Podcasts about Winnicott

durée : 00:03:37 - Le Pourquoi du comment : philo - par : Frédéric Worms - Et si nous ne pouvions exister sans le dehors ? Pour le psychanalyste Winnicott, une “subjectivité mûre” tient entre limites et ouverture. Être bien dans son corps pour s'ouvrir au monde. Selon le philosophe Camus : on ne sort vraiment que depuis un chez-soi. - réalisation : Rafik Zénine

“All of this together shaped how I began to think about mind, not as something to be mastered, but as a landscape of the unspoken whether it was ghosts or griefs or desires that were hard to relinquish. I saw that the ghost was not always an ‘other'. It was often intimate, tied to lost ones, sometimes to unmet desires, to unbearable longings, but in some ways possession was an attempt to keep close what was slipping away. The ghost doesn't just haunt, it feels as if it wants something, and we just have to learn to develop ears to listen to what it wants.”  Episode Description: We acknowledge Loewald's concept of 'ghosts becoming ancestors' and consider the similarities and differences with those who hold 'ghosts' to be literal. Shalini shares with us her journey to open herself to the uncertainty and ambiguity of these externalized entities while appreciating both their cultural and intrapsychic sources. We learn of her family's involvement with exorcisms, especially her grandmother's "fearless warmth" and "empathy that saw beyond the terror of the ghosts." She considers the many facets of mind that are represented by 'ghosts' and the essential value of approaching them as guides to the "landscape of the unspoken." Shalini describes a long term engagement that she had with an individual who "taught me to receive the inchoate and horrific...to contain the brokenness and not interpret it away.. and to appreciate the glimpses of beauty in the most grotesque parts of self."   Our Guest: Shalini Masih, a psychoanalytic psychotherapist and writer, grew up in India amidst priests and healers, witnessing spirit possession and exorcism. Now based in Worcestershire, UK, she holds a Master's degree in Psychoanalytic Studies from Tavistock & Portman, London, and a PhD from the University of Delhi. Mentored by psychoanalysts Michael Eigen and Sudhir Kakar, she's an award-winning scholar of the American Psychological Association. She has taught and supervised psychoanalytic psychotherapists in Ambedkar University, Delhi and in Birkbeck, University of London. Her acclaimed paper, 'Devil! Sing me the Blues', was nominated for Gradiva Awards in 2020. Her debut book is Psychoanalytic Conversations with States of Spirit Possession: Beauty in Brokenness.  Recommended Readings: Kakar, Sudhir. Shamans, mystics, and doctors: A psychological inquiry into India and its healing traditions. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1991.   Kakar, Sudhir. Mad and Divine. India: Penguin Books India, 2008.   Eigen, Michael. “On Demonized Aspects of the Self” In The Electrified Tightrope. Routledge. 2018.   Kumar, Mansi, Dhar Anup & Mishra, Anurag. Psychoanalysis from the Indian Terroir: Emerging Themes in Culture, Family, and Childhood. New York:Lexington Books, 2018.   Meltzer, Donald, and Williams, Meg H. The apprehension of beauty: The role of aesthetic conflict in development, art and violence. Karnac, London: The Harris Meltzer Trust, 2008.   Obeyesekere, Gananath. Medusa's Hair: An Essay on Personal Symbols and Religious Experience. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1981.   Ogden, Thomas. This Art of Psychoanalysis—Dreaming Undreamt Dreams and Interrupted Cries. East Sussex: Routledge, 2005   Botella, Cesar, and Botella, Sara. The Work of Psychic Figurability: Mental States without Representation. Brunner-Routledge. Taylor and Francis Group: Hove and New York. 2005.   Winnicott. Donald W. “Transitional objects and transitional phenomena.”  International Journal of Psycho-Analysis, 34, (1953): 89–97

The Fantasy/Animation Footnotes complete their unofficial ‘psychoanalysis trilogy' with this look at object relations and a branch of psychoanalytic approaches to film that emerged as a competing way of thinking about cinema linked to the development of the conscious minds of children. Listen as Alex takes Chris through the contributions of the British Psychoanalytical Society and the influential work of Melanie Klein and D. W. Winnicott; the value of unconscious fantasies, creativity, and what it means to theorise play; cinema as a potentially “transitional” (and cultural) object that we can use to fantasise with; using object relations theory to think about what kind of object a film might be, and the specificity of fantasy filmmaking as ‘extra transitional'; and what a focus on objects says about how children can and do formulate relationships to the world. **Fantasy/Animation theme tune composed by Francisca Araujo** **As featured on Feedspot's 25 Best London Education Podcasts**

