Think Act Be Podcast

My guests this week are Drs. Kelly Yanek and Michel Kinderman. I was truly excited to learn more about their dual therapist model where they see each client together—two therapists with a single client. They described how this approach keeps them interested and engaged at work, and makes them look forward to Monday mornings. I think you’ll find this conversation as fascinating as I did.

Topics we discussed included:

• Kelly and Michele’s unique Dual Therapist Model (DTM) of psychotherapy
• What led my guests to the DTM
• Burning out as a therapist
• The advantages of the DTM
• Having a real-time witness to the best and hardest moments in therapy
• The finances of doing therapy with two therapists
• The very different experience of having another therapist in the room
• The rewarding aspects of practicing with a fellow clinician
• Important considerations when choosing a co-therapist
• The continual work of being open and honest with one’s dual therapy partner
• Navigating the complex relational dynamics in DTM
• My own interest in a dual therapist approach
• How to get started in the DTM
• Kelly and Michele’s DTM training program

Michele Kinderman, PhD, is a Licensed Clinical Psychologist and co-founder of Wellness Outside the Box. For nearly two decades, she’s been successfully treating children and adults struggling with trauma, depression, anxiety, relationship conflict, parenting issues, and the stresses of everyday life.

Michele combines the more traditional therapies (cognitive behavioral therapy, dialectical behavior therapy, insight oriented therapy) with music, movement, and nature to assist clients in building their strengths and achieving their goals. She also loves animals and offers Pet Therapy. To maintain balance and serenity in her own life, she enjoys hiking, rock climbing, skateboarding, dancing, and spending time with her husband, two sons, and the family dog Zippy.

Kelly Yanek, PsyD, is a nationally certified School Psychologist and the other founder of Wellness Outside the Box. Kelly has had a love for the outdoors since she was a little girl climbing trees and exploring nature, and she’s been incorporating this passion for nature and adventure into her work since her career began.

In addition to her certification as a school psychologist, Kelly has specialized training in adventure-based counseling and the technical skills of high and low ropes/adventure courses. She’s also a certified yoga instructor. She takes great pride in the progress and success of her clients, and looks forward to helping you.

In her free time, you can find Kelly traveling, enjoying the beach, practicing yoga, running, cycling or swimming, and most of all, spending time with her family and friends.

Discover more about Kelly and Michelle and the Dual Therapist Model by visiting theirwebsite.

My guest this week is psychologist and author Dr. Jill Stoddard, who recently wrote a book calledImposter No More: Overcome Self-Doubt and Imposterism to Cultivate a Successful Career. Jill and I had a great discussion about feeling like an imposter—why it happens, who’s likely to have the experience, and most important, how to deal with those thoughts and feelings. The solution probably won’t be what you expect because the answer is not to forceyourself to think and feel differently. Most of us find that our thoughts and feelings kind of have a mind of their own, and trying tomakethem change is often more frustrating than successful. So if you’ve wrestled with the imposter syndrome, you’ll find this conversation really helpful.

Topics we discussed included:

• What the imposter syndrome is
• Terminology: imposterism, imposter syndrome, imposter phenomenon
• Who is likely to feel like an imposter
• The lack of solid research into imposterism
• Possible evolutionary adaptations related to feeling like an imposter
• The degree to which imposterism is based on past experiences
• Why more success typically is not the answer to feeling like a fraud or out of place
• Where in our lives imposterism tends to show up most often
• Jill’s own experience of trying to do more and more and eventually burning out
• The difficulty in trying to get rid of imposter thoughts and feelings
• Psychological flexibility as a way to make peace with imposterism
• Different ways of saying the same thing in the therapy world
• The different meanings of fear depending on the context
• Thoughts that are more or less likely to be disputed effectively
• The difficulty in believing the good things that others see in us

Jill Stoddard,PhD, is passionate about sharing science-backed ideas from psychology to help people thrive.

She is a psychologist, TEDx speaker, award-winning teacher, peer-reviewed ACT trainer, and cohost of the popularPsychologists off the Clockpodcast.

Jill has written two books in addition to her latest one:Be Mighty, andThe Big Book of ACT Metaphors.

Her writing has also appeared inPsychology Today, Scary Mommy, Thrive Global, the Good Men Project, Mindful Return, andThe Washington Post.

She regularly appears on podcasts as an expert source for various media outlets. Jill lives in Massachusetts with her husband, two kids, and disobedient French bulldog.

Find out more about Jill at herwebsite.

