Come As You Are Podcast

I was going to send the podcast episode with a micro essay as usual, but I have been hit with a blinding migraine so I’m going to keep this short. Side note — once I read that migraines are caused by “too many thoughts” and I suppose that could be true.It makes me very sad and also enraged, that every time I write about the countless experiences I had with predatory men as a little girl and a teenager and a young woman — and continue to have as a grown woman (with the added horror of having to worry about my teenage daughter out in this mess) — there is a deafening chorus of women in the comments saying, Me, too.I wonder who we would all be if we did not have to spend so much energy assessing our surroundings all the time, and wondering whether we are safe — safe in a literal, physical sense — but also safe to express ourselves, to say no, to speak up, to take up space, to not waste so much time questioning our worth, to not have to fight so hard for basic things like respect, dignity and bodily autonomy — while simultaneously being expected to hold up the sky. I wonder who we’d be if we could jog at 5am or 9pm without thinking twice, if we could walk through an empty parking lot without glancing over our shoulders, if we could walk down a desolate street without feeling the need to put our keys between our fingers, if we could leave our drinks unattended when we’re out with friends…Why do they never ask what men were wearing?I wonder who we’d be if we were believed when something bad happened, when a man did a thing that is painful to repeat, let alone to have lived through. I wonder who we’d be if we could pass a man on a hiking trail and not worry if there was no one else in sight. I wonder who we’d be if the names they redacted were the names of the children, not the horrific men who hurt them.I wonder who we’d be if the good men in our lives worked a little bit harder to show us we aren’t in this fight alone — because it feels that way too much of the time.Maybe we’d smile more. Sending love to anyone having a tough time right now. None of this is easy, but we are not delicate, and we have each other. That’s a lot. Come As You Are is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit allyhamilton.yogisanonymous.com/subscribe

I’ve been having vivid nightmares lately, and they have a theme: I’m out somewhere, and suddenly someone is threatening me. Last week, I was pushing a baby carriage in a place that wasn’t familiar. It was nighttime, and I was walking next to a hotel. A man passed me and I knew he intended to hurt me, the way you know things in a dream. I picked up my pace and glanced up at the hotel to see if anyone was on any of the balconies, but they were empty. I looked over my shoulder, and sure enough, the man had paused. When we made eye contact he started running toward me, eyes wild. I screamed. I screamed so loudly I woke my dog.Last night I had a similar dream. I was in some kind of village, but everyone was dressed like it was Colonial times. It’s my subconscious, what can I tell you? There was a furious woman chasing me. I ducked into a store. There were rows of bookshelves almost to the ceiling, there was a huge, empty birdcage for sale in a corner, there were umbrellas in a stand — more likely parasols if I was dreaming realistically — or so Google tells me. I ducked behind one of the huge shelves, and peeked around the corner in time to see the woman come bounding through the doors. She knew exactly where I was. I understood she intended to kill me, I didn’t know why. I looked down and realized I had a pole in my hands, so held it up and yelled at her to stay away from me! Woke the dog, again.You don’t have to be an oneirologist to catch the drift. I’m feeling vulnerable, like there are threats coming from every side. The baby carriage represents, no doubt, some feeling I have that I can’t keep my kids safe. No one being on the balconies is the disappointment I feel in people who are going about their lives as though everything is normal. Finding myself in Colonial America is (almost) hilarious. I have to give my subconscious an A+ for use of metaphor. Maybe tonight I’ll dream of Joan of Arc.On the plus side, the moment I open my mouth to yell, I yell. This is new. For most of my adult life, if I have a nightmare and want to scream, no sound comes out. This is a terrible feeling, whether you’re awake or asleep. The feeling of being in imminent danger and wanting to call for help, only to find you cannot make a sound? I take it as a positive change that now when I go to scream in my dream, I scream in real life — it took me years but I have finally found my voice. Perhaps not a positive development for the dog, but I like to think I make it up to him in a million other ways.There are good reasons to have some hope. Liam Conejo Ramos and his father are home. I take this as the most tangible and joy-affirming evidence that our loud, unwavering refusal to accept the inhumanity and lawlessness of this administration — works. It might not work as quickly as we’d like, but it works — and so does our judicial system, some of the time. Democratic U.S. Representative from Texas Joaquin Castro has been working tirelessly on their release. He went to Dilley Detention Center to meet with Liam and his dad Adrian while they were detained. He traveled with them from Texas back to Minnesota. Their attorney, Mark Prokosch, is continuing to represent them. There is a gofundme for Liam and his family if you are able to contribute any amount, it’s going to be a long road. There are judges like the Honorable U.S. District Judge Fred Biery. In his Opinion and Order granting a Writ of Release to Liam and his father, he did not hold back. I encourage you to read his Opinion in full, and I propose we call him Fiery Biery from this day forward. Yes, “Biery” is pronounce “beer” “ee” and no, I don’t care. Here is just a taste:“Observing human behavior confirms that for some among us the perfidious lust for unbridled power, and the imposition of cruelty in its quest, know no bounds and are bereft of human decency. And the rule of law be damned.”We shall see what happens with the DHS bill. The Epstein files are horrific. There’s too much coming at us every day, and no one can keep up, which is the point. It seems 37% of our population is still supporting this administration for reasons that boggle the mind. They seem to feel fine if the Constitution guarantees their rights, but no one else’s — certainly not liberals, immigrants, Black or brown people, or anyone in the LGBTQ community — and also most women, generally. Maybe they’d make an exception for a few people they know, but probably not.Here is a funny thing about strangers. When we walk out the door in the morning, we’re all strangers to most of the people we encounter. We don’t know a thing about them — what they’ve been through, what they’re going through right now, what keeps them up at night. If you crossed paths with either of my children today, it’s likely you would not know they are mine — but they mean everything to me, and I hope with my entire heart that you would treat them the way I would treat your most precious people if we met somewhere, somehow. We all need a kind stranger sometimes. How this is confusing to anyone is beyond me. The smug confidence that allows a person to “other” someone else is one of the most painful forms of ignorance I’ve seen in my lifetime. These are the people who believe in God and call themselves Christian, too. If that’s your worldview, aren’t these God’s children you’re “othering”? I don’t know, but I would think God is going to have some words for you at the Pearly Gates before you head elsewhere. You might want to slow down with the laughing emojis — just a thought.There’s no such thing as other people’s children. We all belong to each other, and to the world. Sending you a lot of love, friends. Keep at it. Love always wins in the end. Come As You Are is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit allyhamilton.yogisanonymous.com/subscribe