Abby and Patrick welcome returning guest Hannah Zeavin – scholar, write, editor, co-founder of the Psychosocial Foundation and Founding Editor of Parapraxis magazine – to talk about her brand-new book, Mother Media: Hot and Cool Parenting in the 20th Century. It's an exploration of the complex relationships that have tied together the figure of the mother as an abstraction, the work of mothering as a practical matter, and academic and popular discourses about what mothers should be and how they should go about doing it. What does it mean to think about the mother as a “medium” for containing, nurturing, and shepherding the development of a child, and why do debates about mothering pivot so invariably around questions of media consumption and technological mediation? The conversation spans the history of academic research into parenting from behaviorism to attachment theory; clinical and popular discourses about mothers from Freud to Dr. Spock; the profusion of tools that promise to “help” mothers with their kids; “good-enough” mothering, mother-blaming, and vicious double binds; moral, political, and legal debates about nannies, “helicopter mothers,” incarcerated mothers, Sudden Infant Death Syndrome; and much, much more. Read and subscribe to Parapraxis here: https://www.parapraxismagazine.com/Learn more about the Psychosocial Foundation here: https://www.thepsychosocialfoundation.org/Mother Media is available here: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262049559/mother-media/An excerpt from Mother Media in the Los Angeles Review of Books: https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/the-heir-conditioner/Zeavin, “Composite Case: The Fate of the Children of Psychoanalysis”: https://www.parapraxismagazine.com/articles/composite-caseZeavin, “Unfree Associations”: https://www.nplusonemag.com/issue-42/essays/unfree-associations/Zeavin, “Parallel Processes”: https://www.nplusonemag.com/issue-49/politics/parallel-processes/A podcast about psychoanalysis, politics, pop culture, and the ways we suffer now. New episodes on Saturdays. Follow us on social media:Linktree: https://linktr.ee/OrdinaryUnhappinessTwitter: @UnhappinessPodInstagram: @OrdinaryUnhappinessPatreon: patreon.com/OrdinaryUnhappinessTheme song:Formal Chicken - Gnossienne No. 1https://open.spotify.com/album/2MIIYnbyLqriV3vrpUTxxOProvided by Fruits Music

The hosts of Ordinary Unhappiness join the podcast to discuss D. W. Winnicott; one of the most influential figures in the history of psychoanalysis in Britain. They explain how Winnicott's work was shaped by the traumatizing effects of World War 2, debates between Anna Freud and Melanie Klein, and the place of mothers in the construction of the British welfare state. We also discuss how this history relates to contemporary struggles over social reproduction and care.Abby Kluchin is Assistant Professor of Philosophy and Religious Studies at Ursinus College in Pennsylvania, where she coordinates the Gender, Women's, and Sexuality Studies program. Abby is a co-founder and Associate Director at Large of the Brooklyn Institute for Social Research. She co-hosts the podcast Ordinary Unhappiness with Patrick.Patrick Blanchfield is a writer, an Associate Faculty Member at the Brooklyn Institute for Social Research, and co-host of Ordinary Unhappiness, a podcast about psychoanalysis, politics, pop culture, and the ways we suffer now. He is also a contributing editor at Parapraxis magazine. SUPPORT: www.buymeacoffee.com/redmedicineSoundtrack by Mark PilkingtonTwitter: @red_medicine__www.redmedicine.substack.com/

Wie uns frühe Kommunikationserfahrungen in unseren Beziehungen prägen.

L'editoriale del direttore Alfredo Lombardozzi per il volume 3/2024link al volume: https://riviste.raffaellocortina.it/scheda-fascicolo_contenitore_digital/autori-vari/rivista-di-psicoanalisi-2024-3-RDPS2024_3-4347.html

From small towns to the global stage, fitness is key to being a better being. Dale Benedict is the owner of The Training Studio in Louisville, Kentucky. Established in 1996, Dale's gym focuses on a comprehensive approach to fitness, emphasizing functional dynamic movements, core strength, balance, and body stabilization. With over 25 years of experience, including completing 35 marathons and eight Ironman events, Dale shares insights from his journey, discussing his upbringing in Winnicott, Wisconsin, his transition from the military to fitness, and his development of the Restoration Project—a program aimed at helping men over 40 restore joint function, energy, and confidence. Dale's story underscores the importance of consistency, personalized training, and the significant impact of fitness on overall well-being.Connect with Dale:thetrainingstudio.comConnect with Michelle:betterbeings.netIG: @betterbeingsusYouTube: Michelle Zellner - Be A Better Being Podcast playlist

Abby and Patrick welcome psychoanalyst and author Jamieson Webster to discuss her brand-new book, On Breathing: Care in a Time of Catastrophe, out in March 2025 from Catapult. It's a wide-ranging conversation that traverses clinical, social, and political domains while remaining firmly grounded in one of the most basic prerequisites for human life: the activity of breathing. In what ways does the history of psychoanalysis represent a repression of the fact of breathing? How do analytic accounts from Freud to Winnicott to Bion to Lacan variously take up or downplay the necessity of respiration? How does thinking about breath implicate our ideas about development, embodiment, the production of speech, and more? And how does thinking in a sustained way about breath challenge our assumptions about individuality, independence, and wellbeing? The three explore the stakes and meanings of breathing, from COVID wards to police violence to the wellness industry and beyond. A pre-order link for On Breathing is available here: https://books.catapult.co/books/on-breathing/Conversion Disorder: Listening to the Body in Psychoanalysis is here: https://cup.columbia.edu/book/conversion-disorder/9780231184083Disorganization and Sex is here: https://divided.online/all-books/disorganisation-and-sexMarch and April book tour dates for On Breathing:3/11/25 7pm Eastern at Brooklyn Public Library - Central Library, Dweck Center (Brooklyn, NY) in conversation with Jia Tolentino3/15/25 6pm Eastern at Riffraff (Providence, RI) in conversation with Kate Schapira3/30/25 1pm Eastern virtual event with The Psychosocial Foundation4/13/25 2pm Eastern at Pioneer Works (Brooklyn, NY) in conversation with Leslie Jamison and a performance by Andros Zins-Browne as part of the Second Sunday seriesHave you noticed that Freud is back? Got questions about psychoanalysis? Or maybe you've traversed the fantasy and lived to tell the tale? Leave us a voicemail! (646) 450-0847A podcast about psychoanalysis, politics, pop culture, and the ways we suffer now. New episodes on Saturdays. Follow us on social media: Linktree: https://linktr.ee/ordinaryunhappiness Twitter: @UnhappinessPod Instagram: @ordinaryunhappiness Patreon: patreon.com/OrdinaryUnhappiness