I’m all alone for this episode. This week I wanted to talk with you about finding the courage you need to take a bold step forward in your life. It could be anything, from continuing your education to changing jobs or starting to date.

Anxiety and uncertainty often hold us back when we know we need to make an important change. But they don’t have to. There are effective ways to move through our hesitation so that nothing stops us from living the life we know is calling us.

I hope you get a lot out of this episode. It’s based on the first session of a new course I created calledForward: Finding Courage to Take a Bold Step. The course offers 5 audio sessions that include mindfulness exercises to help you find your center, manage your mindset, and act with awareness and intention.

The practices you’ll discover in Forward will help you retrain your thoughts, roll with difficult emotions, and work with whatever life brings you. Each session includes an invitation to practice the things you’ve learned, so you can move from insight to action.

The sessions are designed to teach you effective skills without taking a lot of time or energy. They’re audio-based, so you can listen without needing to look at a screen.

I’ll be monitoring the Comments section so I can respond to your questions. I’d love tosee you there!

This week I'm continuing my series with Dr. Joel Minden, and we discussed a fun and interesting topic: psychotherapists in popular media, including film, TV, and comic strips. We explored what these depictions get right, the challenges of presenting therapy accurately, and why therapists so often are portrayed as buffoons.

Specific topics we touched on included:

• Common therapist tropes in movies and TV shows
• The movie Mumford
• Richard Dreyfuss as Leo Marvin in the 1991 film What About Bob?
• The accelerated pace of change in dramatized versions of therapy
• Therapists pushing their patients to “go deeper” and explore painful parts of their lives
• The TV show Shrinking
• The “psychiatrist” Lucy Van Pelt in the Peanuts comic strip
• Robin Williams’s portrayal of therapist Sean Maguire in Good Will Hunting
• Steve Carrell as therapist Alan Strauss in The Patient
• Jennifer Melfi (played by Lorraine Bracco) on The Sopranos
• Gabriel Byrne as therapist Paul Weston on In Treatment
• The iconic tissue pass in therapy
• The potentially big impact of small interventions in therapy, and in life
• Harry Stack Sullivan’s Interpersonal Theory and Psychotherapy (affiliate link)
• The movie Suture and psychogenic amnesia
• Larry David’s therapist on Curb Your Enthusiasm
• The power dynamics of chairs in therapy office

Joel Minden, PhD,is a clinical psychologist specializing in cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) for anxiety and related disorders.

He is the author ofShow Your Anxiety Who’s Boss (affiliate link), founder of the Chico Center for Cognitive Behavior Therapy, diplomate of The Academy of Cognitive and Behavioral Therapies, and lecturer in the Department of Psychology at California State University, Chico.

Find Joel online at hiswebsite, follow him onTwitter, and read his blog onPsychology Today.

This week I'm continuing my series with Dr. Joel Minden, and there's no one I'd rather talk with about how to handle worry. Joel is a true expert on this topic. He offers a compassionate, realistic, and effective set of tools for worrying less so you can redirect your energy toward living well.

Specific topics we touched on included:

• Anxiety vs. worry
• The implicit goal of anxiety
• The similarities between obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and generalized anxiety disorder (GAD)
• Intolerance of uncertainty
• Worry as a learned behavior that is reinforced (rewarded), making it more likely to continue
• Finding alternatives to replace worry
• The sense of helplessness that can lead to depression
• Whether worry can ever be productive
• The value of writing down one’s worries
• Possible signatures of unproductive worry
• Shifting attention to what we can control rather than focusing on the uncontrollable
• The downsides of distraction as a way to deal with anxiety and worry
• Accepting uncertainty when the outcome would be truly bad
• Being more specific about one’s worst-case fears
• Unhelpful distraction vs. more helpful and productive engagement with life
• Allowing anxiety to “come along for the ride”
• The role of meditation in dealing with worries
• Joel’s use of CBT techniques for dealing with his own worry and anxiety

Joel Minden, PhD,is a clinical psychologist specializing in cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) for anxiety and related disorders.

He is the author ofShow Your Anxiety Who’s Boss (affiliate link), founder of the Chico Center for Cognitive Behavior Therapy, diplomate of The Academy of Cognitive and Behavioral Therapies, and lecturer in the Department of Psychology at California State University, Chico.

Find Joel online at hiswebsite, follow him onTwitter, and read his blog onPsychology Today.