We don’t even get a day to recover anymore, which is the plan and the point. They want to exhaust people like you and me, people who are heartbroken, scared and furious — so we become overwhelmed beyond comprehension, and stop raging. I don’t know what they think. Maybe they imagine we won’t post videos anymore, we’ll stop talking to one another, stop protesting. This is how an organized crime gang would behave if they moved into a neighborhood and wanted to make sure we understood they were in charge now. They’d let one of their own murder a mother of three in cold blood, and not worry about the videos with the five different angles, the slow motion renderings, the 3D models. They’d block local law enforcement from the scene, tamper with evidence, and allow the killer to walk free. They’d hide him, even. They’d send a puppy-executioner to tell a fictional, insulting tale about what happened, without even bothering to get the glaring facts right. Later, when the autopsy results showed she had a pulse for eight long minutes while her wife sat on the ground, sobbing into their dog — eight minutes they refused to allow a doctor to check on her — they’d just shrug. Then they’d sit back and laugh, watching their zombie-apocalypse-followers repeat the party line.Before we could wrap our heads around that, we’d see photos of a sweet, tiny boy in a light blue bunny hat being loaded into an ICE vehicle, a giant gloved hand on his back. They’d lie about that, too. They’d say his dad was here illegally, his whole family was — and not worry about the fact that it isn’t true. Because facts don’t matter, and they know it. They can just say a thing is true. I don’t even think their followers believe it — they understand the game. Daddy tells you what he wants you to say, or he sends Noem, Miller, Hegseth, Leavitt, or Vance to do his bidding. It doesn’t matter, they all spit venom the same, and you take your orders like a good soldier. Yes, Daddy. Understood, Daddy. We’ll go drive those left-wing liberals crazy, Daddy, hahahaha. Will you make us another AI video shitting on them later as a treat?Then they get on the internet and say black is white or wrong is right or good is bad or these people are getting what they deserve and soon America will be white again — like it or not you woke-ass whiners, why don’t you just leave if you hate it here so much?I don’t know to what degree you have to hate yourself to give your blind loyalty to a man who would step directly onto your head if it was in his way, but it must be a lot. I guess the rage must run so deep, you can look at an innocent little boy who is surely traumatized by now — and feel nothing — and be willing to make up stories about his family so you can laugh at devastated strangers on the internet. You can say it was his dad who abandoned him, or that his mother wouldn’t open the door and that’s why this happened, and what were these kindhearted, patriotic ICE agents supposed to do? Drive away and leave him on the doorstep with his mom right on the other side of the front door, begging them to do exactly that, while her husband screamed at her not to open the door — because if she did, they’d take her, too — and then who would be there when their middle school tween got home? You can watch a man shoot a woman in the face three times because of his teeny, weeny, peeny ego, and side with him, and feel not even a flicker of sadness for her, for her three children, for her wife, her parents, or her dog. You just don’t care. She should have stayed home, like you. She shouldn’t have given a crap about her neighbors, then she’d be alive.How about now, I wonder? Alex Pretti is getting dangerously close to someone you’d almost like, minus the liberalism and caring about your neighbors part. He was all heart and courage and kindness, so nothing like you, but you catch my drift. If you’d passed him on a hiking trail, you might not have been sure. He’ll never go hiking again, though. Tall, young, white, thirty-seven-year-old lawful gun-owner with a permit to carry. Totally legal in Minnesota. So now what. Now they’ve executed a white man who believed in the Second Amendment. It doesn’t matter, though. These folks will play whatever game their Daddy wants. A couple of weeks ago they were screaming that Renee Nicole Good should have stayed home, minding her own business. Then she’d be alive. Same people who have no problem that Kyle Rittenhouse drove twenty miles to go to a protest and involve himself in other people’s business. Hypocrisy runs through their veins in place of blood, it’s how it is.Today, a lot of these people were screaming that Alex Pretti put his hands on federal agents and then went for his gun — but he absolutely did not. This is getting so old and tired. This is a painful and horrifying execution, so do not watch unless you have the resources to do that right now, or feel the need to see for yourself. He was there filming. An ICE agent initiated contact with him, starting pushing him back toward the sidewalk. Then another woman, also filming, had a chemical agent sprayed directly into her face. Alex went to help her. He’s a registered nurse. He works at the VA hospital in MN, has for ten years. Everyone there loves him. Everyone there loved him. He was always helping people, always kind. He’s been protesting since Renee Good, he talked to his parents about it a couple of weeks ago. They told him to be careful, and he promised them he would, said he wouldn’t do anything but observe. They are heartbroken, obviously, but they are also furious. When they pepper-sprayed the woman, Alex went to help. He put his body between her and the agent. He said, “It’s okay!” attempting to de-escalate, a thing ICE agents are supposed to do but definitely 100% do not do. He also asked if she was okay. Then they sprayed him in the face. You can kill people like that. Then five or six guys tackled him. His hands were on the ground the entire time, likely because he couldn’t see. They beat him, and one of the agents took Alex’s gun out of his holster — you can see that happen in the video. Alex Pretti was not just incapacitated when they executed him, but also unarmed. Then one of the thugs shot him, multiple times. They executed him. At no time did he reach for his gun. At no time did he threaten the agents.If a single Democrat senator funds this DHS bill, that needs to be the end of their career. We need to vote out anyone who continues to participate in the war our government is waging against its own people. They’re killing us in the streets. Their supporters will be with them till the end if they’re still with them now, so stop wasting your energy fighting with people who want to pretend up is down. We need our energy to keep each other safe, any way we can. If you’re here in the states and you haven’t been doing anything proactive, if you thought this might pass you by, if you don’t like to “be political” — non-participation is not an option anymore. Truly, it is not. It hasn’t been. Please find a way to help. The incredible Wyrd Sister made two versions of the Renee Good t-shirts from my little protest sign. They’re so great. All the proceeds after cost go to either the ACLU (always doing incredible work to fight this administration at every turn): https://wyrdshirts.threadless.com/designs/just-anotheror the National Queer and Trans Therapists of Color Network:https://wyrdshirts.threadless.com/designs/just-another-trans-versionSending you so much love. I am angry, I am heartbroken, I am so horrified by people who are still supporting this — but I am not without hope. There are more of us. There are more of us, I promise you. We have so much heart. We have not lost our way. We have not lost our souls. It is scary, but we have each other. Meet you in the comments if you need a little love.Come As You Are is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Thank you for being here. These are scary times, and community is everything. I love you and I am sending hugs. I’m a mom, it’s part of the gig xo This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit allyhamilton.yogisanonymous.com/subscribe

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit allyhamilton.yogisanonymous.com/subscribe

This week’s episode is about men who hate women and the women who love them. It’s about people (mostly men) screaming at me in all caps that the division and violence in our country is due to rhetoric from “radical left lunatics” like me — and not because we’ve reached a point where 30% of the people in our country would not care if I got shot in the face three times for worrying about my neighbors. They would shrug and say I should have thought about my kids, stayed home, and minded my own business — then I’d still be alive. That’s what they said about Renee Good. That’s what they’re saying about women who are trying to take care of their communities. We’re the problem. What a shock. These are MAGA men, and the women who support them, and I got a very unpleasant taste of the way they think under an essay I wrote recently. There was no room to talk about violations of the Fourth, Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments, no willingness to look at actual examples of ICE agents grabbing people from their legal immigration appointments, rappelling out of a helicopter and into a building in Chicago, busting down doors without a warrant anywhere in sight. No ability to talk about children zip-tied and thrown into the backs of U-hauls, some of them U.S. citizens. No conversation about the ways this has been happening for a year.They just wanted to scream at me.People are filming ICE raids for a reason. Nonviolent protest and civil disobedience are as old as Jesus Christ, as any Christian who read the Bible would tell you. So is state-sanctioned murder. Rosa Parks was protesting and committing an act of civil disobedience when she refused to give up her seat on the bus. Should she have stayed home, minding her own business?People filming ICE agents are not trying to impede or harass anyone, they’re trying to keep their neighbors safe, and they are thinking about their children. They’re thinking about what kind of world they’re going to inherit if we’re going to allow a Mad King to overtake our democracy.Greenland and every NATO country is looking at us in shock, horror, and utter despair. Anyone who loves this country ought to feel the same. Men who hate women should never be in power. They are violent and they do not understand consent. Not when it comes to women and girls, not when it comes to countries who do not want to be owned by us.Renee Good should still be here. She would be if an angry man with a gun hadn’t decided to defend his fragile ego because two queer women were too relaxed for his liking, not impressed by him, not intimidated. There’s no such thing as “toxic empathy” — there’s just empathy, and you have it, or you don’t. There is such a thing as toxic masculinity, though, and it sounds like calling someone a “f*****g b***h” after you shoot her in the face three times. All this and more on the pod. Grateful for the men who like and respect women (because, duh), grateful for the people who care about their neighbors, all of them. Stay safe out there as best you can. We love you, Minneapolis. And always grateful for the fantastic, brilliant, strong women in my life — and all women and girls of every background everywhere. Don’t let the b******s get you down.Sending you love.Come As You Are is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit allyhamilton.yogisanonymous.com/subscribe

