Podcast & Pause: An Unbook Club
Listen. Reflect. Exhale.
Podcast & Pause is a facilitated experience of listening, reflection, and rest for Black people, grounded in the stories and wisdom preserved through The Exit Interview.
Together, we slow down.
We listen to Black educators speak honestly about work, identity, race, belonging, departure, joy, boundaries, reinvention, and what it means to reclaim yourself beyond what an institution expects of you.
Then we pause.
Not to analyze the story.
Not to solve someone else’s experience.
Not to create another action plan.
We make room to notice what the conversation brings up in us—and to be in community with other Black people who are doing the same.
There is nothing to prove here.
Nothing to perform.
Nothing you are expected to fix.
Come as you are.
Join Podcast & Pause: Cohort 3
The next Podcast & Pause cohort is coming soon!
Format: Virtual
Designed for: Black adults across professions and life experiences
Dates: Tuesday, October 6th, 13th, 20th, 27th and November 3rd & 10th
Time: 6 PM MST/8 PM EST
Number of gatherings: 6
Investment: $125
Cohort size: 12 PARTICIPANTS
Registration deadline: OCTOBER 1ST
Space is intentionally limited so the cohort can remain intimate, relational, and grounded in community.
Your Hosts:
More Than Listening to a Podcast
Every now and then, someone tells a story that feels familiar before you fully understand why.
A guest names something you have experienced but never had language for. Another describes leaving a place you are still trying to survive. Someone talks about losing themselves inside a role.
A conversation about joy reminds you of something work has crowded out. You hear another Black person tell the truth and recognize a piece of your own life inside it.
Most podcast listening ends there.
The episode finishes.
You move to the next task.
Podcast & Pause creates another possibility. We stay with the story for a little while. We listen, reflect, breathe, talk, sit quietly, laugh, journal, make connections, and give ourselves enough room to notice what the story has opened.
Is Podcast & Pause for You?
Podcast & Pause welcomes Black adults across professions, industries, and life experiences.
You might still be working inside an institution you care about. You might be wondering whether it is time to leave. A transition may already be behind you.
Perhaps you are rebuilding a relationship with yourself after years of being known primarily by your title, expertise, or ability to carry more than your share.
You may simply want community where you do not have to explain why certain experiences are exhausting.
You do not need to work in education to recognize yourself in these stories.
The experiences preserved through The Exit Interview begin with Black educators, but the questions they raise reach far beyond schools:
Who am I beyond my work?
How much of myself have I given away trying to belong?
What happens when an institution no longer protects my dignity?
What does rest look like when I stop trying to earn it?
What am I allowed to want now?
What might joy feel like outside of survival?
Those questions belong to many of us.
What You’re Joining
Podcast & Pause is a cohort experience rather than a one-time event.
Your registration includes:
A series of facilitated virtual gatherings
Carefully selected episodes and excerpts from The Exit Interview
Guided reflection and journaling
Grounding and breath practices
Facilitated community conversation
Space for quiet, laughter, connection, and rest
A consistent cohort that gathers across the experience
Between-session reflections or resources, when included in the cohort
You are not joining a class. You are entering a space.
What Happens During a Gathering?
There Are No Assignments Here
Each session begins with a story.
A selected Exit Interview episode or excerpt becomes the doorway into a larger conversation.
Podcast & Pause is not professional development disguised as wellness.
Rest is not preparation for more labor.
From there, the experience may include reflection prompts, journaling, grounding practices, small-group connection, facilitated dialogue, silence, breath, movement, or simply time to sit with what you heard.
Participation is invitational.
No one is required to tell a difficult story.
There is no expectation that vulnerability be performed publicly.
Silence is welcome. Listening is participation. Reflection is participation. Rest is participation.
Reflection does not have to become an action plan.
Healing does not need to improve your performance.
Joy does not need to make you more productive.
No one is measuring whether you leave the experience more resilient, more efficient, or better equipped to tolerate what has been harming you.
The value of the pause does not depend on what you accomplish afterward.