This week I’m continuing my series with Dr. Joel Minden. This time we discussed how much can be accomplished in a single psychotherapy session. Joel and I explored single-session interventions, one-session treatments for phobias, and sudden gains.Topics we touched on included:

• Goals for the first therapy session
• The hope that often follows a first session
• One as the modal number of therapy sessions
• Shorter treatment protocols, including single session interventions (SSIs)
• The work of Dr. Jessica Schleider and her colleagues
  • 2017 meta-analysis
  • 2017 review
  • 2022 randomized clinical trial
• The value of helping clients develop flexible responses to emotions and strategies for behavioral change
• The importance ofclinicalsignificance, in addition tostatisticalsignificance
• How to interpret an effect
• One-Session Treatment for phobias, developed by Öst, and the big effect of exposure on anxiety
• Sudden gains in the course of psychotherapy treatment
• The interplay between behavioral and cognitive change
• The advantages of single-session interventions, including scalability

Joel Minden, PhD,is a clinical psychologist specializing in cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) for anxiety and related disorders.

He is the author ofShow Your Anxiety Who’s Boss(affiliate link), founder of the Chico Center for Cognitive Behavior Therapy, diplomate of The Academy of Cognitive and Behavioral Therapies, and lecturer in the Department of Psychology at California State University, Chico.

Find Joel online at hiswebsite, follow him onTwitter, and read his blog onPsychology Today.

My guest once again this week is Dr. Joel Minden. This time we discussed psychotherapy, drawing on the years that each of us has been a therapist. Good therapy has the power to improve thinking patterns, relationships, habits, and even personality, so we explored the unique aspects of the therapy relationship that facilitate these changes. This conversation is the second in a series of several episodes with Joel, with more to come.

Topics we touched on included:

• A Washington Post piece that inspired our discussion, “Why I Fired My Therapists” by Foster Kamer
• Whether it’s productive to “call out” clients in therapy
• The problem of always being told one is right as a therapy client
• Trying to match therapists to clients
• The dialectic of supporting and challenging in therapy
• Possible developmental shifts across one’s career as a therapist
• My experience with a supervisor who berated my client
• Whether there’s a place for telling clients what they need or ought to do
• Addressing unhelpful patterns of reinforcement
• Why telling people what to do generally doesn't work
• Creating different dynamics in therapy from what people tend to experience elsewhere
• The uniqueness of the therapy relationship among all other relationships
• The value in just talking through an issue in order to arrive at a solution
• The actual self vs. idealized self
• The risk in being one’s authentic self

Joel Minden, PhD,is a clinical psychologist specializing in cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) for anxiety and related disorders.

He is the author ofShow Your Anxiety Who’s Boss, founder of the Chico Center for Cognitive Behavior Therapy, diplomate of The Academy of Cognitive and Behavioral Therapies, and lecturer in the Department of Psychology at California State University, Chico.

Find Joel online at hiswebsite, follow him onTwitter, and read his blog onPsychology Today.

My guest this week is Dr. Joel Minden, a regular on theThink Act Bepodcast. This time we switched roles and Joel interviewed me, mostly about my approach to therapy that I describe in my latest book,Mindful Cognitive Behavioral Therapy(affiliate link). This conversation is the first in a series of several episodes with Joel, so stay tuned for more to come.

Topics we touched on included:

• The traditional approach in cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT)
• The medical model of therapy
• My background in mindfulness
• The book Shambhala: The Sacred Path of the Warrior (affiliate link)
• Parallels between my religious practices as a kid and my early experiences with meditation
• Mindfulness practice as more than another “technique” for feeling better
• Allowing oneself to experience difficult emotions instead of trying to get rid of them
• The challenge in not fighting against our experience
• The manageability of the moment
• How cognitive work can support mindfulness practice
• Contentment that doesn't depend on one’s circumstances
• Letting go of the struggle against the struggle
• Feeling bad about “not being mindful enough”
• My decision to self-disclose about my own struggles
• The necessity of honesty in any healthy relationship
• Humor in the context of mindfulness, and taking things less seriously
• Mindfulness in action, and the value of finding stillness

Joel Minden, PhD,is a clinical psychologist specializing in cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) for anxiety and related disorders.

He is the author ofShow Your Anxiety Who’s Boss (affiliate link), founder of the Chico Center for Cognitive Behavior Therapy, diplomate of The Academy of Cognitive and Behavioral Therapies, and lecturer in the Department of Psychology at California State University, Chico.

Find Joel online at hiswebsite, follow him onTwitter, and read his blog onPsychology Today.

