Chicken Soup for the Soul with Amy Newmark

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and today we’re talking about traveling with grandchildren, from the mundane, like those emergency bathroom visits, to the sublime, which is basically everything else that happens when you travel with those amazing children. These stories are in our very cool new book, Chicken Soup for the Soul: Being Grandma, which is a fabulous gift for every grandmother out there, whether she’s brand new to the job or an old hand. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul, and it’s Wow Wednesday, which is when I find awe-inspiring or surprising stories to share with you. Today I’ve got a couple of cool stories from Chicken Soup for the Soul: Being Grandma. These stories are written by grandmothers and by their very appreciative families… and our first one is something new for me, even though I’ve personally published more than 17,000 new stories during the last 18 years that I’ve been editor-in-chief here. Nancy Geiger tells us about her amazing mother, who was born in 1923 and lived through the Depression and then got married right before World War II and lived through all the hardships that Americans faced during that period. And her poor mom became a widow with infant twins right before the end of the war. She married again, had two more twins and another child, and was widowed again at age 60. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul, and today I’m sharing a couple of stories from Chicken Soup for the Soul: Tap into Your Inner Strength, stories that will give you a better understanding of the troubles other people have and help put our own in perspective. When tough times happen, I think we’re all surprised by how strong and capable we can be, but it’s also great to see how other people do it, and we feel so much less sorry for ourselves when we have role models—often, people who are going through much worse problems than we are. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and I’m excited about sharing another couple of stories with you from our book for grandmothers. This is the best book ever for grandmas – and I should know, as I have seven grandchildren and they’re a huge part of my life. When you become a grandmother it’s so exciting, but also a bit like stepping into a minefield. You have your own expectations, but the new baby’s parents have expectations too, and theirs basically have to take precedence. They’re in charge. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and I’m pleased to add another element to our podcast – excerpts from our new audiobooks. We have a lot of audiobooks out there, and a lot more coming, and I thought you’d enjoy hearing some of the stories narrated by professional actors. So today, with permission of Simon & Schuster, I’m going to share a couple of stories from the Simon & Schuster audiobook version of Chicken Soup for the Soul: Hope, Faith & Miracles, authored and edited by me! It’s copyright 2025 by Chicken Soup for the Soul, and available now in all the places you go to listen to audiobooks. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and I’m excited about sharing stories with you from our new book about being a grandmother. Chicken Soup for the Soul: Being Grandma will make a great gift for Mother’s Day or any other occasion. It’s filled with stories written by grandmothers and also by grandchildren and grown children about the grandmothers in their lives. I’m biased because I have seven grandchildren but I think this book is AMAZING. Today I want to share a couple of stories that will actually be helpful to anyone who is involved with taking kids shopping for gifts or providing gifts to children, as there are some good ideas in these stories about how to make shopping a more meaningful experience for kids instead of just the same old “more more more I want” kind of thing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and it’s Friend Friday, which means I’m chatting with someone interesting from the Chicken Soup for the Soul world. Today I’d like to introduce you to Tess Clarkson, who has written two great stories for us, both about miraculous events. She also has such an interesting background that I wanted you to meet her. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul, and it’s Wow Wednesday. I always try to share awe-inspiring or surprising stories with you on Wednesdays, so I went back to one of our older books and found a couple that I really love from one of our biggest bestsellers, Chicken Soup for the Soul: Touched by an Angel. They are both about what I call “deathbed miracles.” We do get a lot of stories about miraculous things that happen even during an awful time, the death of a family member. It’s nice to hear these stories that provided so much wonder and comfort to family members. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul. I’m continuing to share stories with you from our new book Chicken Soup for the Soul: Self-Care Isn’t Selfish. We made this book because this is such an important truth for us all to embrace. I’m sure you’ve been through plenty of things where you have NOT put yourself first, where you didn’t even put yourself on your to-do list AT ALL. And that’s not good. It’s bad for you and it’s bad for all the people you take care of too. Because you’re no good to them if you’re frazzled and exhausted and starting to get resentful because your needs are not being addressed. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul, and today I want to share a couple of stories with you that I found so helpful. These are about grieving, and how, instead of just focusing on what you’ve LOST, you can also focus on what you HAD and be grateful for having had that. These stories are from a powerful new collection of stories that we selected from our library, all about how you can tap into your inner strength. Because we all have these reserves inside us just waiting to be called upon when we need them. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and I’m pleased to share another couple of stories with you from one of our new audiobooks. Today’s stories are about amazing coincidences and they’re from Chicken Soup for the Soul: Miracles, Angels & Messages from Heaven. We owe thanks to Simon & Schuster Audio for permission to play a couple of these stories from the audiobook of our Miracles, Angels & Messages from Heaven book, edited by me and the audiobook copyright 2026 and available now in all the places you go to listen to audiobooks. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul, and today I’m sharing some very wise advice from Chicken Soup for the Soul: Tap into Your Inner Strength. This book contains 101 stories from our library about resilience during tough times. It always amazes me how much inner strength we have inside us, just waiting to be called upon. I’m sure you’ve been through things that were awful that you managed to weather and you looked back and wondered how you did it. When tough times happen, I think we’re all surprised by how strong and capable we can be. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark and I want to share a couple of stories with you today from Chicken Soup for the Soul: Change Your Habits, Change Your Life, stories that may help you develop a strategy for making your resolutions stick… or even better, give you better resolutions and goals. When we put together this new collection we chose the best advice and the most relatable stories we found among the thousands of submissions we received, and I think you’ll definitely find something that resonates with you. The stories in the book cover the most common resolutions, such as getting fit, losing weight, quitting smoking, and getting organized, but they also cover time management, improving relationships, engaging in self-care, and learning how to stress less. And no matter what your resolution, the tips from our writers will help you, finally, have success with your resolutions. Today I’m sharing a couple of stories from people who made their resolutions work by DOING LESS, by cleaning the unwanted stuff off their calendars. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and I’m pleased to add another element to our podcast – excerpts from our new audiobooks. We have a lot of audiobooks out there, and a lot more coming, and I thought you’d enjoy hearing some of the stories narrated by professional actors. So today, with permission of Simon & Schuster, I’m going to share a couple of stories from the Simon & Schuster audiobook version of Chicken Soup for the Soul: Tap into Your Inner Strength, authored and edited by me! It’s brand new, copyright 2026 by Chicken Soup for the Soul, and available now in all the places you go to listen to audiobooks. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and I’m excited about sharing another couple of stories with you from our book about how changing your habits can change your life… in big ways and small ways. I know that we might have started the year with some pretty big goals and resolutions, but there’s something to be said for making incremental do-able changes instead of gigantic ones that are more likely to be abandoned after a few weeks. Finding something small and easy to do is so satisfying. For example, how about making a quick and easy change in how you handle your marriage or your relationship with your significant other? It can do wonders for both of you and it can be pretty simple. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and I’m continuing to share some of the truly entertaining stories from our latest book called What I Learned from My Dog. These stories are not only fun but also eye-opening because sometimes I can’t believe how heroic, or sweet, or comforting, or CLEVER dogs can be. I know with all those Instagram videos, which I watch way too much, we DO see a lot of smart dogs, but I think you’ll get a kick out of these two stories today. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul, and it’s Wow Wednesday. I have two really amazing stories to share with you today, ones that continue to be top of mind for me even though I’ve published more than 17,000 stories during my tenure as editor-in-chief of Chicken Soup for the Soul. These are stories about Amazing Life-Saving Coincidences that are almost impossible to explain, except that sometimes miracles really do happen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and I’m pleased to share new stories with you from Chicken Soup for the Soul: What I Learned from My Cat, which is our latest best-selling book of cat stories. We were overwhelmed with submissions for this book over the past two years, because it seems like every cat owner has a story about how their cat improved their life, made them a better person, taught them how to live in the moment, and other good things like that. Plus, lots of people wrote about their cats’ intelligence and their special skills, but then there’s another favorite topic for our cat-loving writers and that is their naughty cats. There’s a famous quote by Missy Dizick about this. She said Some people say that cats are sneaky, evil, and cruel. True, and they have many other fine qualities as well. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and I’m pleased to share another couple of stories with you from the audiobook of our bestselling book, Chicken Soup for the Soul: Change Your Habits, Change Your Life. With permission of Simon & Schuster, I’m going to share a couple of stories from the Simon & Schuster audiobook version of Chicken Soup for the Soul: Change Your Habits, Change Your Life, authored and edited by me! It’s brand new, copyright 2026, and available now in all the places you go to listen to audiobooks. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul, and it’s Wow Wednesday. I always try to share awe-inspiring or surprising stories with you on Wednesdays, and I have a bunch of those in our latest book, which is called Chicken Soup for the Soul: Tap into Your Inner Strength. This book contains 101 stories from our library about resilience during tough times. It always amazes me how much inner strength we have inside us, just waiting to be called upon. I’m sure you’ve been through things that were awful that you managed to weather and you looked back and wondered how you did it. When tough times happen, I think we’re all surprised by how powerful we can be. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and I want to share a couple of stories with you today from one of our new books, Chicken Soup for the Soul: Pets, Pets, Pets. This is such a fun book and it’s been the #1 bestseller among pet books ever since it came out three months ago. I haven’t counted but I think there are at least 40 kinds of pets in this new collection, every kind of furry, feathered, scaly, flying, walking, swimming, slithering, tame or wild, tiny or gigantic pet imaginable. A lot of these pets don’t necessarily live in our homes, including horses. But horses are such an important of so many people’s lives that I made sure to have a few great stories about them in our book. Today I want to share a couple of stories about equine therapy and how it really works well. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and it’s Friend Friday, which means I’m chatting with someone interesting from the Chicken Soup for the Soul world. Today I’d like to introduce you to Ellie Shefi, who wrote a great story for our bestselling book, Change Your Habits, Change Your Life. She also has such an interesting background that I wanted you to meet her. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul, and it’s Wow Wednesday. I always try to share awe-inspiring or surprising stories with you on Wednesdays, and I have new ones for you from our latest bestseller, Chicken Soup for the Soul: Pets, Pets, Pets. This book has been a big success, and I think it’s because of the tremendous variety of pets we talk about and all the different ways in which they become part of their humans’ lives. One of those ways is through being rehabbed. Our writers are a great bunch of people and it’s amazing how many of them have gone way beyond anyone’s expectations in saving injured animals--both domestic pets and wild animals. Today I’m going to share a couple of stories from people who found a lot of joy in helping out those animals, starting with J.A. Rost. She tells us that her daughter called to say that her husband Brad had rescued a baby bat, and they were going to try and save it. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and I’m pleased to add another element to our podcast – excerpts from our new audiobooks. We have a lot of audiobooks out there, and a lot more coming, and I thought you’d enjoy hearing some of the stories narrated by professional actors. So today, with permission of Simon & Schuster, I’m going to share a couple of stories from the Simon & Schuster audiobook version of Chicken Soup for the Soul: Change Your Habits, Change Your Life, authored and edited by me! It’s brand new, copyright 2026, and available now in all the places you go to listen to audiobooks. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and I’m pleased to share new stories with you from Chicken Soup for the Soul: What I Learned from My Cat, which is our latest best-selling book of cat stories. We spent two years collecting stories for this book so there is a huge variety of topics in it, but I have to say that one of my favorite subthemes in any cat book we publish is what I like to call Time-Share Cats. Somehow these clever little furry pets, if you can call them pets – maybe we are THEIR pets, right? – well anyway these beautiful creatures often figure out how to live with more than one family at the same time, with no one the wiser. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul, and it’s Wow Wednesday. Which means that I’m sharing two really amazing stories – stories about how mothers keep helping their children even after they are no longer around. It’s kind of reassuring for those of us who are mothers – that our influence and advice will persist even when we’re not there to personally deliver the goodies —and it’s reassuring for grown children worried about how they will keep navigating all those adult milestones without the counsel of their mothers. So that’s why today’s episode is called When Mom Is Gone but Still Being Mom. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and I’m continuing to share some of the truly entertaining stories from our latest book called What I Learned from My Dog. Not only are these stories entertaining, but since we’re Chicken Soup for the Soul there has to be some inspiration too, and we all know that dogs make their humans better versions of themselves… so here we go, with an extremely valuable lesson that we all learn from our dogs, and that is… HOW TO LIVE IN THE PRESENT. Isn’t that one of the best life skills that dogs have? It’s one that we all know we SHOULD HAVE, but of course we’re not very good at it. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark and I want to share a couple of stories with you today from Chicken Soup for the Soul: Change Your Habits, Change Your Life, stories that may help you develop a strategy for making your resolutions stick. When we put together this new collection we chose the best advice and the most relatable stories we found among the thousands of submissions we received, and I think you’ll definitely find something that resonates with you. The stories in the book cover the most common resolutions, such as getting fit, losing weight, quitting smoking, and getting organized, but they also cover time management, improving relationships, engaging in self-care, and learning how to stress less. And no matter what your resolution, the tips from our writers will help you, finally, have success with your resolutions. Today I’m sharing a couple of stories from people who made their resolutions work by making very small changes that ended up yielding big results… and increased fitness. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and I want to share a couple of stories with you today from Chicken Soup for the Soul: Pets, Pets, Pets. This book has been a #1 pet category bestseller since it came out in the fall, and it’s filled with entertaining stories about all the classic pets, from dogs and cats, to horses and goats, llamas and cows, chickens and ducks, pigs and donkeys, snakes and spiders, rodents and ferrets, birds and lizards, fish and turtles, and every other kind of animal that people love, including wild animals that turn out to be not so wild and become pets too. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and I’m excited about sharing another couple of stories with you from our book about how changing your habits can change your life… In big ways and small ways. I know that we all think about fitness and BIG resolutions at this time of year, but there are plenty of SMALL easy-to-implement changes that we can make that also make a big difference. And finding something small and easy to do is so satisfying. For example, how about making a quick and easy change in how you have conversations? It can do wonders for your relationships with people you know and even interactions with perfect strangers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and I want to share a couple of stories with you today from Chicken Soup for the Soul: Pets, Pets, Pets, which has been such a bestseller. It’s a really fun book and it makes a great gift for anyone of any age who loves animals. I haven’t counted but I think there are at least 40 kinds of pets in this new collection, every kind of furry, feathered, scaly, flying, walking, swimming, slithering, indoor or outdoor, tame or wild, tiny or gigantic pet imaginable. And of course, dogs and cats too, although the book is about two-thirds stories about other kinds of pets. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul, and it’s Wow Wednesday. I always try to share awe-inspiring or surprising stories with you on Wednesdays, and I have new ones for you from our latest bestseller, Chicken Soup for the Soul: Change Your Habits, Change Your Life. It’s that time of year when we think about what we want to do better, and that often means focusing on fitness and weight and physical health. But there are so many other ways that we can improve our lives, and one of those is by reaching out, making connections, and letting other people into our lives. It can actually be rather miraculous when one of these connections occurs. So that’s what I want to talk about today, starting with a story by Shannon Leach that I think we can all relate to. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and I’m still sharing stories with you from out book about forgiveness, Chicken Soup for the Soul: Let It Go. Today’s stories are about changing your mindset and doing what’s necessary to make your marriage work, and of course these strategies could apply to any relationship that needs a little TLC. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and I’m pleased to share new stories with you from Chicken Soup for the Soul: What I Learned from My Cat, which is our latest best-selling book of cat stories. We were overwhelmed with submissions for this book over the past two years, because it seems like every cat owner has a story about how their cat improved their life, made them a better person, taught them how to live in the moment, and other good things like that. Plus, lots of people wrote about their cats’ intelligence and their special skills, including for diagnosing serious illnesses, hence the name of today’s episode: Dr. Cat. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul, and it’s Wow Wednesday. We have a new book out about cats, and it’s amazing how many of the stories in it are about miraculous events revolving around cats, including about weird coincidences, premonitions, and dreams involving finding cats and then coming across those same cats in real life. I’m going to share two stories today about the weird and magical way that some people adopted their cats, new family members that were truly meant to be. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it’s Amy Newmark with your Chicken Soup for the Soul and I’m continuing to share some of the truly entertaining stories from our latest book called What I Learned from My Dog. We always see how dogs make their humans better versions of themselves, but they also help their humans to get to know themselves better. And that’s why today’s episode is called “What My Dog Taught Me about Myself.” Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices