Dr. Lindsay Gibson joins the podcast to share her groundbreaking work on emotional maturity. Dr. Gibson and I explore how growing up with emotionally immature caregivers can affect our adult relationships, and what we can do to recover from these experiences, build healthier patterns, and disentangle from emotionally immature people.

Dr. Meg Jay, a specialist on what she calls the “defining decade,” joins me to explore how we can navigate this transformative and often anxiety-provoking time in our lives.

What do dissociation, avoidance, and shutdown all have in common? They’re connected to the “freeze” response to stress. In one of my favorite episodes to date, Dr. Rick joins me to explore the freeze response in detail and how we can begin to move through it. Towards the end of the episode we discuss managing these tendencies in a relationship.

In this episode we open up the mailbag and answer questions from our listeners.

Dr. Rick and I share (roughly) 10 things we wish we’d known in our 20s. You’ll learn how to find and embrace your natural talents, appreciate meaningful relationships, and see things in a new light.

Dr. Rick and I explore self-abandonment, which occurs when we go against our authentic wants, emotions, and boundaries in order to serve others, meet external expectations, or protect ourselves emotionally.

Dr. Rick, Dr. Jud, and I discuss our eating patterns, shame spirals, and the many problems with diets. We then move the conversation from what we eat to how we eat, applying Dr. Jud’s work on habits and craving to the experience of emotional eating.

Associate therapist Elizabeth Ferreira joins me to explore how we can feel our feelings while staying calm, collected, and in control. We walk through two examples of under- and over-regulation, and Elizabeth offers specific practices that might help in each common situation.

Dr. Joy Harden Bradford joins the podcast to explore how we can apply lessons from group therapy to build stronger friendships. Dr. Joy and I focus on how we can build the trust necessary for vulnerability, and how to manage attachment issues that show up in friendships.

Jessica McCabe joins me to explore her journey with ADHD, dealing with common challenges like self-criticism, shame, and sensitivity, and how we can work with our unique brain, not against it. 

Dr. Rick and I focus on the secret to everyday happiness: learning how to like without wanting. We talk about the lies our brain tells us, the rapid movement from liking to wanting, and how we can enjoy an experience without craving more of it.

Dr. Danny Penman joins the show to explore the role of vedanā, how we can help our brain interpret the world more accurately, and practical tools for relaxing suffering and enjoying life.

Dr. Rick and I open up the mailbag to answer questions from listeners. How can we understand and support someone going through a mental health crisis? Is meditation enough to heal trauma? And what can we do about family members that just won’t change?

Dr. Rick and I are joined by Dr. Richard Schwartz, creator of the Internal Family Systems (IFS) model of therapy, to explore how we can integrate all the aspects of who we are.

Dr. Mariel Buqué joins the podcast to help us learn how we can heal from the past, create healthier patterns, and break cycles of trauma.

Dr. Rick and I kick off 2024 by exploring how we can relate to the past, plan for the future, and get more from the year ahead.

Forrest and Elizabeth welcome listeners into their home to talk about their changing relationship with the holidays, letting go of the past, healthy boundaries, glimmers, and different paths to taking in the good.

Dr. Rick joins me for a deep dive into harnessing our natural generativity. How can we become more productive and creative, experience greater satisfaction, and lean into our biological drives to get more of what we want out of life?

Dr. Amy Morin and I explore how couples can work together to identify their issues, deal with effort imbalances, and avoid common mistakes (like having, get this, not enough conflict).