This week’s podcast episode is full of heartbreak and fury. It’s about Venezuela, Greenland, Colombia, Cuba, and Canada. It includes The Monroe Doctrine, The Roosevelt Corollary, the Authorized Use of Military Force, a screeching Stephen Miller, and an administration with no qualms about doing/taking/killing what it wants — ethics, decency, truth, and the Constitution be damned. It’s about January 6th, five years ago, and how we should have stopped this, then. Most of all, though, it’s about Renee Nicole Good, which means it’s about all of us.I feel sick and have for days. Pretty sure I’m afflicted with toxic shock syndrome, but not the kind we’ve been warned about. I sent my essay out into the ether last week as I do every week. There is one platform where I have a business page with a lot of people (fb) that used to be a place where community happened, where people could have conversations and even disagree without losing their minds, but that is no longer the case. I don’t spend a lot of time there anymore, I simply have the page connected to my other meta account (insta), so when I post on one, it shows up on the other.I started getting alerts from fb quickly. Some of the comments in the thread underneath were so lacking in empathy they made me feel sick in my soul, as if I was talking to people who had been infected by a virus that caused contempt to run through their veins.We’ve reached a point in our country where the people who did not vote for this president cannot have meaningful conversations with people who are in support of the current administration — and in my case, it is not for lack of trying. I have tried. I tried again this week. I keep trying because I don’t know how we fix things if we can’t talk to each other, but the vitriol and smug disdain coming from the 30% of the country who voted for this and are still in support of it — toward people like me who are devastated by what is happening, is breathtaking and horrifying. Truly, y’all are not okay. One man called my business number to say I should not block people. I blocked people who were screaming expletives at me, or hurling insults. Imagine being so entitled you call a woman’s business line because you’re butt-hurt she won’t allow people to be abusive to her on her own damn page. Get a grip, sir.It is legal and a First Amendment right to film ICE raids occurring in public places, and if you don’t understand why concerned citizens are doing that, then you have not been paying attention to what is happening at many of these ICE raids, or you do not care. The second option would be worse. As a small example, Kristi Noem described what happened to Renee Good two hours after she was murdered — like this: She said ICE agents were “snowed in” and “surrounded by angry rioters” and Renee was “ramming her vehicle into them” and the ICE agent was in fear for his life and the lives of the other agents, so he shot her.Then you look at the footage of all the people who were there filming, and thank god they were, because that is not. what. happened. That’s why people go and film, so there’s a record. They are not there to impede, they are there to bear witness and to make sure there’s accurate documentation of what occurs. In too many instances, ICE agents are using excessive force, they don’t identify themselves, and they refuse to say where they’re taking people. Sometimes it’s the people observing who de-escalate a situation, by making sure the ICE agents know they’re being filmed. People are grabbed so quickly they don’t have a chance to call anyone, so they might yell out the name and number of their mom, their wife, their attorney. There were no “angry rioters” on the block where Renee and Becca Good were parked, a few blocks from their house — there were neighbors, filming and observing. Why? Because immigrants in our country are also entitled to due process under the law and some people care about that. There are a lot of hard-working, tax-paying immigrants in our community, mothers and fathers, grandmas and grandpas, people who have been here for decades, many of whom have been doing it “the right way.” Sometimes they get grabbed directly from their legal immigration appointments.No one is being paid to care about their neighbors or their communities. People are not being “trained to weaponize their vehicles.” Left-leaning people do not want hardened criminals walking around their neighborhoods, that’s a lie. It is really something being yelled at about law and order from people supporting an administration that violates the Constitution every day. The gaslighting and hypocrisy are exhausting. It was made very clear to me that there were people in the comments on fb who would not shed a tear or have a kind thought for my children if I was filming an ICE raid to try to help my neighbors, and an agent decided to shoot me in the face three times. They would shrug and say, she got what she deserved. Why wasn’t she home, minding her own business? Why didn’t she think about her children? The thing is, when I worry about my neighbors, that’s part of thinking about my children, and what kind of world they’re going to inherit. There are ICE agents going door-to-door in Minneapolis today. There are videos of ICE agents tackling two seventeen-year-old kids who work at a Target in Minneapolis, inside the vestibule of the store, violently. Turns out they were both U.S. citizens, which they said. One had his hand broken by those agents. One called out his mother’s phone number. If there’s any confusion about why people film, I sure hope this clears it up.A woman was murdered on Wednesday, by a man who got angry. He called her a “f*****g b***h” seconds after he ended her life. He was never off his feet. He did not have to stand where he did, trying to block her so his buddy could yank her door open. One agent told her to leave, one agent screamed at her to get the f**k out of her car. Her wife told her to drive, baby, drive. I would have fled, too. You know why? I’ve had enough experiences in my life with violent men to know when I’m unsafe. She backed up. She turned her wheels all the way to the right. He took her life because he was pissed. Men like that do not like non-compliant females. Renee Nicole Good was a mother of three, a wife, a poet, a daughter, and a very good neighbor by all accounts. She should still be here. This is a public episode. 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Friends, a quick hello on Day 3 of this new year, or Day 4 if you get this Sunday morning. We will not be counting the days of this year generally, just these first few because it’s wild that it’s only Day 3 and … yeah. There are some new people in the mix and in our midst, so I want to welcome you all with a lot of love, and thank you so much for being here. Also, I want to let you know I do a podcast every week, after the essay, and after I’ve had time to meet you in the comments section — which is one of my favorite places to be. Often I’ve had time to ponder further based on what you’ve shared, so I think about the podcast as a co-creation and a conversation we’re having. I may eventually move it to the app so we can see each other in real time if you’re around while I record. I genuinely treasure getting to know you. That will become clear if it isn’t already. Maybe you like podcasts, maybe not. There are a few I love, but I only have time to listen if I’m driving somewhere, so I get it. We are all inundated. But, maybe you do a lot of driving, or maybe you like a voice in the background while you’re folding laundry. Fair warning, I cry during episodes possibly more than most people with podcasts. I cry easily these days and have since my mother died. Maybe it’s grief, maybe it’s hormones, maybe it’s being relatively sane in a world that is heartbreaking too much of the time.Okay, thus ends this session of hello and podcasting with Ally, thanks for coming. Now we can talk about this particular episode and also how unhinged the president is. Fantastic.Why not end the longest year ever with back-to-back trips to the Social Security Office and the DMV? How could you have a car registered to your name, but the wrong VIN number attached — for four years? Why isn’t there an opt-out button that triggers a trap-door with a fun slide that takes people directly to a grown-up sleep-away camp where we could all go when the world feels like too much?I dug into all those questions and more in this episode about why some of us struggled mightily in 2025. The discussion includes love of the Constitution, the three branches of government, our checks and balances, the Supreme Court, and the free press…and the heartbreak of watching all of those guardrails of our democracy fail one by one, simultaneously. The biggest heartbreak of all was the collusion required for that to happen. Feel as you may about the Founding Fathers, I think it’s safe to assume they never imagined a world where so many Americans would pledge fealty to a man so lacking in ethics and morals, betraying the country they claim to love and the Constitution they swore to uphold.I talked about due process, ICE raids, the attack on DEI, the LGBTQ community, women’s rights, the increase in the number of abortions since Roe was overturned, the increase in maternal and infant mortality rates in states with restrictive abortion bans, the hypocrisy of causing people grave harm with no compassion or empathy in the name of Christianity. Those are just a few reasons some of us had a hard time last year.And here on day 3…it looks like we’ll have plenty to deal with in 2026. (Side note, it’s not a new thing for America to decide it’s time for a regime change somewhere in Latin America. Some of you are young, so maybe it’s your first time witnessing a president decide he doesn’t need congressional approval to kidnap a dictator in the dead of night, but I am old enough to remember George H.W. Bush doing this very thing in 1989. See: Noriega! We’ll get back to this because there’s so much to unpack. The Monroe Doctrine, The Roosevelt Corollary, The War Powers Resolution, and the Authorized Use of Military Force, just to get us started. But if you think two things can’t be true at once, for example — Maduro was terrible for the people of Venezuela, and in the simplest of terms he is a not a good man and, it is an abuse of power and a terrible idea to use military force to oust dictators/overthrow governments from countries with resources we want, and then “take them over” with no plan except “we want their oil”I’d say you might want to think again.) Anyhoo, friends, we’re off to a wild, destabilizing start, but that’s how this “peace president” — the one who wasn’t going to get us into any more foreign wars — likes and wants it. Someone pass the FIFA peace pipe I guess. My heart goes out to the family members of civilians who died in Venezuela last night, and those who are scared for their loved ones. It goes out to the family members of our military who are being led by a president who has no qualms about making it known we are there for the oil and there is no clear strategy beyond that. It goes out to anyone who wonders how we are supposed to do this for another three years. One hint: don’t do that to yourself. Take it one day at a time. Take it one step at a time, one phone call, one email, one kind word, one supportive text, one hilarious meme, one thoughtful card, one chance to let someone merge, one moment to catch your breath, one afternoon to slow down, one walk to notice the sun is shining, one conversation with someone who understands, one opportunity to make the world a little bit better…at a time. That’s how we do it, and we do it together. 5calls.org makes it easy to let your reps know how you feel, and please do call. Deep breath in, hold for the count of seven. Deep breath out for the count of eight. Repeat. Love y’all.Since it’s a new year, maybe it’s a good time to mention you can go into your settings and set things up so you only get essays and podcasts in the app — that’s a general Substack thing, did you know that? You don’t have to get emails sent to your inbox unless you want them. If that’s exciting to you or if it’s news to you, I’ll take you through it. From your laptop, click on your picture or avatar in the upper right corner, then click on Settings: This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit allyhamilton.yogisanonymous.com/subscribe

As the holidays approached this year, I started seeing a lot of people in my feeds expressing the desire to “quiet quit” the whole endeavor. People wondering if they could opt out, not have the big extended family dinner, get a “Charlie Brown” Christmas tree, stay in pajamas. I saw this across all holidays — whatever people normally do around whatever holidays they celebrate, they wanted to do the easiest, most stress-free version.For some people it was financial, they did not have the means to buy presents and go to parties, they didn’t want to show up empty-handed or have to explain that times are tough and they’re saving for health insurance. For others it felt too forced to try to pull joy out of the hat in the midst of so much suffering and mental exhaustion.If you’re someone who voted for (gestures wildly and unfathomably) this painful mess we’re in, maybe the holidays were great for you? For those of us who never wanted any of this cruelty, and could not imagine voting for a president who said people were eating cats and dogs, or — you know what? the list of things this man has said and done is so insane, and each one of them should have disqualified him, so — for those of us he called members of the “radical left scum” as part of his lovely Christmas Day message, let us say we had to dig deep to find the holiday cheer.As we approach the end of this fever dream of a year and head toward 2026, I am thinking about the things that are and have been heartbreaking and exhausting, and also the reasons I have hope, and know in my heart we are going to be okay. I know we are. If you have also had a very hard time this year, if you’re tired of the insanity and don’t know how we’re going to get through it for another three years, I’ll tell you how: we’re going to get through it together. We’re going to remember we are all neighbors. Those of us who are likeminded are going to show up for each other in every way we can. We’re going to be the helpers. “When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, ‘Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.’”―Fred RogersHappy New Year, friends. Or, “Here comes a New Year!” if that feels more apropos for now. I am so grateful to head into this next year with you. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit allyhamilton.yogisanonymous.com/subscribe