Subscribe to get access to the full episode, the episode reading list, and all premium episodes! www.patreon.com/OrdinaryUnhappinessAbby, Patrick, and Dan put Winnicott's ideas about hate and aggression to work. What everyday situations, personal experiences, and institutional practices get clarified when we consider them as reflecting displaced feelings of hate? What do popular beliefs about hate look like when seen in Winnicottian terms, and how might familiar ideologies actually rely on channeling aggression while disavowing hate and even championing values like justice, family, and love? The conversation leads Abby, Patrick, and Dan to consider everything from theologies of “hating the sin but loving the sinner” and the injunction to “love your neighbor as yourself” to the differing approaches of Democrats and Republicans when it comes to assigning blame, enjoying cruelty, and claiming collective righteousness. They also explore how the invocation of hate can be flexibly used to disqualify, condemn, or explain away the behavior and motivations of entire groups, mystify material political antagonisms, and even assert dominance in hateful ways while maintaining fantasies about legitimacy, the impersonality of state violence, and much more. Key texts in addition to Winnicott's “Hate in the Counter-Transference” and Freud's Civilization and its Discontents include On Loving, Hating, and Living Well: The Public Psychoanalytic Lectures of Ralph R. Greenson, M.D. Have you noticed that Freud is back? Got questions about psychoanalysis? Or maybe you've traversed the fantasy and lived to tell the tale? Leave us a voicemail! (646) 450-0847  A podcast about psychoanalysis, politics, pop culture, and the ways we suffer now. New episodes on Saturdays. Follow us on social media:  Linktree: https://linktr.ee/OrdinaryUnhappiness Twitter: @UnhappinessPod Instagram: @OrdinaryUnhappiness Patreon: patreon.com/OrdinaryUnhappiness Theme song: Formal Chicken - Gnossienne No. 1 https://open.spotify.com/album/2MIIYnbyLqriV3vrpUTxxO Provided by Fruits Music

Abby, Patrick, and Dan conclude their close reading of Winnicott's “Hate in the Counter-Transference,” unpacking and tying together its three biggest arguments. First, there's the connection Winnicott draws between the therapeutic encounter and childhood development: more than just an analogy, these two environments are directly connected, and in fraught ways. Second, there's the link he draws between early experiences of “deprivation,” counter-transferential enactments in treatment, and the struggles of certain patients to establish a stable, safe sense of selfhood. Third, and most provocatively, is Winnicott's articulation of how feelings of aggression and even hatred naturally arise not just from a child seeking to assert its independence, but from a caregiver. As Abby, Patrick, and Dan discuss, Winnicott's idea of the “good enough mother,” far from being an exercise in mother-blaming, is in fact a humbling and compassionate recognition of motherhood as a kind of “impossible profession” (and more). And it reveals an approach to pathology, social conventions, and ideologies of the family that are critically different from Freud's. Plus: the cruelty of the “cult of mother,” sublimated aggression in grim nursery rhymes, and the joy of stealing noses. Up next, in Part IV: we get granular about the implications of Winnicott's thinking for confronting real-world expressions of hate and aggression in everyday social interactions, institutional dynamics, and, above all, politics.Have you noticed that Freud is back? Got questions about psychoanalysis? Or maybe you've traversed the fantasy and lived to tell the tale? Leave us a voicemail! (646) 450-0847  A podcast about psychoanalysis, politics, pop culture, and the ways we suffer now. New episodes on Saturdays. Follow us on social media:  Linktree: https://linktr.ee/OrdinaryUnhappiness Twitter: @UnhappinessPod Instagram: @OrdinaryUnhappiness Patreon: patreon.com/OrdinaryUnhappiness Theme song: Formal Chicken - Gnossienne No. 1 https://open.spotify.com/album/2MIIYnbyLqriV3vrpUTxxO Provided by Fruits Music

