The Stories We Tell and the Ones We Avoid with Chas Hoppe | EP018

Chas Hoppe has spent much of his career helping other people tell their stories. As a ghostwriter, editor, and founder of Cape & Cowl Media, he has worked on dozens of books and helped authors find the meaning, structure, and honesty inside experiences that can be difficult to put into words. In this conversation, we turn that lens back on Chas. He reflects on an early childhood filled with creativity and a close extended family, followed by a series of devastating losses that changed his sense of safety and left him determined not to be defined as "the broken kid." We talk about how those experiences shaped his parenting, his relationship with grief, and his lifelong pull toward creative work. Chas also shares why he eventually recognized that helping other people tell their stories had sometimes felt safer than confronting his own. From there, we explore the work we did together on my memoir, Chasing Control, including the difference between being honest and still holding something back, how an editor can challenge deeply personal material without taking ownership of it, and why sometimes the stories we avoid are the ones we most need to understand. This is a conversation about grief, identity, creativity, parenthood, and the stories we tell about our lives — including the ones that take us longer to face. Learn more about Chas and Cape & Cowl Media at capeandcowlmedia.com or connect and say "hello" to Chas on LinkedIn.