Voiceover by the fantastic Andi Arndt I went to see It’s a Wonderful Life on Christmas Eve — they play it on the big screen at a theater near us every year — and if that film fails to put you in the holiday spirit you probably have to give up for the season and try again next year. It’s a strange year for all the reasons, so I think there are a lot of us trying. I love Jimmy Stewart. One of his other films, Harvey, is one of my favorite films of all time. If you haven’t seen it, Stewart plays a man named Elwood P. Dowd whose best friend is a huge white rabbit named Harvey who no one else can see.Jimmy Stewart loved the film, too. He loved playing Elwood, a man with no guile who was kind to everyone, and he loved Harvey so much that he doodled him on napkins and scraps of paper for the rest of his life. He’d write “Harvey” underneath, and sign them. One year for my birthday, one of my best friends got me a framed print of one of those doodles. I’m not a shopper, I don’t go in for jewelry or handbags or fancy dinners out, but that doodle is one of my prized possessions. Also, I can’t recommend the film enough if you want to feel good about human beings for a little while, which I always do. I want to feel good about human beings now more than I ever have.I grew up watching Mr. Rogers Neighborhood, and sometimes I think we should all start watching episodes again. My mother could never understand my obsession, she thought the show was so boring. This middle-aged man coming through the door singing about how we’re all neighbors, and asking if I’d be his neighbor, too? Unhurriedly taking off his jacket or raincoat and hanging it up, putting on his cardigan, then swapping his outside shoes for sneakers and tying them while he talked about nothing in particular? For the life of her, she could not figure out why I was rapt at four years old, five years old, six years old. I loved him.We all did as far as I know, I rarely meet any Gen Xer who didn’t grow up feeling like they were partially raised by Fred Rogers. Most of us had parents who needed to be reminded we existed at 10pm, and there he was, taking us on little field trips to learn about the Post Office, or teaching us to think about how things were for other people. Elwood P. Dowd is like Fred Rogers, except he likes to go to the bar. There are all kinds of theories about the film and why he’s seeing a huge white rabbit (a púca). I won’t ruin it for you if you haven’t seen it, I’ll just say I think Harvey is real because that’s what I choose to think — in the context of the entire thing being a film where everyone is a fictional character, of course. I’m not insane.People believe all kinds of things because that’s what they choose to do. I saw a clip on Instagram of Mary and Joseph in couples’ counseling. Joseph was upset because he was feeling erased. Mary said it wasn’t her fault, the Angel Gabriel showed up and said she was pregnant with God’s baby, what was she supposed to do? Joseph said he was just a blip in their story now. Just a sheepherder, shoveling s**t all day. If someone ever wrote a book about them — at which point Mary interrupted and said no one was ever going to write a book about them — and I snort-laughed my coffee everywhere.Once about fifteen years ago the same friend who got me the Harvey doodle came to Los Angeles for a visit. We decided to go see a movie at The Grove, we just drove over after a class I taught to see what was playing next. The Passion of the Christ was the only film about to start. This was before everyone knew Mel Gibson was a wife-beating racist, mind you.We asked the woman behind the counter if she’d seen it, and if it was good. “Yes,” she said solemnly, “it’s really good. It’s about the last twenty-four hours of Jesus’ life. It’s a cinematic documentary.” I’m not sure how long we stood there staring at her, trying to figure out if she was serious, but it was long enough to realize she was serious.Many people who identify as Christian and therefore believe in Jesus say they voted for the current administration because they believe abortion is murder so they had to vote for this administration*…but they do not seem to realize this administration would deport Jesus himself and Mary and Joseph, too, if they showed up in the United States today. Brown people from the largest Arab city in Israel who had their baby in Palestine and then walked forty miles to Egypt before emigrating? Without papers? Jesus Christ, good luck and I mean that.Also just because I have to, even though I’ve said it eleventy bajillion times:*The number of abortions has risen and continues to rise since Roe was overturned — a thing conservatives said would never happen, but we all knew would happen. Then they said, well it’s okay, we’re just sending it back to the states! This is what happens when you send it back to the states. Maternal and infant mortality rates rise in states with the most restrictive abortion bans. Women who have the means, travel to other states to get lifesaving healthcare when they need it. More women use telehealth services.The president takes credit for the overturning of Roe, so it stands to reason he would also take credit for the rise in abortions, as he should. If you voted for him, you voted for that, too, even if you did not mean to do that. If you believe abortion is murder and you want fewer abortions, you should be voting against restrictive abortion bans that endanger girls and women, which means you should be voting for people who are pro-choice.Pro-choice is not pro-abortion, it is pro respecting women and girls. It is pro believing all human beings are deserving of the same rights and respect when it comes to bodily autonomy and lifesaving healthcare procedures. It is pro thinking your rights should not change every time you cross state lines. My son’s rights don’t change if we take a road trip across the country, why should my daughter’s? Why any woman votes against her own best interests, or the best interests of her daughters, sisters, mothers and friends is a thing we should all ponder.Also, if you believe in Jesus in any capacity —whether you believe he is literally the son of God (and you believe in the Immaculate Conception like my friend at The Grove),or you believe the Bible was written by men trying to control society at large,if you believe men wrote the Bible to take the power of creation away from women — and give it to an all-powerful man in the sky no one can see,or you believe there was a flesh-and-blood guy named Jesus who was a peace activist who walked this earth and did a lot of good,if you believe we are all children of God, but you don’t think God is some white be-robed and bearded man in the sky with a ledger and a penchant for deducting points if people play with themselves while the world burns — if instead you think of God as the energy of creation and Jesus as an allegory and an aspiration, and neither as gendered (oh I know it’s tough for some people to give that up!) —Whatever you believe, from everything I have ever understood, Jesus’s entire purpose was to spread compassion and kindness.If I’ve got that part right, he would not have appreciated a message in his name written by the political leader of our nation calling the half of us who did not vote for him “radical left scum” on Christmas Day, or any day. He would not approve of a president who openly admitted to grabbing women by the pussy. He would not support a man who mocked Serge Kovaleski — or anyone suffering from any congenital condition, disease, or affliction of any kind, because who does that? What kind of person does that, and why would anyone vote for him?He would not approve of a man who spent fifteen years hanging out with the most infamous and despicable pedophile rapist and his pedophile rapist girlfriend, calling him a “terrific guy”, laughing with him at parties, celebrating birthdays and holidays together, flying on his plane and lying about it later, inexplicably getting his girlfriend a sweetheart deal a few months ago, so she is now in a prison camp in Texas instead of behind bars for twenty years where she belonged. Why would he do that, and why would anyone support it? He would not have approved of a president who called female journalists “piggy” and “stupid” and “terrible people” for doing their jobs. He would not have approved of a childish, petty, violent, racist, misogynistic president who turned the White House garish gold because there is definitely something about a camel and the eye of a needle. Which means he would have been appalled to learn the Trumps have pocketed $1.8 billion in cash and gifts since his re-election in 2024.This is not a man who cares about anyone’s grocery prices or healthcare. He’s no “man of the people.” He is working “outside the lines” in Washington, for himself and his billionaire buddies.Of the Ten Commandments, there are at least five that seem glaringly problematic for the current occupant of the White House and all his cohorts:Thou shall not kill. Oops.Thou shall not commit adultery. Bwahahahaha.Thou shall not steal. Dang. Points deducted!Thou shall not bear false witness against thy neighbor. Lol.Thou shall not covet thy neighbor’s wife. Oops. Oops.Thou shall not covet thy neighbor’s goods. Triple oops.I don’t think they’re doing too well with the other five commandments, or the Seven Deadly Sins. Or just being the very average level of baseline decent.At least this administration is doing one really good thing. I’ll always give credit where credit is due. Finally, it seems, we white people won’t have to apologize for being white anymore. I have to admit I’m relieved, I was really getting tired of that. How many times do I have to walk into Whole Foods, grab my cart and yell, “Hey, everyone! I am so sorry for being white!”All I want to do is buy some overpriced nut milk and kale.Or like, at the Post Office? When you walk in and there’s a long line and you have to t

I recorded this episode after one of the most sorrowful weeks I can remember. I wanted to be feeling joyful because it’s the holiday season, but you can’t force joy, and it’s very difficult to live in a country where we continue to have school shootings as though there’s nothing we can do to change that.Of all the issues we face here, that’s the one that wrecks me in a way that is hard to describe. Part of it is having school-age children myself — my son is the age the Sandy Hook kids would have been — and part of it is finding it unfathomable that anyone is willing to continue to fail our children this way. It isn’t normal that both of my children have texted me during lockdowns. It isn’t normal that we now have kids who have been in more than one school shooting.Then there was Bondi Beach, people fleeing for their lives, parents diving into pits trying to cover their children with their own bodies. When it seemed things could not get sadder, news of the Reiners stared to emerge.There wasn’t a way to pull holiday cheer out of the hat, friends, and if that’s what you’re looking for, stick a pin in this episode. But if you are struggling with it all and in need of a good cry, then maybe this is for you. Either way, this is not an episode for little ears. I’m sending you a lot of love. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit allyhamilton.yogisanonymous.com/subscribe