[NOUVELLE SERIE] "Ma famille" en compagnie de Nicole Prieur, philosophe, psy, hypnothérapeute et experte dans les relations familiales. Dans ce troisième épisode, Anne Ghesquière et Nicole Prieur discutent de ce que les lieux où nous vivons disent de nous et de nos familles. Les lieux où nous évoluons nous impactent-ils à vie ? Quelle est l'importance de renouer avec un lieu du passé dans la construction d'un adulte ? Doit-on transformer les lieux ou objets hérités ? Découvrez comment nos souvenirs, nos maisons familiales, ou même des objets symboliques comme des bijoux peuvent devenir des ressources puissantes pour dépasser nos peurs, renouer avec nos racines et renforcer notre identité.Durant 6 semaines, Anne et Nicole explorent ce qui nous relie, nous construit et parfois nous freine dans nos sphères familiales. Découvrons quelle est notre place dans la famille, ce que les lieux disent de nous, comment gérer les conflits, les silences et les blessures pour en faire des forces d'évolution.Retrouvez les ouvrages de Nicole Prieur dont Ces trahisons qui nous libèrent aux éditions Robert Laffont et le titre de son dernier livre chez Ernster Editions L'argent, poison ou trésor. On peut aussi retrouver toute son actualité et ses livres sur son site internet, www.parolesdepsy.com.Avant-propos et précautions à l'écoute du podcastRecevez un mercredi sur deux l'inspirante newsletter Métamorphose par Anne GhesquièreFaites le TEST gratuit de La Roue Métamorphose avec les 9 piliers de votre vie !Suivez nos RS : Insta, Facebook & TikTokAbonnez-vous gratuitement sur Apple Podcast / Spotify / Deezer / CastBox/ YoutubeSoutenez Métamorphose en rejoignant la Tribu MétamorphoseQuelques citations avec Nicole Prieur : "Les lieux, c'est la mémoire du corps.""Le rapport à l'espace, c'est le rapport à son territoire et il y a quelque chose de très animal.""Supporter le désordre de l'autre, c'est supporter quelque part le chaos intime de l'autre."Thèmes abordés lors du podcast avec Nicole Prieur : 00:00 Introduction04:10 Le lieu sécure en hypnose.07:39 Renouer avec le "continuum d'existence" de Winnicott.11:47 Que disent les lieux de notre identité ?14:25 Lieux hérités : à transformer ou sanctuariser ?15:43 Qu'est-ce que dit de nous l'aménagement d'un lieu ?18: 00 Le rapport à l'ordre d'un lieu.22:54 Le bijou talisman.À écouter : Nos places et nos rôles dans la famille (Ep.1)Enfant, je ne me suis pas (toujours) senti aimé (Ep.2)Photo DR Hébergé par Acast. Visitez acast.com/privacy pour plus d'informations.

✨ Et si la quête de la perfection n'était pas ce qu'il nous fallait pour être une bonne maman ? ✨Dans cet épisode, je te propose de lâcher la pression et de découvrir une alternative libératrice : la "mère suffisamment bonne".

Clinician and psychoanalyst Jan Abram proposes and elaborates the dual concept of an intrapsychic surviving and non surviving object. She extends Winnicottian technique by highlighting the centrality of the analysand playing with the object. Across eight chapters she develops this theory of survival, while also exploring the terror of non-survival, and its implications for psychic health, the fear of WOMAN as underlying misogny; Winnicott's theory of desire; and the role of the father as part of a paternal integrate. Abram draws on the work of André Green and Thomas Ogden, and also makes use of a Japanese ukiyo-e to visualize her argument. This is an extraordinary volume on Winnicottian metapsychlogy by its foremost scholar, opening up some of the lesser known aspects of Winnicott's work. The Surviving Object: Psychoanalytic Clinical Essays on Psychic Survival-Of-The-Object (Routledge, 2021) transcends an established context of reference that emphasizes holding, by honing in on questions of formlessness, the significance of survival, and the incommunicado core. Furthermore, Abram asserts the intrapsychic dimension of the surviving object, thereby crucially rectifying the view that Winnicottian clinical practice is purely interpersonal. Interview conducted by Myriam Sauer Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/psychoanalysis

Send us a textIn this monumental episode, we sit down with Jessica Buchanan—kidnapping survivor, New York Times bestselling author, and advocate for women's empowerment—to delve into her extraordinary journey of navigating motherhood in the wake of unimaginable trauma. Jessica shares her motherhood journey as chronicled in the 3rd book of her anthology series, Deserts to Mountaintops. Despite surviving 93 days as a hostage in Somalia before being rescued by a U.S. Navy SEAL team ordered by President Obama, Jessica reveals that motherhood was the experience that truly shook her to her core."It wasn't actually the kidnapping and rescue that had rocked my world so much: it was motherhood."Jessica's vulnerability in addressing the complexities of motherhood resonates deeply. She sheds light on the shame many women feel about their struggles in motherhood and how society conditions us to “shame ourselves into gratitude." Through her story, Jessica gives permission to mothers everywhere to acknowledge their hardships without guilt.We also explore:The Consequences of Ignoring Intuition: Jessica reveals how ignoring her intuition led to life-altering consequences and explains why trusting our inner voice is vital for reclaiming our power.Distinguishing Intuition from Anxiety: Together, we unpack the fragile line between intuition and intrusive thoughts, offering strategies to discern one from the other.Reclaiming Our Voices: Jessica explains why solitude and stillness are essential to reconnecting with our inner wisdom and building a life aligned with our true selves.Motherhood Without Self-Abandonment: Jessica introduces us to the revolutionary concept of the “good enough mother,” inspired by Winnicott, and emphasizes the importance of living a life that's yours too.About Jessica:Jessica has been named one of the ‘150 Women Who will Shake the World' by Newsweek, and her story was the most highly viewed 60 Minutes episode to air, to date. Jessica is a highly sought after inspirational speaker and her TEDx Pearl Street talk, ‘Change is Your Proof of Life' has been the foundation for which she travels the world, inspiring audiences to access their resilience by identifying their own autonomy and chance in the middle of their own life-changing eventAs the founder of Soul Speak Press, she empowers women to reclaim their narratives through writing. Her upcoming anthology, Deserts to Mountaintops: The Pilgrimage of Motherhood, launching January 25th, 2025, is a testament to the strength of women's voices and the healing power of shared stories.If you're in Colorado, don't miss the chance to join Stace and Steph live for Reclamation: The FempiMOTHER PLUS INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/mother_plus_podcast/MOTHER PLUS FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/motherpluspodcastMOTHER PLUS PERMISSION SLIP: https://www.motherplusser.com/Permission-SlipMOTHER PLUS NEWSLETTER: https://www.motherplusser.com/signup-pageMOTHER PLUS BLOG: https://www.motherplusser.com/blog