My guest this week is Matt Zemon, editor of the excellent new bookPsychedelics for Everyone: A Beginner’s Guide to These Powerful Medicines for Anxiety, Depression, Addiction, PTSD, and Expanding Consciousness(affiliate link). Matt also contributed several chapters to this book. This conversation is a great introduction to the world of psychedelics, and Matt is an excellent guide. He’s knowledgeable, compassionate, and he presents a balanced view of the potential place of psychedelics in our lives.

Topics we discussed included:

• What Matt means by “psychedelics for everyone” means
• The positive effects of psychedelics on a wide range of psychiatric conditions, especially those involving repetitive mental patterns
• Breaking old patterns of brain activity and creating new ones
• How psychedelics might have their powerful and lasting positive effects
• Effects of psychedelics in the spiritual domain
• Some of my guest’s spiritual experiences with psychedelics
• Different reasons that people approach psychedelic experimentation and use, including medical, spiritual, and libertarian
• Navigating the legal restrictions on psychedelic use
• Psychedelic churches
• Possible adverse effects of taking psychedelics
• David Nutt’sstudy on risk of harmfrom different psychoactive substances (create a free account withLancetto view the full article)
• The possible role of fear and anxiety on reactions to psychedelics
• The side effects of psychedelics vs. those of existing prescription medications
• Paying attention tosource,set, andsetting
• People who should definitely not take a psychedelic substance
• SpiritPharmacist.com for medical consults and to discuss potential psychedelic use

Matt Zemon, MSc, is a dedicated explorer of the inner world, and a passionate advocate for the thoughtful and responsible use of psychedelics.

With a Master of Science in Psychology and Neuroscience of Mental Health with honors from King’s College London, Matt has studied the effects of psychedelics on the mind and the potential for these experiences to serve as a catalyst for positive transformations.

His work in this field is motivated by a profound desire to help people navigate the sometimes challenging terrain of the psychedelic experience, and emerge from it with a deeper sense of purpose, connection, and understanding—to reclaim their true self.

As an entrepreneur in the wellbeing sector, Matt has co-founded various companies, including:

• HAPPŸŸ, a mental wellness company specializing in psychedelic-assisted ketamine therapy
• PSYCHABLE, an online community connecting people who would like to explore the healing power of psychedelics with a network of practitioners and psychedelic-based treatments
• TAKE2MINUTES, a nonprofit dedicated to helping individuals improve their mental health and wellbeing.

For more information visit hiswebsite, find him onLinkedInorInstagram, or contact Matt with yourquestions. You can order his excellent journal for psychedelic preparation and integration here:Beyond the Trip(affiliate link).

My guest this week is Thomas Moore, a psychotherapist and author of a new book entitledThe Eloquence of Silence: Surprising Wisdom in Tales of Emptiness(affiliate link). I was so pleased to have the opportunity to speak with Thomas, since I’ve appreciated his work for about 25 years, going back toCare of the Soul.

Topics we discussed included:

• The role of emptiness in religion and spirituality
• The possibilities that emerge with emptiness
• Fostering emptiness as emptiness, not as a space to fill
• Qualities of emptiness that we often recognize and appreciate in others
• Dropping the anxious additions we often bring to our interactions
• The emptiness in good acting
• Finding the narratives that support unhelpful behaviors
• Everyday examples of emptiness in our lives
• Silence in the therapy room
• Finding meaning in or through emptiness
• Nicholas of Cusa, author ofSacred Ignorance
• The value in recognizing how little we know
• Emptying our concept of what we call “God”
• Unlearning enough that one is ready to teach
• Allowing emptiness to be empty
• Finding that life empties you regularly
• The disappointments that empty us out—and prepare us for an important change in our lives
• The difficulty in leaving space in our lives, and the importance of lessening busyness
• The close association of desire and soul
• The quiet that seems to have characterized my guest’s life
• The origins of Thomas’s fear of the water
• Thomas’s appreciation for the creative individuals in his family, including his wifeJoan Hanley’s paintings; daughter Siobhán Moore, also known as the musicianAjeet; and stepson and architectAbraham Bendheim

Thomas Mooreis the author ofTheEloquence of Silenceand 24 other books about bringing soul to our personal lives and culture.

He wrote the #1New York TimesbestsellerCare of the Soul(affiliate link).

Thomas has been a Catholic monk and university professor and is also a psychotherapist influenced mainly by C. G. Jung and James Hillman.

His work brings together spirituality, mythology, depth psychology, and the arts, emphasizing the importance of images and imagination.

For more information visit hiswebsite.