My guest this week is Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor, author of the new book, Whole Brain Living: The Anatomy of Choice and the Four Characters That Drive Our Life (affiliate link). Jill has quite a story to tell, which you may have heard the beginning of in her bestselling book, My Stroke of Insight. In this conversation she describes how she recovered from a massive stroke, and is now able to share the powerful lessons she learned about the brain, human nature, and ultimately love.

My guest this week is clinical psychologist Dr. Jeffrey Bernstein, bestselling author of The Anxiety, Depression, & Anger Toolbox for Teens (affiliate link). Jeff specializes in treating kids and teens. In this episode we talk about how the pandemic has affected young people, and the warning signs parents can look for that could indicate their child is having a mental health crisis. We also explored how to talk with our children about their mental health, and how Jeff’s powerful blend of mindfulness, cognitive behavioral therapy, and positive psychology can equip kids and teens with the skills they need to navigate any challenge. I think you’ll find a lot in this episode that’s really useful.

My guest this week is clinical psychologist and author Dr. Mitch Abblett. We focused our discussion on Mitch’s recent book called Prizeworthy: How to Meaningfully Connect, Build Character, and Unlock the Potential of Every Child (affiliate link). In this episode you’ll find out exactly what prizing is, what it feels like to be prized, and why it's the cornerstone of everything Mitch does as a therapist and a parent. Mitch also offers many helpful tools for handling the challenges that we all face as parents, or as anyone who wants to bring out the best in young people.

My guest this week is Dr. Daniel Kinderlehrer. Dan is a physician and author of the recent book, Recovery From Lyme Disease: The Integrative Medicine Guide to Diagnosing and Treating Tick-Borne Illness. This was a great discussion about a topic that’s important for a lot of people. Dan is extremely knowledgeable and has a great deal of experience treating Lyme Disease.

Some of his experience is personal, as you’ll hear him describe, since he recovered from Lyme himself. We discuss many of the psychiatric syndromes that Lyme can trigger, including extreme depression and anxiety.

My guest this week is Martin Lee, the primary author of the recent book The Essential Guide to CBD (affiliate link), which offers a solid introduction to the many possible benefits of CBD. Martin and I explored how it is that a single substance can have such wide-ranging effects, and got into specific conditions like anxiety, depression, and sleep. If you're new to CBD, or interested to learn more about the science behind its effects, I think you'll find a lot of good information here.

My guest this week is Shelley Buck, co-author of the recent book Leave Your Light On about her son, Ryder Buck. (Shelley’s co-authors include Kathy Curtis and Ryder.) This is a conversation about love, parenting, holding on, letting go, finding faith, and what happens when we die, among other things. I think you’ll get a lot out of our discussion.

​I had a great conversation in this episode with Dr. Jonathan Schaefer. Jon is a clinical psychologist and an expert in psychiatric epidemiology, which addresses questions about how common psychiatric diagnoses are. As you’ll hear, it’s far more common to experience a mental health issue than was previously thought. The main takeaway seems to be not that mental illness is becoming more common, although that’s part of the issue, but that previous methods of measurement had probably undercounted, for reasons that Jon explains very nicely. I was certainly blown away by the most recent statistics.

My guest this week is Dr. Patricia Zurita Ona, a clinical psychologist who specializes in treating obsessive-compulsive disorder. We discussed her new workbook entitled Living Beyond OCD Using Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (affiliate link), and what ACT adds to traditional CBT for OCD. We covered some really interesting territory about changing thoughts vs. making peace with them. We also discussed the latest research in how we overcome our fears, as well as increasing our ability to tolerate discomfort.

My guest this week is paramedic and podcast host Eoin Walker. I really loved this conversation. Eoin has an incredible amount of wisdom to share from both his professional and his personal experience, especially around managing stress and taking care of ourselves. We talked about ways to care for our bodies, minds, and spirits, especially through times of high stress, like many of us are experiencing now. I got so much from this discussion, and I think you will, too.

My guest this week is Dr. Richard Shane, developer of the Sleep Easy Method for getting better sleep. If you or someone you care about struggles with sleeping soundly, this conversation is for you. Richard and I talked about why many of the common approaches to treating sleep aren’t very helpful, and exactly why his approach works. You can follow along as he guides you through an easy way to start sleeping better tonight.