Lights on a Similar Path: ‘Awake’ Readers Reflect On Finding Their Way

For The Love With Jen Hatmaker Podcast

Jen Hatmaker

Relationships, Society & Culture

4.6 • 6.3K Ratings

🗓️ 8 October 2025

⏱️ 76 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Description: In this moving episode, listeners share their own tender and personal stories inspired by Jen's bestselling book, "Awake," which debuted at number three on the New York Times bestseller list. The touching and heartrending voicemails coming in from readers of “Awake” highlight our yearning to build our lives on solid foundations, our propensity to reach for community and friendship, and the shared human experience we feel around suffering and pain. In this deeply emotional episode, listeners recount overcoming stories of adversity and finding hope, often describing "Awake" as a "life raft" during their own challenging times and Jen gets to hear the profound impact that “Awake” is having on readers everywhere. Tune in for an inspiring journey through the voices of those touched by "Awake." Thought-provoking Quotes: “These listener voicemail episodes are so resonant. I love them. Y'all always say the truest, most beautiful, hardest things. Honestly, I'm always grateful for your courage to come on this show and say your thing out loud.” – Jen Hatmaker “I didn’t know Jen was about to curl up in my cave and hold me close. I didn’t know her story, which I expected to be irrelevant to mine, would tell me that I am okay, normal, and I won’t stay this way.” – Anonymous reader/listener “The best teachers don’t tell, they show. Although you say this book is not prescriptive and you’re not telling us what to do, you’ve shown us how to live a life and get through hard things with integrity, honesty, discretion, and strength. You’ve shown us how to take responsibility and ownership of our own shit. Your friends have shown us how to show up fully and unconditionally. Beautiful examples of love and friendship. Your family has shown us how to be there as an unwavering and loving presence to get through their hardest things.” Reader/listener, Denise “My life broke apart too and thankfully I had friendships to fall back on. It wasn’t a thing where I was grateful in hindsight. I was able to be grateful for it in the moment, which is not typically how stories unfold.” – Anonymous reader/listener Resources Mentioned in This Episode: Awake: A Memoir by Jen Hatmaker - https://amzn.to/3KDAalt 107 Days by Kamala Harris - https://amzn.to/47aZ6tb Poems & Prayers by Matthew McConaughey - https://amzn.to/473gy1Q Fierce, Free and Full of Fire: The Guide to Being Glorious You by Jen Hatmaker - https://amzn.to/48jrtXg Emily P. Freeman Podcast episode 374: Tell the Whole Truth with Jen Hatmaker - https://emilypfreeman.com/podcast/374/ For the Love Podcast: A Lantern for Others in Dark Spaces: Jen Hatmaker on Sharing Her Most Tender Story - https://jenhatmaker.com/podcasts/series-64/a-lantern-for-others-in-dark-spaces-jen-hatmaker-on-sharing-her-most-tender-story/ 7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess by Jen Hatmaker - https://amzn.to/4mTSzrM Connect with Jen!Jen’s Website - https://jenhatmaker.com/ Jen’s Instagram - https://instagram.com/jenhatmakerJen’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/jenHatmaker/ Jen’s Facebook - https://facebook.com/jenhatmakerJen’s YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/JenHatmaker The For the Love Podcast is presented by Audacy. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Friends, I want to share a little piece of Awake with you today.
0:08.5	This book is the truest thing I've ever written.
0:12.4	And it was important to me that the audiobook feel as real and intimate as the words themselves,
0:20.7	frankly, even more so than just in print.
0:24.8	So here is a short clip straight from the audio version of Awake. Part 1. The End.
0:34.1	Over. At 2.30 a.m. on July 11th, 2020, out of a dead sleep, I hear five whispered words not meant for me.
0:46.5	I just can't quit you. My husband of 26 years is voice texting his girlfriend next to me in our bed.
0:56.9	It is the end of my life as I know it. The next four hours are chaos. While he eventually passes out from a treacherous
1:04.1	combination of booze and exposure, I follow a trail of betrayal on his computer an entire other life. My body is frozen. I can't even cry.
1:16.7	My whole world is slipping away click by click. I float above myself, watching my brain absorb the
1:24.2	impossible, watching my heart splinter. So this is what it looks like,
1:30.3	when a life unravels in real time. It's quieter than I expected. The kids are upstairs
1:37.2	asleep, unaware that their story has just split in half. They went to bed in the hazy,
1:43.9	lazy days of summer, polluted by a four-month-old
1:47.0	COVID outbreak, but otherwise sleeping the comfortable sleep of kids whose parents will always be just
1:53.0	downstairs. Family disruption might come from the outside, but never from within. Not ours
1:59.3	anyway. I keep thinking, they don't know.
2:03.3	I don't want to know.
2:04.7	I want to go upstairs with them and not know.
2:08.4	At 6.30 a.m., having endured as much discovery as a.
2:13.2	I can take in four middle of the night hours,
2:16.2	I wake him up and ask for the full truth and nothing
	...

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