This episode is about a time when I was four, and two kids said I was dying and I believed them. More than that, though, it’s about a person who allowed me to be scared and sad and to grieve openly. I missed my grandma. I missed my old life before my grandma died — when my mom and dad and I lived together, and I didn’t spend three nights in one apartment, four nights in another.I missed my mom when she was happy. I missed mornings at the Jersey Shore with my grandma — my Nanny — the person whose face lit up every time she looked at me, and whose hugs where the best possible place to be. I didn’t know where Heaven was. I couldn’t tell my mom when I was scared or sad because she’d get angry. I was afraid she might decide she couldn’t handle it and leave me at her friend’s farm.I couldn’t tell my dad how I felt because he’d flip the script and make it about him. He’d sob in my arms which was too much for me to handle at four or five or six or ten — or every year he laid his grownup problems at my feet — until I told him I couldn’t take it anymore. That didn’t happen until I was thirteen. So I stopped telling anyone, until that day when I had a nosebleed and thought I was going to die. It’s a gift when someone lets you feel however you feel without trying to fix it, and without giving you the feeling that there’s a time limit. When they hold you tightly enough you know it’s safe to fall apart. Come As You Are is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit allyhamilton.yogisanonymous.com/subscribe

Four years ago today I was on a plane, trying to stay calm. I’d had to throw stuff in a bag and get on an app to find a flight that left a day earlier than the flight I had booked, which was a thing I did in a Lyft on the way to LAX. It wasn’t the plan. The plan was that I was going to fly back to NYC the following day, December 8th, to be there when the hospital discharged my mother into hospice care at home. I’d spent the last couple of days doing the paperwork and switching her into the hospice network, setting up the team to meet her at the apartment where I grew up, where she still lived, where I now seemed to live more than I didn’t. I’d been coordinating times for a hospital bed to be delivered, buying an easy chair that reclined all the way back and had good reviews so the hospice team could maybe get some sleep here and there, figuring out shifts for everyone. She was going to need 24-hour care in addition to me, my brother and my stepdad. You have to know when you’re beat, and I did.I’d had a bad feeling, though. My mother hated the bipap machine. That was the machine that forced oxygen into her lungs, and sucked CO2 out. I couldn’t blame her — her jaw was slack because of the ALS, so they had to use a visor and velcro straps to secure it to her face and around the back of her head. She’d been on a ventilator for 12 days before that, and when she came off the ventilator (a thing they weren’t sure she would do at all) her breath was shallow and weak. She didn’t like the feeling of the “aggressive breaths” being forced in and out of her. She scrawled those words on a notepad — her perfect, Catholic-school-girl cursive a thing of the past. She shook her head at me helplessly, and even that took effort. Her eyes were two huge pools of sadness. She didn’t like the velcro straps, the machines beeping, the tubes everywhere. I can’t write anymore about this right now.I’d gotten into the rhythm of being back in NYC, sleeping in the bedroom that was mine before my brother was born, spending 12-hour days in the ICU with my mom, who was dying. I’d fly back to Los Angeles for a night, hug my kids, make sure they were okay, and then get back on a plane the next day. It had been going on for a month. I never imagined I’d be taking planes like cab rides, and I did not allow myself to look at my credit card statements or even worry about how I was going to handle any of it, I just did it. For as far back as I can remember, I’ve longed for my mother. Sometimes I longed for her in a room full of people, sometimes when it was just the two of us talking. As a child I never felt that I “had” her — it seemed like she wasn’t very interested in me no matter how hard I tried to be good or perfect. If I had her attention, it was because I’d enraged her. We struggled as I got older, because I could see she was in pain. People do not drink like that for no reason. I wanted someone to help her, and to help me by extension. She refused to admit there was a problem. Everyone else refused to challenge her. There’d been so much pain between us. She was hurt, and she’d hurt me. Then when I receded, as any sane person will do if you hurt them, she felt betrayed. I was supposed to pretend the bad things hadn’t happened, and my inability to do that — and later, my refusal to do that — made her furious. As I got older, that response of hers enraged me. At the end of her life, none of it mattered. I would have fought an army by myself with nothing but my broken heart to save her if I could have. I tried. It was enough, though, because she saw me trying. Everyone saw me trying. I would have given almost everything for more time with her, because the ALS took every last thing from her, including her ability to drink. Including her ability to rage. It didn’t happen all at once, the year leading up to her hospitalization was a thing that was so brutal it’s hard to comprehend sometimes. As the disease ravaged her, she lashed out at me in ways that hurt my heart when I think of them. I’m still recovering from it all, four years later. But the last three weeks of her life, when she could not speak anymore…that was when my mom and I started to communicate in the only language you ever really need. It was the only thing I’d ever wanted or needed from her. I finally had her in that way I’d been longing to have her my whole life. Three weeks felt like such a short amount of time to have her, and then to have to let her go. I did make it to the hospital in time to be with her the last few hours of her life, thanks to a huge line of people at the taxi stand at JFK who let me cut to the front. Do not ever let anyone tell you New Yorkers are not kind. I still think of those people and wish I could hug every one of them.For anyone who is grieving or missing someone this time of year, this episode is for you. I will let you know that I had to stop a few times, and there were tears. But that’s okay. You have to let the grief move through you.Sending love to all, and to my mom, who left this earth of ours at 3:37 AM EST on December 7th, 2021. I miss her every second. Come As You Are is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit allyhamilton.yogisanonymous.com/subscribe

Last week I wrote about what it’s like growing up and existing as a girl and a woman in this world. The response from so many women who relate was overwhelming, enraging, heartbreaking, and also incredible. The “Quiet, Piggy” moment touched a deep nerve in many women across all kinds of borders, because so many of us felt it in our bones. So many of us know exactly what it’s like when a man attacks you, verbally or otherwise, because you are not behaving the way he wants you to behave. Because you have the gall to question him, to speak up for yourself or someone else, to assert your right to exist as a full human being. Because you aren’t being polite, you aren’t “staying in line” or being nice. More power to you.There is a certain kind of man who does not like women, does not respect them, does not consider them to be equal. There is a certain kind of man who thinks little girls are easy targets. I wrote from the perspective I know, but it’s children who are not safe around men like this, not just little girls. They are not the kind of men we want in positions of power. It’s tough when men like these are our dads, our teachers, our bosses at work, a guy we pass on a hiking trail, in a stairwell, or a desolate parking lot at night. It is hard to get across what it’s like to be doing this kind of math in your head all the time, because you can’t know by looking at a man which kind of man he is. To be assessing whether you’re safe, what you need to do to keep yourself safe, whether your daughter is safe. The fury I feel when I think about that last part is impossible to describe. I’m surprised I don’t open my mouth and breathe fire.It’s devastating that so many people support men who are abusive, misogynistic and in many cases, predatory. It will never make sense to me that millions of people did not find it disqualifying when the man who sits in the Oval Office said he “grabs women by the pussy.” He said it. Out loud. If you voted for him, you were okay with that. You excused it as “locker room talk” but it isn’t talk — it’s a way of thinking about women. Good men don’t say things like that. As ever, the comments section under the essay this week is incredible. If you have any doubt whether women everywhere relate and have stories of their own, please go take a look. There are also so many thoughtful, heartening comments made by men. The only way things will get better is if we make them get better, together. Not just for our daughters, but for our sons, too. This isn’t good for any of us.Thank you for being here, I appreciate you so much. If you’re new here, welcome. I record the podcast episodes after I read the first round of comments, so these podcast episodes are very much co-creations. Last thing, Rufus my rescue dog was in the room with me. Turned out he was in the mood to play, not podcast, even though we’d already played and had a very long walk. You’ll hear him once or twice, some things can’t be helped. He’s the best, and so are you. Sending you love.Come As You Are is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit allyhamilton.yogisanonymous.com/subscribe

There’s a certain kind of person who is so concerned with their own needs, how they’re feeling, and what’s good for them, they really don’t have the capacity to take in much of anything else. You might know some people like this. They can be very charming and charismatic, but after a short time you’ll realize their favorite topic — and the one they circle back to again and again — is them.When they aren’t talking about what’s good for them or what they’re excited about or looking forward to (world dominance! ballroom-bunkers! the end of Obamacare!) — they’re talking about things that really upset them. A list of ways they’ve been wronged or people they loathe — and they can be very petty about it. These kind of people like to assert their dominance as a way of feeling better about themselves. No one feels the need to assert something when they feel confident it’s already understood, and only insecure, fearful people have the desire to dominate and control others. This week I wrote about a time I watched my dad strip my not-yet-stepmom of her power and joy right in front of me, teaching us both that he was the one who was going to call the shots. I was five, and I remember looking from him to her and back again, as the energy in the room shifted, and so did something in my mind. This wasn’t about a teddy bear, this was about permission. She’d done something without asking him if it was okay, and he wasn’t going to allow that.There was more to it — if she and I bonded, that threatened the relationship he’d set up with me. I was supposed to be his tiny confidante, his pocket therapist, his pint-sized affirmer and secret-keeper. If she started buying me teddy bears, who knew whether I’d keep his Extracurricular Olympic-Level Womanizing Activities to myself.My dad was fifty. His girlfriend (eventual third wife) was twenty-four. I was five. Those numbers feel significant. She’d bought me the bear with her own money, but he made us return it. We both got the lesson that she was not allowed any agency when it came to me. Only he was the grantor of joy if there was going to be any.What kind of man makes his tiny daughter return a teddy bear? What kind of man teaches his girlfriend she gets no respect, right in front of his child? She’s allowed to do the laundry, make the dinner, keep the house clean, work and pay half the bills, but she’s not allowed to buy a gift he wouldn’t have purchased … because, why?What kind of man gives $40 billion to Argentina, but won’t feed the most vulnerable people in his own country? What kind of man makes people choose between food and affordable healthcare? What kind of president doesn’t care that 20 million people are going to see a doubling of their healthcare premiums (mine are quadrupling) or that 15 million people will be thrown off Medicaid and the ACA?What kind of administration grants tax breaks to billionaires and huge corporations, but doesn’t care that hardworking people are struggling to buy groceries? What kind of people send ICE agents to daycare centers? In the midst of all these horrors, what kind of man pauses, looks around, and asks, “Did Women Ruin the Workplace?” All this and more (including the very excellent special elections) in this week’s podcast episode. Love to all.Come As You Are is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit allyhamilton.yogisanonymous.com/subscribe

