The Audacity Tapes™

Episode Summary

What happens when proving people wrong becomes the driving force behind your life?

In this episode of The Audacity Tapes, Dr. Shai Butler shares a deeply honest conversation about survival, achievement, addiction, healing, and the lifelong journey of becoming.

At 14 years old, Shai became a mother and quickly discovered that the world had already begun making assumptions about who she would become. Growing up in pub...

Episode Summary

What happens when kindness stops being performative and starts becoming dangerous?

In this episode of The Audacity Tapes, I sit down with Kind Cotton co-founder Kaitlin Johnstone for a conversation about moral courage, public conviction, and the growing cultural backlash against inclusion, equity, and human dignity.

Before launching Kind Cotton, Kaitlin spent eight years as a kindergarten teacher where she witnessed...

Episode Summary

Movements do not always begin with massive institutions, sweeping reforms, or people with enormous power.

Sometimes they begin quietly. With one person recognizing that vulnerable people are falling through the cracks and deciding the existing system is not enough.

In this episode, Sue Ludwig, founder of the National Association of Neonatal Therapists (NANT), explores how one occupational therapist helped transform ...

Episode Summary At five years old, Erin Mark overheard her father quietly say she likely would not live past eighteen.

The next day, Make-A-Wish arrived at her house.

For decades, Erin lived with cystic fibrosis under the shadow of an expiration date — until a devastating doctor’s appointment forced her to confront a painful reality: sometimes the most dangerous thing a patient can lose is not treatment, but hope.

In this powerful...

What does war actually look like — beyond headlines, beyond politics, beyond distance?

In this powerful and deeply human conversation, Svitlana Salamatova, President of the Geopolitical Alliance of Women, takes us inside the lived reality of Ukraine: a nation fighting not only for territory, but for democracy, dignity, and survival.

This episode is not a geopolitical analysis. It is a firsthand account of what it means to live thro...

This is the final episode in our 5-Part Series:

Women, Power, Justice, and the Global Backlash

Each episode builds on the last—unpacking what’s happening beneath the surface, how power operates, and what it means for women across the world and in our everyday lives.

Episode Summary

After five episodes examining backlash, power, justice, and the human cost of exclusion, we arrive at the only question that matters:

Now what?

In this ...

This is Part 4 of a 5-Part Series:

Women, Power, Justice, and the Global Backlash

Each episode builds on the last—unpacking what’s happening beneath the surface, how power operates, and what it means for women across the world and in our everyday lives.

Episode 4 Summary:

What happens when power stops being political and starts shaping whether you can go to school, leave your house, report violence, protect your children, or simp...

This is Part 3 of a 5-Part Series:

Women, Power, Justice, and the Global Backlash

Each episode builds on the last—unpacking what’s happening beneath the surface, how power operates, and what it means for women across the world and in our everyday lives.

Episode 3 Summary:

We often assume progress means systems are working.

More women in leadership. More policies. More commitments. Stronger language. Greater visibility.

And...

This is Part 2 of a 5-Part Series: Women, Power, Justice, and the Global Backlash Each episode builds on the last—unpacking what’s happening beneath the surface, how it’s operating, and what it means moving forward.

Episode 2 Summary:

After naming the global backlash in Episode 1, the next question becomes unavoidable:

How is power actually shifting underneath it?

Because on the surface, it looks like progress.

More women in leade...

This is Part 1 of a 5-Part Series: Women, Power, Justice, and the Global Backlash

Each episode builds on the last—unpacking what’s happening beneath the surface, how it’s operating, and what it means moving forward. Episode 1 Summary: What I witnessed at the United Nations wasn’t subtle.

It was clear. Consistent. And happening across regions, ideologies, and systems.

In this opening episode, I take you inside what I saw, heard, a...

Episode Summary

We often talk about reinvention like it’s a choice.  A bold decision. A strategic pivot.

For Sarah Barnes-Humphrey, it wasn’t.

After 20 years working in her family’s business — the only career she had ever known — the doors closed just days before her 37th birthday. In a single moment, she lost not just her job, but the identity she had built her life around.

What followed wasn’t clarity. It was uncertainty, surviva...

Episode Summary

What does it take to turn private grief into national change?

In this deeply human and unflinching conversation, Robbin Jorgensen sits down with Kristen Christy — a national leader in suicide prevention, military spouse, and the originator of what became the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline.

Kristen’s story is layered with both love and loss: a life-altering stroke as a teenager, the strength of community in milita...

Episode Summary

We tend to talk about violence after it explodes — after lives are lost and headlines are written. Dr. Andrea “Dr. Dre” Mata believes we’re looking in the wrong place.

A clinical child psychologist and founder of Bright Spot Families, Dr. Mata has dedicated her career to going “upstream” — interrupting harm long before it becomes tragedy. Rooted in the personal loss of her brother to violence, her work focuses not o...

Episode Summary

What happens when the life you built disappears overnight?

In this powerful conversation, Army Command Sergeant Major (Ret.) Gretchen Evans — Purple Heart recipient and founder of Team Unbroken — shares what it means to lose your identity and choose to live anyway.

After surviving a 2006 mortar blast in Afghanistan that left her permanently deaf, Gretchen was medically retired from the military after 27 years of ser...

Gabrielle Claiborne Living Authentically in a World That Debates Your Existence Episode Summary

Do we truly see one another — or do we reduce each other to labels?

In this powerful conversation, Gabrielle Claiborne — author, TEDx speaker, leadership strategist, and advocate — shares what it means to live authentically as a trans woman in a world where identity is debated in headlines and policy rooms.

This episode explores dignity,...

This episode originally aired as part of the Women Igniting Change® podcast. While it reflects the foundational work that shaped this journey, The Audacity Tapes represents a deeper, bolder evolution of these conversations — centered on truth, conviction, and courage. Original episode description below:

“I want to share this keynote with you because we stand at a critical moment in time for women’s rights. And it is going to take ...

This episode originally aired as part of the Women Igniting Change® podcast. While it reflects the foundational work that shaped this journey, The Audacity Tapes represents a deeper, bolder evolution of these conversations — centered on truth, conviction, and courage. Original episode description below:

Hey, changemakers! Today, Robbin introduces an invaluable framework to help you organize and realize the social impact you aim t...

This episode originally aired as part of the Women Igniting Change® podcast. While it reflects the foundational work that shaped this journey, The Audacity Tapes represents a deeper, bolder evolution of these conversations — centered on truth, conviction, and courage. Original episode description below:

“Reproductive health includes so much more than just abortion, yet that’s all people think about because it’s been so politiciz...

This episode originally aired as part of the Women Igniting Change® podcast. While it reflects the foundational work that shaped this journey, The Audacity Tapes represents a deeper, bolder evolution of these conversations — centered on truth, conviction, and courage. Original episode description below:

“Do you even know we exist? Do you have an understanding of refugee camps?” asks Mary Maker who was once a refugee from South S...