This one is a special edition.

We're marking a milestone. June 4 was Day 100 of The After Chapter Podcast, and we couldn't let it pass without saying something. Not with fanfare, but with honesty. Which, if you've been listening, is the only way we know how to do anything.

Inside this issue: what Day 100 actually felt like, the results of the 100 Pour Challenge, where the show is headed before Season 2 premieres in September, and two summer episodes we think you'll want to put on your calendar.

We're glad you're here. Pour something and stay a minute.

Michele & Cecilia

On June 4, The After Chapter Podcast turned 100 days old.

The first instinct was yay! We did it. Let's make sure we share the news with our listeners, friends and family. That lasted a few minutes.

The instinct that resonated and stayed longer was keep moving, write the next episode notes, check the numbers and think about Season 2 and 3.

We caught ourselves. And we want to sit with that for a second. Because we're still unraveling too. We don't have it all together. And the things we've been watching in others? We do them as well.

We've been noticing something at events, in conversations with founders, scrolling past posts from women who built something real -- there's a pattern in how we mark the moment, or more accurately, how quickly we don't.

It shows up as a pivot. "We hit X milestone. Now here's what's next." The achievement becomes a runway, not a landing.

We get it. We do it. The discomfort of fully receiving something you worked for is real. Staying in the celebration feels indulgent when there's more to do. And somewhere along the way, most of us got the message that moving fast is the same thing as being serious.

But what if the skipping is the problem? Not because you deserve a party, but because the pause is where you actually learn what the thing meant. What it cost, what it changed in you.

100 days ago, we launched a show with no audience, no guarantee, and a real question at the center of it. What happens in the space after something ends, before the next thing starts? We didn't have the answer then and we still don't. But we built a place to sit with it together.

That's what Day 100 is. Not a finish line. Not a launchpad. Just a moment to actually feel the weight of having started something and stayed.

We asked you to help us reach 100 new Spotify followers to help us celebrate Day 100 of the Podcast. Here's where we landed, after 19 days we gained 78 new followers (as of June 7).

Thank you for every follow and every share! Each one moved this show toward someone who needed it. Though the challenge has ended, help us continue to build and share these conversations with those who would benefit from them.

Season 1 was The Unraveling. We named what was coming apart and we stayed with the discomfort of not knowing what came next. We didn't rush toward resolution, and neither did you. What we got from it was asking better questions and sitting in the in-between with a little more comfort.

What's coming is The Reconstruction. Not a rebuild of what was but something new being assembled from what's left. Season 2 turns outward and is more practical, it’s designing a next chapter with constraints, agency, and realism, without becoming prescriptive. We're not there yet and we're not pretending to be, but the foundation is being laid, one brick at a time.

Before we get there, the Bridge and Summer Pour episodes run through August. All of it slower, more interior. An honest look at what sits underneath the big transitions: desire, identity, ambiguity, the quiet signals most of us miss when life stays loud. It's the bridge between who you were in the unraveling and who you're becoming in the reconstruction.

Season 2 premieres September 8.

Two episodes you won't want to miss this summer.

This summer, each co-host goes solo for one episode. No guest, just one question, one pour, and no place to hide.

Cecilia goes first. On July 14, she sits alone with something she's been sitting with longer than she expected: who are you when you're not producing, proving, or performing for anyone else? If your sense of self is quietly tied to what's getting done, this one is for you.

Michele follows on July 28, with something quieter. The signals that only come through when you stop filling every moment with noise, structure, and urgency.   The ones that tell you something true, if you slow down enough to hear them.

For 10 weeks, alongside Season 1 of the podcast, we showed up a little more personally. Before the Chapter was our space to share what we were learning, what we were sitting with, and the things that don't always make it into a recorded episode. It was also a space for you to get to know Cecilia and Michele, individually.

We asked every guest on The After Chapter Podcast to introduce themselves in three words, no professional titles, no family roles. Just who they are. Over 10 weeks, we finally answered that question ourselves.

Michele: Teacher, Host & Explorer.

Cecilia: Facilitative, Global & Inquisitive.

We also talked about our passions and hobbies. Not as an aside, but because it matters. Episode 1 was about auditing your energy. Having things outside of work and obligation, things you do simply because they fill you up, is part of how you know who you are when the titles fall away.

Michele earned her Court of Master Sommeliers Introductory course examination. Wine is something Michele studies as seriously as she enjoys it, and she uses that knowledge to curate every pour moment on the show. That's the explorer and the teacher showing up in the same glass.

For Cecilia, knitting and travel are inseparable. She's walked into over 300 yarn shops across the U.S. and internationally. That curiosity, that willingness to go somewhere new and connect with people through a shared craft, that's the facilitative, global, inquisitive person she named herself to be.

Our hobbies weren't incidental to starting this podcast. They were the signal. Before the Chapter won't continue as a formal series. But we'll keep showing up in that way, more casually, on social media. Because that kind of honesty doesn't need a format to exist.

If you built something this year, even something quiet, we hope you let yourself have it too.

New episodes drop every Tuesday. https://linktr.ee/afterchapterpodcast