“We see things not as they are, but as we are. Because it is the ‘I’ behind the ‘eye’ that does the seeing.”― Anaïs NinThis week’s essay and this podcast episode are about the “I” behind the “eye.” You, me, any of us — we are always walking out the door carrying our frames of reference with us, our perspectives, our ideas about how the world works, what we have to offer, whether anyone wants to hear from us. So much of what we’re seeing is influenced by what we expect to see, or by the way we perceive what we’re seeing. I had a rough week, but not as rough as a lot of people. I was reminded that at any time your phone can ring and it can change everything. A single moment on a random Tuesday morning can render most things meaningless, and remind you of what you cannot live without. If you’re smart, the “things” you can’t live without are the people who mean everything to you, and whatever ideals you hold close to your heart — kindness, compassion, the belief that everyone deserves dignity. It’s been a rough time for kindness and dignity. Every day I see things that hurt my heart and make me wonder what has happened to far too many people, and what will become of the country I love. People I once knew are supporting some of the most cruel and heartless acts of callousness I’ve seen in my lifetime, but want to agree to disagree. The government is being sold off for parts, and the people in power are willing to starve the most vulnerable members of our country for political leverage.But there are also people working hard to fight back, to say no, to make sure no one will go to sleep hungry. There are people throwing themselves in front of ICE agents, Attorneys General filing lawsuits, good human beings showing up for their neighbors. No matter what happens, we get to decide what it means when we say “I am here” — we get to decide who that “I” is, and what we expect to see from the people around us. What we will tolerate from our friends, and what we are not willing to accept.We get to look up on a starry night and be amazed, or sit by the ocean and recognize how tiny we are — and how utterly arrogant we’d have to be to think we know how other people should live. We get to be thankful for the chance to visit this pale blue dot of a planet, or ignorant enough to believe we own any of it. It isn’t ours, we’re just visiting, but we belong to each other. It’s really easy to spot the people who know that. They’re the people trying to help.Come As You Are is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit allyhamilton.yogisanonymous.com/subscribe

One of the harder things about life right now is the constant onslaught of news that feels insane, impossible, heartbreaking, outrageous, mind-boggling, or fill-in-the-blank with your chosen word. We really aren’t built for this and it’s so incredibly sad, because it doesn’t have to be this way, and it shouldn’t be this way. It could be so beautiful.I hope you are taking care of yourself, consciously stepping away from the madness sometimes, putting your phone down, getting outside if you can, breathing deeply, connecting with people you love, reading good books, listening to music, and doing anything and everything you can to remind yourself that human beings can be incredible. We’ve been through tough times before, and the most important thing is not to lose hope. Sometimes that’s also the hardest thing, I know.This week, of course, we watched as the president took a wrecking ball to the East Wing of the White House with no congressional oversight or approval, and no public review. There are at least a dozen other things happening that need our attention – he is directing our military to strike alleged “drug boats” out of international waters based on his assertion that they are carrying drugs — with no evidence, and without congressional input.So we’re just shooting boats out of the water, now, and taking his word for it bad people are on those boats. The administration just approved more oil and gas drilling in Alaska’s Arctic national wildlife refuge which breaks my heart. This president wants to accept a $130 million donation from a friend, Timothy Mellon, to pay the military this month and there are going to be millions of people who think that’s a good thing. It is not a good thing at all, even for active duty service members. Obviously I want them to be paid, along with all federal workers being impacted by the shutdown.I do not think senators choosing not to come to work should be paid, however, nor do I think they should receive top-of-the-line healthcare when they can’t be bothered to to their jobs. I don’t want my tax dollars to pay for their vacation. It’s not good for any American if the president starts accepting anonymous donations or any donations to pay for our military, because we need Congress. We need a functioning Congress to ensure we have a functioning democracy. We, the people, need our representatives to work together to make sure we are being represented. That’s why they are called “representatives.” That’s why we get to vote for them (unless the president calls governors of states and tells them to redraw their maps so we don’t get to vote for them), that’s why our tax dollars pay their salaries.They are supposed to go to our state capitols and to Washington to work for us. If there is a shutdown because our senators cannot come to an agreement, and the party in the majority starts taking huge donations to pay for things, there is no need to negotiate anymore. This president is working to undermine the power of one of the three branches of government in broad daylight and I do not understand why this isn’t the top story everywhere. More on that later this week.For now, in case you (also) encounter people who try to compare Obama’s basketball court to the ballroom, allow me to help. He turned the existing White House tennis court into a court that could also be used to play basketball – so some lines were painted and hoops were added. Even that he did with congressional approval and oversight. It is freaking hilarious to compare these two projects. Like an ant versus an asteroid.When people start telling you the “South Lawn Expansion Project” began during Obama and, “Trump is just finishing what Obama started” that is misinformation. In addition to the tennis court/basketball court mashup, Michelle Obama planted The White House Kitchen Garden, which continues to provide 2000 pounds of produce to the White House annually. She understands the concept of leaving a place better than you found it.You may also hear about a $376 million dollar renovation that happened while Obama was president. It did! It’s so funny, because the people talking about it are so smug. They’re like, “Look you apoplectic liberals having seizures over the ballroom, look what Obama did!” As if he spent $376 million in taxpayer dollars doing upgrades to the White House for himself.What they don’t say is that the $376 million dollar renovation was approved by Congress in 2008 when BUSH was president, before Obama took office, because the Bush administration came to Congress with a Bush administration report, saying inspectors the Bush administration had hired found infrastructure systems that were continually failing and needed to be replaced. Not just HVAC systems but security systems. So yeah, those renovations happened while Obama was in office, but they were approved and put in motion before he was president.CNN later confirmed in a September 10, 2010, segment that Congress had approved the project’s funding in 2008, before Obama took office, following a Bush administration report that warned of periodic system failures in the White House. Bloomberg News further noted that several of the building’s systems were nearing the end of their “reliable productivity.”It is very tiring and disheartening to have just paid my federal taxes when the president of the country where I live hates people like me who did not vote for him. That is not how it’s supposed to work. He is in no hurry to open the government, he said so himself just a couple of days ago. He is happy about the shutdown, because it is “killing the Democrats.” It is giving his administration the opportunity to get rid of “Democrat programs” – meaning SNAP, ACA subsidies so Americans can have affordable healthcare, Medicaid benefits, funding for pediatric cancer research, and Special Education, to name a few. Last I checked, these were not “Democrat programs.”Anyway, I continue to hope more people will realize what is happening here. Congress is the branch of government most accessible to the people – that is by design. We are able to call and email our reps for a reason. We know when votes go to the House floor, and the way our representatives vote are in the public record so we can see if they are representing our interests, voice our feelings if not, and vote them out if we continue to feel that way. Without a functioning Congress, we skid ever closer to an Executive-run country. A CEO at the helm, calling the shots — which, if you’re paying attention, is exactly what they want. This is Project 2025, and we are seeing it play out. It’s time to smell the hostile takeover.Someone commented on another platform that I have so much anger and should do some yoga. I am angry sometimes — watching arrogant, bigoted, racist, misogynistic, violent people ruin everything tends to piss me off. Sometimes I am full of despair. Other times I am full of hope, gratitude and joy — more of the time, thankfully. I don’t practice yoga to avoid my feelings or to avoid reality, I practice so I can face it, try to show up with love, and see how I can help.Come As You Are is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit allyhamilton.yogisanonymous.com/subscribe