Clinician and psychoanalyst Jan Abram proposes and elaborates the dual concept of an intrapsychic surviving and non surviving object. She extends Winnicottian technique by highlighting the centrality of the analysand playing with the object. Across eight chapters she develops this theory of survival, while also exploring the terror of non-survival, and its implications for psychic health, the fear of WOMAN as underlying misogny; Winnicott's theory of desire; and the role of the father as part of a paternal integrate. Abram draws on the work of André Green and Thomas Ogden, and also makes use of a Japanese ukiyo-e to visualize her argument. This is an extraordinary volume on Winnicottian metapsychlogy by its foremost scholar, opening up some of the lesser known aspects of Winnicott's work. The Surviving Object: Psychoanalytic Clinical Essays on Psychic Survival-Of-The-Object (Routledge, 2021) transcends an established context of reference that emphasizes holding, by honing in on questions of formlessness, the significance of survival, and the incommunicado core. Furthermore, Abram asserts the intrapsychic dimension of the surviving object, thereby crucially rectifying the view that Winnicottian clinical practice is purely interpersonal. Interview conducted by Myriam Sauer Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

Clinician and psychoanalyst Jan Abram proposes and elaborates the dual concept of an intrapsychic surviving and non surviving object. She extends Winnicottian technique by highlighting the centrality of the analysand playing with the object. Across eight chapters she develops this theory of survival, while also exploring the terror of non-survival, and its implications for psychic health, the fear of WOMAN as underlying misogny; Winnicott's theory of desire; and the role of the father as part of a paternal integrate. Abram draws on the work of André Green and Thomas Ogden, and also makes use of a Japanese ukiyo-e to visualize her argument. This is an extraordinary volume on Winnicottian metapsychlogy by its foremost scholar, opening up some of the lesser known aspects of Winnicott's work. The Surviving Object: Psychoanalytic Clinical Essays on Psychic Survival-Of-The-Object (Routledge, 2021) transcends an established context of reference that emphasizes holding, by honing in on questions of formlessness, the significance of survival, and the incommunicado core. Furthermore, Abram asserts the intrapsychic dimension of the surviving object, thereby crucially rectifying the view that Winnicottian clinical practice is purely interpersonal. Interview conducted by Myriam Sauer Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/psychology

Clinician and psychoanalyst Jan Abram proposes and elaborates the dual concept of an intrapsychic surviving and non surviving object. She extends Winnicottian technique by highlighting the centrality of the analysand playing with the object. Across eight chapters she develops this theory of survival, while also exploring the terror of non-survival, and its implications for psychic health, the fear of WOMAN as underlying misogny; Winnicott's theory of desire; and the role of the father as part of a paternal integrate. Abram draws on the work of André Green and Thomas Ogden, and also makes use of a Japanese ukiyo-e to visualize her argument. This is an extraordinary volume on Winnicottian metapsychlogy by its foremost scholar, opening up some of the lesser known aspects of Winnicott's work. The Surviving Object: Psychoanalytic Clinical Essays on Psychic Survival-Of-The-Object (Routledge, 2021) transcends an established context of reference that emphasizes holding, by honing in on questions of formlessness, the significance of survival, and the incommunicado core. Furthermore, Abram asserts the intrapsychic dimension of the surviving object, thereby crucially rectifying the view that Winnicottian clinical practice is purely interpersonal. Interview conducted by Myriam Sauer Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/book-of-the-day

