:


Mark Rank,The Random Factor: How Chance and Luck Profoundly Shape Our Lives and the World Around Us


Mark Rank – Washington University in St. Louis


Christian Tomasetti et al., research on random mutations and cancer risk (Johns Hopkins)


Every Cure (founded by David Fajgenbaum)


Tour dates & tickets: katebowler.com/joyfulanyway


Watch the live conversation on YouTube


Join Kate Bowler on Substack for the season of Lent: katebowler.substack.com

We live in a world that wants life to be fair. Work hard, make good choices, believe the right things&mdash;and things should turn out okay. But what happens when they don&rsquo;t? In this live conversation, Kate talks with sociologist Mark Rank, author of The Random Factor, about the role of chance in our lives. From the lottery of birth to the timing of a missed phone call, Mark&rsquo;s research shows how much of what we call success&mdash;or failure&mdash;comes down to forces we never chose.
<hr>
SHOW NOTES:
<ul data-pm-slice="3 3 []">
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
Mark Rank,<a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/books/the-random-factor/hardcover"> The Random Factor: How Chance and Luck Profoundly Shape Our Lives and the World Around Us</a>
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
<a href="https://brownschool.washu.edu/faculty-and-research/mark-rank/">Mark Rank &ndash; Washington University in St. Louis</a>
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
Christian Tomasetti et al., <a href="https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/news/media/releases/bad_luck_of_random_mutations_plays_predominant_role_in_cancer_study_shows">research on random mutations and cancer risk</a> (Johns Hopkins)
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
<a href="https://everycure.org/">Every Cure</a> (founded by David Fajgenbaum)
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
Tour dates &amp; tickets:<a href="https://katebowler.com/books/joyfulanyway/">&nbsp;katebowler.com/joyfulanyway</a>
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
Watch the live conversation on&nbsp;<a href="https://www.youtube.com/@katecbowler">YouTube</a>
</li>
<li data-list-indent="1" data-list-type="bulleted">
Join Kate Bowler on Substack for the season of Lent:&nbsp;<a href="https://katebowler.substack.com/">katebowler.substack.com</a>
</li>
</ul>

The Strange Gift of Joy with Rowan Williams

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