Saturday I went to a No Kings event with one of my closest friends. She’s more my sister than my friend, we’ve been making good trouble together since the 80s. I am so fortunate to have a few people in my life I’ve known since childhood, or maybe it isn’t good fortune, maybe it’s that I hate goodbyes and hold on hard to the people I love. I’m a lifer unless you’re an asshat. It’s such a wonderful thing to have people who can say, “Remember that time…?” And then mention a thing that happened back in elementary school or high school or college, or a night with details we shall take to our graves, a person someone dated or married or divorced, or an update about someone we knew back in the day — who just got spotted on a dating app. That is one of the wonderful things about long term friendships — you do not have to be the sole keeper of your memories. A lot of your memories overlap with other people’s past experiences, they’re intermingled and intertwined, but so are all of our histories, all of our present-day circumstances, and all of our futures, whether we know each other or not. Our fates are tied.This is a reality that was driven home to millions of people Saturday, in this country and around the world. We’re all connected, like it or not. Even if we don’t like it, there’s no way around it — we have to find a way through this, together. I’m not sure what’s happening with the people who are refusing to recognize that there are choices, but they’re limited - you can be a rat b*****d (a phrase my Dad used to use for people who weren’t kind) or a good neighbor — either way, you’re gonna die, and you don’t take anything with you. People remember how you made them feel, though. I dunno about you, but I move away from people who aren’t kind. I don’t want to spend time with anyone who thinks they know how other people should live, or who uses language I find abhorrent to describe people who look, love, speak, pray (or don’t pray), differently than they do, or anyone who thinks it’s okay for some people to be treated without empathy or dignity or decency. I don’t want to have lunch with a person who thinks it’s okay for other people’s children to be zip-tied and thrown into the back of a U-haul, as long as it isn’t their child, because it’s my belief that there’s no such thing as other people’s children. I don’t think it’s an “edgy joke” to say you “love Hitler” or that “rape is epic” or to call Black people names I will not repeat here. I don’t think a person who is somewhere between twenty-four and thirty-five years old can be called a “kid” and excused for saying things this despicable, and I think it’s insulting, embarrassing and far below the level of integrity I expect in a vice president to defend these people and call them “promising leaders.”After Saturday’s record-breaking turnout with more than 8 million people here in this country making it clear they are not okay with the policies of this White House — along with people from other countries who joined in solidarity — the POTUS and the VP took it upon themselves to post more AI garbage on Truth Social and BlueSky, respectively. The president posted a video featuring him — wearing a crown and manning a fighter jet (King BoneSpurs McDraftDodger I guess) dropping feces on protesting American citizens — with a special shoutout to Harry Sisson who got “covered” first. How classy and presidential. The VP’s contribution was a video featuring the president sitting on a throne wearing a crown, pulling out a sword — and then they cut to the footage of Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats kneeling for 8 minutes and 46 seconds at the Capitol’s Emancipation Hall in tribute to George Floyd (performative, embarrassing af Kente cloth notwithstanding), as if they were kneeling down to King Trump. No one seems to be mentioning the George Floyd part, and how despicable it is to be using that footage in a gross AI video (it’s the second of the videos linked in the article above). There really is no bottom for these people.Funny thing, I saw the last speech President Reagan gave back in 1989 because Jimmy Kimmel posted it. I’m sure I saw it at the time. I was eighteen then, and no fan of a president who would not say the word “AIDS” for years while so many young men died. But watching the speech today, I find it amazing that his last words to the American people were about our immigrant community. It is worth watching if you haven’t seen it for thirty-some-odd years. It’s worth watching if you have.Then I saw the speech President George W. Bush gave the morning after President Barack Obama won the election. He congratulated President-elect Obama, and Vice President-elect Joe Biden on their “impressive victory” and promised his administration’s help in every way so he could guarantee a smooth and peaceful transition of power. Makes one think of January 6th.I didn’t agree with President Reagan or either of the presidents Bush on policy, but these were adults who did not defile the Oval Office with their presence, and did not fancy themselves kings. They did not violate the Constitution. They did not hate Democrats. They did not shut down the government and advise Republican senators to refuse to negotiate with their Democrat colleagues. I miss the days of John McCain telling people in his audience that he was not going to allow them to call President Obama’s decency or citizenship into question, back when President Obama was his opponent. I wish Republicans missed those days, too. I cannot for the life of me fathom why they are okay with the quality of people representing the GOP now. A president posting AI videos of himself dumping s**t on American citizens? Smh.I don’t think the two-party system is working here, but we can’t even have that conversation right now. The only conversation we can have is the one that is about who we want to be as a country. Millions of people answered that question on Saturday, and this administration didn’t like the answer. They’ve forgotten they work for us, too, and they’re supposed to be listening, not calling names like schoolyard bullies. What kind of leadership is that?This week’s podcast is not for little ears because I talked about Brainwaves — a film I saw when I was eleven, that I would find disturbing today. I laughed in the comments with some of y’all who also saw JAWS way too young (hi, Kate!), and Rosemary’s Baby (hi, Kendall!) and Manhattan (hi, Wendy!) - and generally commiserated with all my Gen X friends whose parents believed things that were too scary or grown-up for us to understand as children would somehow “go over our heads” instead of directly into them. Not so much! Maybe in some strange way it was good preparation for this very moment, when so many things are appalling and insane. We’re used to that. We’re grown now. We know what gaslighting is, and we know what boundaries are, too. It doesn’t make any of this easy, but at least we have each other and we can talk about it, we can laugh about it or cry about it or sit on the couch and stare into the middle distance until someone sends a meme or a text that reminds us people are freaking excellent and funny and wise. We don’t have to try to process these things alone. We have each other. Maybe no one “had us” when we were little (except for Mr. Rogers, obviously), but we have each other, now. We don’t need kings, but we do need to remember we are all neighbors. Sending you a lot of love.Come As You Are is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit allyhamilton.yogisanonymous.com/subscribe

If you’re new, hi and welcome. I’m so glad you’re here. You might be wondering what’s happening. I don’t mean in this country - I wonder what’s happening in this country every day - I mean with this podcast. Every week I write an essay, and then a couple of days later I record a talk about the topics I wrote about - after I’ve had a chance to read the responses and be in conversations with people - and often commiserate about the insanity of existing right now. This week I wrote about my son, and the time he fell off the monkey bars at recess and broke his elbow. He was six. It turns out a lot of people have fallen off the monkey bars and broken bones. Mostly when they were kids. Also, I laugh when I think of the climbing structures I grew up with, because they were so huge. They were a good twenty feet off the ground. Sometimes I wonder how any of us are still here. Look at this:I fell off a rainbow-shaped metal climbing structure when I was five - right when I got to the highest point and was feeling proud of myself for overcoming my fear - and hit my nose on one of the bars on the way down. I didn’t break anything, but my nose bled like a geyser. It bled so much my friends thought I was going to die and I believed them, because we were five. One of my friends actually said, “Oh no! You’re definitely going to die. People always die when they bleed like that.” I did not die. Anyway, my teachers were very kind to me.Some of you had stories about how incredible your teachers or principals were, and some of you had experiences like we had with the principal at my son’s school, and the nurse, too - disappointing and really hard to forgive.Which brings me to the bigger topic of the essay and the podcast - basic common decency. One of the comments this week (hi, Paul) was that “common decency” is becoming an oxymoron. It is dizzying and heartbreaking to watch people twisting themselves in knots (or not twisting themselves at all) - shrugging off some of the horrific things happening in our country every day. We’re wired for compassion. We’re meant to care about each other because it feels good to care about other people, and because our fates are tied. Historically, when human beings do terrible things to one another, it’s because they’ve decided this person, or this group of people is “other” - they are not like us, they are a danger or a threat to the common good. When you start putting people outside your circle of compassion, you might think you’re dehumanizing them, but it’s your own humanity you’re sacrificing. When you hurt someone accidentally, but you don’t call to check on them because you’re worried about liability and culpability, you’ve already lost the battle for your soul. When you decide one man is more important than the Constitution, democracy, or your fellow country-people, something has gone very deeply awry. For so many of us, it feels like we are living in an episode of the Twilight Zone. I would give almost anything for Rod Serling to come around the corner. If he did, I’d be like “I freaking KNEW it!! I knew this couldn’t be real!” Because it does feel like we’re in the upside down. Like we slipped through a portal. I got into a conversation with a woman who was utterly convinced Melissa Hortman, her husband Mark and their dog Gilbert were assassinated by a “radical left-wing lunatic” and when I explained to her that was absolutely bonkers and that Vance Boelter is a Trump MAGA supporter and had registered in the Republican presidential primary (and that he had tried to kill state senator John Hoffman - also a Democrat - along with his wife Yvette and their daughter Hope), and that he had 45 more Democrats on a list in his car along with 35 abortion providers - she said I was listening to legacy media, and just because I said it didn’t make it true.Me saying doesn’t make it true - the facts of the case make it true. Just like children being pulled out of bed half naked, zip-tied together and thrown into the backs of U-hauls should horrify everyone. Just like people being attacked by their own government for protesting peacefully should upset everyone. Some things are easy to figure out. You have to work really hard to pretend they’re okay when they aren’t - and there’s a cost that comes along with doing that. The cost is your integrity, and I wouldn’t exchange that for anything in the world. Good people are easy to spot. When they make a mistake, they own it. They don’t say mean-spirited, terrible things. They don’t take healthcare away from hardworking people, or free lunches away from hungry kids. They don’t grab women by the pussy. Up isn’t down. Wrong isn’t right. Rod Serling isn’t coming around the corner, but we have each other. If you’re hurting, it’s okay, me, too. If you’re scared, anxious, angry, sad… it’s okay, me, too. We have each other. We fall together and we get back up together. If the monkey bars didn’t kill us, this won’t, either. Sending you love.Come As You Are is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit allyhamilton.yogisanonymous.com/subscribe

