Hi, it's Elise Lunan host to Pulling the Thread. Today is a solo episode that is loosely

organized around the concept of efficient creative work. But really, it's about the balance

between the masculine and the feminine, how to set boundaries, how to say no, and what mothering is really about. And I promise that these all

cohere into a loose thesis about bringing your work into the world.

Amazon offers employees up to $8,000 for education and training, like Juliet.

She's now a trained technician. And to her, the sound of machinery in need of repair, reminds

her of how far she's come. In two years, she's landed her dream job, providing her with valuable skills.

That's up to £8,000 for education and training at Amazon.

Eligibility conditions apply.

Hi, it's Elise Lunoonen, host of Pulling the Thread.

On this show, we pull apart the web in which we all live to understand who we are and why we're here.

My hope is that these conversations spark moments of resonance and plant tiny seeds of awareness so that we

might all collectively learn and grow.

Well, hi friends, and happy May to all the moms who are listening with school-age children,

I feel for you right now.

I don't know why May is, well, I do know why May is such an intense grind.

It's a funny month for Mother's Day, too, which of course is a manufactured holiday,

just because it seems when everything starts then diagramming and landing on us

in really intense ways, it provokes all of my anger and antipathy. A few years ago, when

our best behavior first came out, I wrote this op-ed

for the New York Times that sort of had its own virality, which was about the deep ambivalence

of motherhood. And it was about this idea in our culture where we conflate good moms with wanting to be

...