Subscribe to get access to the full episode, the episode reading list, and all premium episodes! www.patreon.com/OrdinaryUnhappinessAbby, Patrick, and Dan start close-reading Winnicott's famous paper, “Hate in the Counter-Transference” (1949, originally delivered as a paper two years earlier). They start with its place and time, situating Winnicott's work within the context of post-war Britain. This was a clinical landscape where a tiny number of analysts stood apart from a psychiatric establishment that favored methods that Winnicott despised – above all, lobotomies. They then consider the kinds of cases Winnicott's paper takes up and consider how the behavior of patients can, in Winnicott's words, prove singularly “irksome” to even the most tolerant and well-intentioned clinicians. But whereas many of his contemporaries would swiftly send such patients off for psychosurgery, Winnicott instead explores the dynamics of the transferential encounter at play.  This leads Abby, Patrick, and Dan to consider the ways that the “problem of aggression” and the recognition of hate are central for Winnicott's visions of development, the therapeutic relationship, and even institutional dynamics. Have you noticed that Freud is back? Got questions about psychoanalysis? Or maybe you've traversed the fantasy and lived to tell the tale? Leave us a voicemail! (646) 450-0847  A podcast about psychoanalysis, politics, pop culture, and the ways we suffer now. New episodes on Saturdays. Follow us on social media:  Linktree: https://linktr.ee/OrdinaryUnhappiness Twitter: @UnhappinessPod Instagram: @OrdinaryUnhappiness Patreon: patreon.com/OrdinaryUnhappiness Theme song: Formal Chicken - Gnossienne No. 1 https://open.spotify.com/album/2MIIYnbyLqriV3vrpUTxxO Provided by Fruits Music

Abby, Patrick, and Dan take up a topic that couldn't be more relevant to the contemporary zeitgeist – aggression – as theorized by an unlikely source: the British analyst and pediatrician D.W. Winnicott. What did this beloved and famously gentle figure have to say about aggression, and our taboos and fantasies surrounding it? Where does aggression come from, and what is its function developmentally? And what role can acknowledging feelings of “hate” play in the family, in psychotherapy, and in everyday life? To answer all these questions, this episode – the first in a three-part series – sees Abby, Patrick, and Dan sketch out Winnicott's biography, discuss his theoretical preoccupations, and unpack his approach to therapy, especially with severely distressed children and adults. Close-reading his essay, “The Roots of Aggression” (collected in the The Child, the Family, and the Outside World) they explore how, for Winnicott, the capacity to work with aggression implicates everything from our ability to move in physical space to our feeling deserving of love.Robert Adès et al., editors. “Index of Available Audio Recordings.” The Collected Works of D. W. Winnicott: Volume 12, Appendices and Bibliographies, Oxford University Press, 2016: https://doi.org/10.1093/med:psych/9780190271442.003.0011“Winnicott: The ‘Good-Enough Mother' Radio Broadcasts.” OUPblog, Dec. 2016:https://blog.oup.com/2016/12/winnicott-radio-broadcasts/Brett Kahr, “Winnicott's ‘Anni Horribiles': The Biographical Roots of ‘Hate in the Counter-Transference.'” American Imago, vol. 68, no. 2, 2011, pp. 173–211.D. W. Winnicott, “Hate in the Counter-Transference.” The Journal of Psychotherapy Practice and Research, vol. 3, no. 4, 1994, pp. 348–56.Winnicott, “Roots of Aggression.” The Collected Works of D. W. Winnicott: Volume 7, 1964 - 1966, edited by Lesley Caldwell and Helen Taylor Robinson, Oxford University Press, 2016:https://doi.org/10.1093/med:psych/9780190271398.003.0018Have you noticed that Freud is back? Got questions about psychoanalysis? Or maybe you've traversed the fantasy and lived to tell the tale? Leave us a voicemail! (646) 450-0847 A podcast about psychoanalysis, politics, pop culture, and the ways we suffer now. New episodes on Saturdays. Follow us on social media: Linktree: https://linktr.ee/OrdinaryUnhappiness Twitter: @UnhappinessPod Instagram: @OrdinaryUnhappiness Patreon: patreon.com/OrdinaryUnhappiness Theme song: Formal Chicken - Gnossienne No. 1 https://open.spotify.com/album/2MIIYnbyLqriV3vrpUTxxO Provided by Fruits Music

Wynne Godley was by turns a professional oboist, a fellow of King's College, Cambridge, an economist at the Treasury and a director of the Royal Opera House. Yet at thirty he found himself ‘living through an artificial self' and turned to psychoanalysis for help.Masud Khan was a protégé of D.W. Winnicott and at one point the darling of British psychoanalysis. He was also sadistic, manipulative and a shameless self-promoter. In this unforgettable piece from 2001, Godley describes his baffling and disastrous sessions with Khan.Read by Duncan Wilkins.Find the original piece and further reading at the episode page: https://lrb.me/godleypodGive your loved one a Close Readings subscription or audiobook for Christmas: https://lrb.me/audiogifts Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Chaque dimanche, retrouvez le livre coup de coeur de la semaine : roman, thriller, littérature... laissez-vous inspirer pour vos prochaines lectures ! RDV chaque dimanche à 08h50 et 10h20 sur LYON 1ERE. Ecoutez LYON 1ERE sur lyonpremiere.fr, l'application et à Lyon sur 90.2FM et en DAB+.Hébergé par Ausha. Visitez ausha.co/politique-de-confidentialite pour plus d'informations.