You might leave with language for something you have carried quietly.
A connection with someone who understands.
Greater clarity about what you want.
Permission to stop explaining yourself.
A question worth sitting with.
A reminder of who you are beyond what you do.
Or simply a little more room inside yourself.
That is enough.
From Black Educator Space to Black Community Space
That origin remains important. The Exit Interview preserves Black educator stories, and those stories continue to be the foundation of this experience. Yet the more we listened, the clearer something became. The conversations were about education and they were also about much more.
They held questions about identity. Race. Institutional life. Overwork. Dignity. Belonging. Grief. Reinvention. Joy.
The complicated relationship many Black people have with institutions we once believed would value what we brought to them. Those experiences are not confined to schools.
Today, Podcast & Pause welcomes Black people across professional backgrounds into the circle while remaining grounded in the wisdom Black educators have entrusted to The Exit Interview.
The roots remain. The circle has grown.
Rooted in Storykeeping
The stories shared on The Exit Interview were never intended to become disposable content.
They are part of a growing record of Black educator experience.
Podcast & Pause creates another way for those stories to remain alive.
Listening becomes reflection. Reflection opens conversation. Conversation creates recognition. Recognition allows individual experience to connect with something collective.
We engage these stories with care because the people behind them trusted us with something real.
Podcast & Pause began as a space created specifically for Black educators.
What Might You Find in the Pause?
We do not promise transformation on demand. We do create conditions where something different can become possible. Participants may find:
Recognition
Language for an experience that once felt isolated or difficult to name.
Connection
Community with Black people who understand that work, identity, race, ambition, care, and exhaustion can exist together.
Reflection
Room to consider what a story brings forward without immediately being asked what you plan to do about it.
Rest
A place where nothing needs to be produced in exchange for being cared for.
Possibility
Space to imagine yourself beyond the roles, systems, and expectations that have defined you.
The outcome belongs to you.
What We Explore
Every cohort takes on its own shape, guided by the stories we encounter and the conversations that emerge. Themes may include:
Identity beyond work
Dignity
Racial battle fatigue
Institutional harm
Boundaries
Belonging and isolation
The cost of commitment
Rest without guilt
Joy
Community
Grief and transition
Leaving and staying
Reinvention
Family and the ways work follows us home
Reclaiming parts of ourselves that institutions crowded out
Imagining life beyond constant productivity
There is no single conclusion we are trying to reach. We are creating enough room to listen more closely to the stories, to one another, and to ourselves.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do I have to work in education?
No.
Podcast & Pause began with Black educators and remains grounded in stories from The Exit Interview, but the cohort now welcomes Black adults across professions and life experiences.
Do I need to listen to the entire podcast?
No.
You do not need to be a regular listener or know the archive before joining. Information about selected episodes or excerpts will be shared as part of the cohort experience.
Do I have to speak during the sessions?
No.
Participation is invitational. You are welcome to reflect, listen, journal, or simply be present. No one is required to disclose personal experiences.
Are sessions recorded?
No. The intimacy and trust of the cohort matter. Podcast & Pause gatherings are designed to remain within the community present.
What if I miss a session?
No worries. Come to as many gatherings as you can, if you miss one you will not feel lost when you return.
Is Podcast & Pause therapy?
No.
Podcast & Pause is a facilitated healing, reflection, and community experience. It is not therapy, mental health treatment, or a substitute for professional clinical care.
Is this a professional development program?
No.
There are no professional development requirements, assignments, action plans, or expectations that participants apply what happens in the space to their workplaces.
Join Cohort 3
The stories are already there. The pause is what we create together.
Cohort 3 is opening soon.
If you are looking for a Black-centered space to listen, reflect, rest, connect, and explore who you are beyond what the world asks you to produce, there is a place for you here.
Dates: Tuesday, October 6th, 13th, 20th, 27th and November 3rd & 10th
Time: 6 PM MST/8 PM EST
Number of gatherings: 6
Investment: $125
Cohort size: 12 PARTICIPANTS
Registration deadline: OCTOBER 1ST
