Tayari Jones on "Kin" & Letters & The Bonds of Family

Matthew Quick on "Dad, Love, Me," Sobriety, and Forgiving the Unforgivable

New York Times bestselling author Matthew Quick joins Brian for an intimate conversation about Dad, Love, Me, his deeply personal debut memoir written as a letter to his ailing father. Matthew opens up about growing up with an angry and withholding parent, carrying his father’s critical voice into adulthood, and achieving extraordinary literary success while privately struggling with depression, addiction, and creative paralysis. He discusses getting sober, turning to Jungian analysis, and moving closer to his parents after his father was diagnosed with dementia, hoping to find some form of connection before time ran out. Together, Brian and Matthew explore father hunger, wounded masculinity, the inheritance of shame, and the complicated work of forgiving someone who never learned how to love you well. It is a candid and ultimately hopeful conversation about ending generational cycles, choosing compassion without denying the past, and discovering that healing does not always arrive in the form we expect.

Cecily Mak on Going Alcohol-Free, Finding Clarity, and Living "Undimmed"

Cecily Mak joins Shelf Care Society for a deeply thoughtful conversation about alcohol-free living, unwanted habits, and the clarity that becomes possible when we stop dimming ourselves. Cecily is the author of Undimmed: The Eight Awarenesses for Freedom from Unwanted Habits, a founding General Partner at Wisdom Ventures, a breast cancer survivor, mother of two, and an advocate for a more honest public conversation about alcohol and health. In this episode, Brian and Cecily discuss how her thirty-day experiment to go alcohol-free changed her life, and how habits like drinking, scrolling, overworking, or staying constantly busy can become “dimmers” that keep us from fully feeling and fully living. They also talk about family history, AA, meditation, found time in sobriety, Big Alcohol, breast cancer, and why Cecily’s Eight Awarenesses offer a more spacious and compassionate path toward freedom. This is a conversation for anyone who has ever wondered what might become possible if they stopped reaching for the thing that helps them escape and started listening to the life waiting underneath.

Kerry Docherty on "Selfish" & The Permission to Want More

What does it really mean to be “selfish”… and why are so many of us afraid of it? This week on Shelf Care Society, I sit down with Kerry Docherty, co-founder of Faherty and author of Selfish, a sharp, deeply personal memoir about unlearning the roles that keep us small. We start where the book does: on a therapist’s couch, where Kerry and her husband are negotiating Kerry's salary. From there, we unpack the invisible contracts so many of us inherit around marriage, work, ambition, and worth and what it takes to break them. We also discuss "soul contracts"! In this conversation, we get into: * Why “selfish” might be the most misunderstood word in personal growth * The cost of being the reliable one in every room * How ambition shifts when you stop performing for approval * What it looks like to rewrite your role inside a marriage, a family, and a business * The uncomfortable decisions that actually change a life This is a conversation about telling the truth, even when it disrupts everything around you.

Tayari Jones on "Kin" & Letters & The Bonds of Family

What do we owe the people who made us? This week on Shelf Care Society, I sit down with Tayari Jones to talk about her stunning new novel, Kin, an Oprah's Book Club selection. Tayari has a way of writing families that feel both intimate and expansive. In Kin, she turns her attention to legacy and inheritance through the lives of two girls, Niecy and Annie, and the bond that connects them across time. I take a shot at providing an overview of Kin—and Tayari reacts! We discuss what it means for a novel like Kin to resonate at this moment, and why stories about family, history, and inheritance continue to find us exactly when we need them.

Liz Tran On Why Your "Agility Quotient" (AQ) Might Matter More Than Your IQ

What if the thing that determines your success isn’t how smart you are, but how quickly you can adapt? This week on Shelf Care Society, I’m joined by Liz Tran, executive coach and author of AQ: The Agility Quotient. We talk about why agility is becoming the defining skill of our time and how to build it in a world that rarely slows down. Liz shares how AQ shows up in your career, your relationships, and your identity, especially in moments when everything you thought was stable begins to shift. We get into reinvention, letting go of outdated versions of yourself, and learning how to move forward without a clear roadmap. If you’ve been feeling stuck or sensing that your life is asking something new of you, this conversation will meet you there.