I would imagine most of us have at least one childhood memory that has to do with cruelty - and feeling unsure about what to make of it. Being little in a big world is not always easy, especially if the situation at home is chaotic and uncertain. Sometimes kids are dealing with things that are hard to talk about, and the feelings come out sideways and twisted. Sometimes, heartbreaking as it is, kids are dealing with violence or neglect, and it makes them feel weak and small. Then, when they see weak and small beings in the world they lash out. They do unto others, even though they never wanted any of those things done unto them.I wrote (and talked) about a group of kids I came upon once as I was walking home from fourth grade - a group of kids and a tiny mouse and a tall boy with a broomstick. My guess is he and I both related to the mouse - scared and trapped and at the mercy of someone so much bigger - but his response was to stamp out the perceived weakness he saw, and mine was to save the mouse. The mouse was just being a mouse, after all. It hadn’t done anything wrong.There’s bystander syndrome and “groupthink” and fight, flight, freeze, collapse or fawn - all responses that might happen in the face of something traumatic and unexpected. Sometimes people are influenced by someone they consider to be an authority figure, and will obey orders that defy their own moral code. The Milgram Shock Experiment - led by Stanley Milgram in the 1960s - shocked even Milgram himself. I mention this because it is so painful and bewildering to see people we once considered close supporting an administration that thrives on making people suffer. Even children.The other day I responded under a social media post about the shutdown. I explained about the Affordable Care Act subsidies and the fact that we’re in this situation because Republicans are refusing to negotiate so Americans can have affordable health insurance premiums. For example, my premiums are going from $346/month to $1706/month January 1st if the subsidies are not extended.And here is an actual exchange I had with a real human being on social media after I explained about the staggering jump in my premiums and how I could not possibly manage that -Them: Stop using traditional medicine. There are other solutions, both preventative and palliative. Emergency medicine in times of immediate crisis is the only benefit Western medicine provides.Me: There are those of us who need mammograms/ultrasounds and skin cancer checks, but sure, no big deal, I’ll just have a green juice and hope for the best. Them: You can get affordable skin care checks - and for free at certain events. And affordable removal of pre-cancerous skin cells all for less than the cost of healthcare premiums.I go to a chiropractor, hot yoga, hike and do my best to eat healthy all for less than what healthcare premiums cost me. If it’s my time to leave this planet, that’s okay, too. We have such an irrational fear of dying. We fear it more than living boldly. Indigenous cultures are not like that. It’s the fear of death that allows the sick healthcare system to take full advantage of all of us.Me: I’ve been teaching yoga for 30+ years and I am healthy and eat well and all of the above. I don’t have an irrational fear of dying, but I do have children and I’d like to be here for them as long as I can. The point is this is a developed country and affordable healthcare should not be out of reach.Them:Maybe I should just loosen my grip on wanting to live. Adopt a more laissez faire attitude about breathing.Anyway, between the ICE agents macing protesters in the face in Portland (which was peaceful until the POTUS invaded with his thugs), and ICE agents in Chicago traumatizing children - paid for with our tax dollars - and now South Carolina Judge Diane Goodstein’s home burning to the ground after an apparent explosion (she’s the judge who just refused to give DJT access to voter information) we really have reached new heights of violence and mayhem here. People’s rights are being trampled. We just wanted healthcare, and for this administration to honor the rule of law.I’m waiting for his supporters to realize they’re in trouble, too. They are. This is not normal, and it’s not okay. At a certain point, everyone needs to understand these are the people who have no issue with cruelty - they get off on it. They shoot puppies with no remorse. They send Ghislaine Maxwell to “prison spa” with no regard for the survivors who gathered up so much courage to come forward. They’re the grown-up versions of the boys with the broomsticks, and we’re just mice in a bucket to them, but they’ve misjudged. We are not weak, they are. Cruelty is not a badge of honor, it’s an illness and you stop it by continually saying no. Hell no. You refuse to watch your neighbors be treated without compassion while you do nothing. You decide that is not acceptable and you resist and boycott and organize and protest in every way you can and you get loud, friends. You don’t give up. Do not give up. Check on the people who’ve gone quiet. Apple and Google removed ICE-tracking apps, but if ICE is in your neighborhood, you can go to Waze and tap the Report icon, then “bad weather” and “icy conditions” in the parking lot of the closest store. Get creative. See if there’s a Community Garden near you, and whether it’s big enough to feed people in your neighborhood who might be struggling. Maybe you can set up a Neighborhood Watch not just for ICE, but so you get to know your neighbors and they get to know you - and realize you care, and they’re safer than they think. Be kinder to everyone you meet. It’s time to get in the streets. Come As You Are is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit allyhamilton.yogisanonymous.com/subscribe

Hello friends. I write to you from my couch, in my pajamas at 2 p.m. on a Saturday, under a blanket, with a migraine. It’s a beast - so far it has blasted through my daily medication Topamax, and the Rizatriptan I took yesterday because I could tell I had one breaking through - and even the Benadryl I took before bed because I could feel I still wasn’t okay. I was in agony all night and did the barely-sleeping “bed hustle” - then got up to drive my daughter to self-defense. In my pajamas. She did not mind, it’s not like I got out of the car. Maybe I should try a couple of Tylenol. Some guy on insta posted this very hilarious thing pretending to be the CEO of Auntie Faw which I’m splitting into two words and spelling weirdly because god knows if I’m already on lists somewhere (likely) - and he was telling everyone HQ was shutting down and they should come get their things. People in the comments were also funny, they were asking about what would happen to their 401k’s and if anyone had Janice-from-Accounting’s potato salad recipe. But part of me was worrying people were going to believe it, and think it was an actual organization, and not a word that means “being against fascism” which is a good thing to be against. My migraine is probably just the stress from the fall of democracy, I’m sure I’ll be fine soon. Or maybe it was the guy who messaged to tell me he was “unfollowing” from my fb yoga business page because I was talking about politics. I guess he didn’t get the memo that I am now responding to people who feel the need to tell me they are unfollowing with pithy remarks so I can create an anthology. “Okay, but I’m keeping that tapestry we bought in Mexico!” Let him ponder that for a minute.I was too tired to say that everything is politics - the way the food gets to your plate, whether you can afford health insurance, if your neighbors are afforded equal protection under the law - it’s all politics. Politics is another way of saying “your philosophy in action” - the way you think the world should be - that’s what you’re voting for when you cast your ballot. So yeah, if you’ve been practicing yoga for a while, I sure hope you care about whether people are being harmed, and if a person who engaged in a heck of a lot of hate speech is being lionized, and if the president is declaring war on states in his own country…and also comics, LOL! It’s not just a thing you do on your mat before you go eat a kale salad at a restaurant - where the person who puts the salad in front of you could be hauled off by an unidentified masked man, thrown into an unmarked van, and lost - as in vanished. Yeah, you should care, sorry if your yoga teacher forget to mention that part. I lost a treasured friend because he’s gone to the dark side, and I know I’m taking that hard because I don’t let people in easily, and I don’t let them go easily, either. Goodbyes are my least favorite thing, so my head is exploding and my heart is bruised and battered, but I’ve been through worse and I’ll be fine.I was just texting with my friend Kate, and I told her I started reading an article this morning about a medication-resistant fungus that’s sweeping the country and prevalent in California and can be fatal - and I stopped reading. As in, I couldn’t tell you the name or the symptoms or what to watch out for because there didn’t seem to be a way to avoid it except to try to stay out of the hospital, which yes - especially if you don’t know how or if you’ll be able to afford health insurance in January. I don’t need to know there’s a fungus among-us. Kate said the murder hornets must be queueing up about now, and I said frogs falling from the sky in 3…2…I missed the podcast recording that would have gone with The Devil’s in the Details last weekend because I was moving my son into his first apartment as he starts his second year of college. So, I did a mashup episode that combined themes from that essay, and this week’s essay, Escalation, thus - A Devilish Escalation. The themes work together, and this episode is about the events that shape us in early childhood.Those events affect the way we feel about our place in the world, our impact on the people around us, whether we feel free to express ourselves, the roles we play in the family system - and how all of that soil we grow in does not have to define us, but it does lend context if we’re trying to understand why we are the way we are. It’s also essential to consider if you’re trying to liberate yourself from thoughts, feelings and tendencies that lead to heartache. I shared about some of my own “origin stories” and also how I stopped repeating patterns that caused me a lot of pain.It’s about gaslighting and hypocrisy and how exhausting it is to be on the receiving end of that stuff, especially if you grew up with it. It’s about how scared I am about where we are right now, and how sad.In any case, I’m going to “take Rufus to the backyard” - I just remembered that’s what helped the last time I had a really bad migraine. That’s the problem with pain like this, it makes it hard to think. Sending you love, friends. Watch out for falling frogs.Come As You Are is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit allyhamilton.yogisanonymous.com/subscribe