“I didn’t want to just write about loss,” says religion scholar Elaine Pagels. “I wanted to write about coming back from it and finding you can still have joy and a wonderful life. Because for me, that was a surprise.” Pagels is a bestselling author and the Harrington Spear Paine Professor of Religion at Princeton University. Today, she joins host Elise Loehnen to discuss her books Why Religion? and The Gnostic Gospels and the journey that led her to writing them. They talk about how religious traditions can shape how we understand ourselves, whether Pagels thinks there’s such a thing as sin, and why she considers herself more of an explorer than a believer. (For more, see The goop Podcast hub.)
 
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Is Belief Overrated?

goop CEO and founder Gwyneth Paltrow and author Cleo Wade take turns hosting the brightest thinkers and culture changers.

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Self-Improvement

The founder of Brown Girl Therapy and the author of But What Will People Say? joins Cleo Wade to talk about belonging, family, and identity. Kohli examines her own experiences as a child of South Asian immigrants, and the pressure to present different versions of herself across different cultural contexts.
 
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Examining Our Stories (with therapist Sahaj Kaur Kohli)

Sue Varma, author of Practical Optimism, served as the first medical director and attending psychiatrist at the World Trade Center Mental Health Program, treating civilian and first-responder survivors in the aftermath of 9/11. She shares how her work there led her to develop a framework for practical optimism. She explains what it means to be a practical optimist (and why it's different than blind optimism), ways for moving forward if you're feeling stuck, and how small intentional changes have the power to impact our physical and emotional health.
 
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How to Be a Practical Optimist (with psychiatrist Sue Varma)

Legendary author Anne Lamott discusses the many ways love can transform us. She shares how she learned to break free from perfectionism, the spiritual value of crying, the mantras that help ground her in self-love, and her new book Somehow.
 
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Thoughts on Love (with author Anne Lamott)

Katara McCarty is the founder of Exhale, an app focused on the mental wellness of Black women. Today, she shares her personal life story with Gwyneth. They talk about how McCarty’s work has been informed by a unique survey she conducted in 2023. And what it means to hold space: “I think that holding space takes acknowledging the fullness of the person you’re holding space for,” McCarty says.
 
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Systems of Self-Care (with founder Katara McCarty)

Gwyneth is joined by Lisa Mosconi, author of The Menopause Brain. Mosconi is an associate professor of neurology at Weill Cornell Medicine and the director of its Women’s Brain Initiative and the Alzheimer’s Prevention Program. Today, Mosconi explains how hormonal shifts during perimenopause and menopause can impact cognitive health and shares some of the clinical trials and brain-imaging work her lab is doing to better understand this stage of life. They about the foods that can support brain health at any stage of life and Mosconi’s perspective on why menopause can be seen as an opportunity, particularly from an evolutionary standpoint.
 
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Is Belief Overrated?

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