Sarah and Alex make sense of the election results by talking about developmental stages, anti-social behavior, and oh yeah and also polyamory. Mentioned in the episode: Voting patterns by income Thoughts vs Feelings Polywise Polysecure More about Kegan and “The Evolving Self”  Winnicott on the Psychology of Democracy More about Winnicott (and the ideas he stole from his wife) People with more privilege have less empathy mistakescast@gmail.com * https://www.instagram.com/mistakescast/ Logo design by roy franklin: www.whateverfactory.org

Welcome back for the next journey of The Family Express Podcast with Kathryn de Bruin and Ronda Evans where our destination is resilient and connected families. This is the first installment of our Attachment in Action Series. In this episode we focus on attachment in the infant stage. We underscore the importance of assessing for the emotional and relational context at the time of birth and the infant stage, and we provide overview of caregiver responding to baby distress signals.   All Aboard !1:20. Assessment is about taking a developmental history that includes the contextual, emotional and relational attachment history.2:50. This Attachment in Action Series and the accompanying conversations are taken from the content in the book called “Attachment and Family Therapy” by Patricia Crittenden, Rudi Dallos, Andrea Landini, Kasia Kozlowska4:30. Baby/Newborn/Infant stage means that there is joy, and loss because there is change. 5:30. A developmental history needs to include talking about birth because birth can bring death or trauma or loss.6:50. When a baby arrives, there is change and the arrival of conflicting needs. Where there is change, there is inherent loss. When there is change, we may see distress and distress means that coping strategies may emerge/become visible.8:55. Family contexts to consider: Siblings; Non-birthing parent or Non-Primary Attachment parent/caregiver12:30. Consider other contextual factors for families such as covid.22:30. Infants are learning to regulate arousal/distress. Parent needs to see the arousal/distress signal from the baby, problem solve about what does the baby need, and respond to the need, so that the arousal/distress will then reduce. So, baby goes through arousal and calm, over and over. This then determines the baby's internal state of managing their arousal. So the baby experiences and creates a physiological model of managing arousal. Joint, dynamic input from the beginning.30:25. Winnicott said, “there is no such thing as a baby. There is no such thing as a ‘mom'. There is only a nursing pair”. Life starts as a dyad/pair because the baby is 100% dependent on the caregiver. 31:40. If a baby never experiences arousal, then the baby never has to learn how to regulate their internal arousal. Or, if a baby gets aroused, and there is no responsiveness, or responsiveness is too slow (temporal lag between arousal and caregiver response) or responsiveness is intermittent/inconsistent, then the baby won't learn the “contingencies” and the baby does not experience and create the physiological model of arousal regulation. Thus every baby needs to experience arousal so that the internal physiological model of arousal regulation gets created.Thank you for listening! Kathryn de Bruin is an ICEEFT Certified EFT Trainer. Kathryn and Ronda are both licensed marriage and family therapists, EFT supervisors and therapists, and AAMFT Approved Supervisors.You can follow Kathryn de BruinFacebook  YouTube  IG  Yelp  Google +  Twitter  WebsiteYou can follow Ronda EvansFacebook   Facebook   IG  LinkedIn   Website 

"I think it is very interesting to open a debate and talk about this impact of the culture, this epoch, in the subjectivity and never losing the internal work within psychoanalysis, within our consulting room. So when I  quote the Lacanian way of saying the ‘declination of the father's name', I am talking about these times, this epoch, in which the reference  and the subjectivity fails in respecting what we can call ‘the authority'. But ‘the authority'  means not authoritarian systems - it is the law, it is the possibility of symbolization, and it's the way of being free too, because without some limits you cannot be creative, you cannot be open to symbolization. We are talking about how the ‘other' is working in this new social environment and how this evanescence of the father's name is part of a situation that leaves open to the death drive."    Episode Description: We begin with recognizing the aspects of chaos that surround us  in the real-world. Gabriela takes us from there into the chaos that often lives internally. She then addresses the clinical space which allows for its emergence through the dyad. She speaks of the evanescence of the father's name, authority vs authoritarianism, the 'halo of metaphors' and the nature of the analyst's 'open form' of clinical engagement. Gabriela describes analytic cure as "step by step, so that love and not revenge for pain predominate." She shares with us her early life involving her child analysis, her study of architecture and her now working as an analyst and a painter.   Linked Website: Gabriela Goldstein    Our Guest: Gabriela Goldstein, Ph.D. Past President of APA (2020-2023). Training analyst of Argentina Psychoanalytical Association (APA), and the International Psychoanalytical Association (IPA) and FEPAL. Doctor Ph.D in Psychology (Universidad del Salvador). Books include The Aesthetic Experience, Writings on Art and Psychoanalysis, and Art in Psychoanalysis. Co-author, among others, of the APA book Dreams and Perception APA Editorial and the book Dear Candidate Fred Busch edit. She has won the Mom-Baranger prize for best monograph in Psychoanalysis with The Aesthetics of Memory, Freud at the Acropolis and won the A. Storni prize for conceptual contributions in Psychoanalysis with Transience, or the Time of Beauty. She has served on many IPA and APA committees including the IPA and Culture Committee since 2007. In addition, Gabriela is both an architect and a painter. Since 1985 she has taken part in solo painting exhibitions in Argentina as well as collective exhibitions in museums, art galleries, and cultural centers in Italy, France and Germany. She lives and works in Buenos Aires.     Recommended Readings: Baranger, W. y M. (2012). La situación analítica como campo dinámico. Revista de Psicoanálisis. 69(23), pp. 311-352   Bush, F. (editor) (2021) Dear Candidate: Analysts from Around the World Offer Personal Reflections on Psychoanalytic Training, Education and the Profession. Routledge. London and New York.   Freud, S. (1919) “The Uncanny” The Standard Edition of complete psychological works of S. Freud, V 17   Goldstein, G (2013) Art in Psychoanalysis, A Contemporary Approach to Creativity and Analytic Practice, Karnak-IPA      Goldstein G. (2022): “La no respuesta del Otro: algunas cuestiones sobre la cura” Revista de Psicoanálisis de la Asociación Psicoanalítica Argentina, LXXIX-3-4   Goldstein, G (2022): “Los misterios de la creación: Entre cuerpo y cultura”, Revista Uruguaya de Psicoanálisis ( on -line 135)   Mc Dougall, Andre, J., De M´Uzan, Et all,(2010) El artista y el Psicoanalista Ed. Nueva Vision   Winnicott, D.W. (1978). Winnicott, D.W., Green. A, Mannoni, O, Pontalis; J-B y otros    Winnicott, D. W. (1974): “Fear of breakdown” Int. Rev. of Psychoanalysis. (1974) l, 103

Can trying to solve every student problem actually hold them back? Join us as we explore this provocative question, inspired by Donald Winnicott's concept of the "good enough parent.” We'll dissect the instinct to "fix" and consider how stepping back can empower students, helping them build resilience, self-advocacy, and problem-solving skills, ultimately fostering their independence and emotional strength while lightening your workload.We'll also challenge the unrealistic standards set by the ASCA National Model, questioning whether the relentless pursuit of perfection is truly beneficial. With only 1.1% of schools achieving RAMP status, it's clear that these high bars can create an unsustainable work environment. Instead, we advocate for "good enough school counseling," embracing imperfection and focusing on meaningful, manageable impacts. 00:00 Introduction: The Well-Meaning Instinct of School Counselors00:41 Empowering Students by Doing Less01:06 Listener Reviews and Feedback02:55 The Urge to Fix: A Common Challenge04:25 The Concept of 'Good Enough' Counseling07:54 Statistics and Realities of School Counseling10:45 Sustainable Practices for School Counselors21:54 The Importance of Empowering Students22:42 Conclusion and Final Thoughts*********************************References/Resources:Clemens, E. V., & Milsom, A. (2008). The school counselor's role in addressing the mental health needs of students: A model for prevention, intervention, and crisis intervention. Journal of School Counseling, 6(23).Winnicott, D. W. (1953). Transitional objects and transitional phenomena: A study of the first not-me possession. International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 34, 89–97.Winnicott, D. W. (1965). The maturational processes and the facilitating environment. London: Hogarth Press.**********************************Our goal at School for School Counselors is to help school counselors stay on fire, make huge impacts for students, and catalyze change for our roles through grassroots advocacy and collaboration. Listen to get to know more about us and our mission, feel empowered and inspired, and set yourself up for success in the wonderful world of school counseling.Hang out in our Facebook groupJump in, ask questions, share your ideas and become a part of the most empowering school counseling group on the planet! (Join us to see if we're right.)Join the School for School Counselors MastermindThe Mastermind is packed with all the things your grad program never taught you IN ADDITION TO unparalleled support and consultation. No more feeling alone, invisible, unappreciated, or like you just don't know what to do next. We've got you!Did someone share this podcast with you? Be sure to subscribe for all the new episodes!!

In this episode of The Coaching Psychology Pod, host Dr. Natalie Lancer, with Raul Aparici, an integrative coach and psychotherapist, and Dr. Susan Kahn, a psychodynamic coaching psychologist, engage in a rich discussion about the nuances of psychodynamic coaching. We explore the wounded and celebrated self, emphasising the need for coaches to be self-aware and to understand their own vulnerabilities. The conversation also covers the contributions of influential thinkers such as Winnicott and Bion, and the use of creative techniques in coaching. The importance of ethical boundaries, supervision, and respecting client defenses in deep psychodynamic work is highlighted. We ask: What is psychodynamic coaching? What is the difference between psychotherapy and psychodynamic coaching? Which tools and concepts are useful in psychodynamic coaching? Does goal-setting show up in psychodynamic coaching? What are the challenges in using psychodynamic terminology with clients? Why is containment, referral and maintaining boundaries in the coaching relationship important? What roles do supervision, reflective practice and self-awareness have in psychodynamic coaching work? Who are influential thinkers in the field of psychodynamic coaching? How can we train in psychodynamic coaching?   What are the risks and rewards of psychodynamic coaching? The importance of taking a client-centred approach is emphasised in psychodynamic coaching. It privileges understanding the unconscious and the here and now in coaching relationships, such as unpicking transference and counter transference in coaching sessions. Psychodynamic coaching draws upon a rich lineage of a specific set of assumptions and philosophical foundations, aspects of which we cover in our conversation. Learn how this distinctive approach can be integrated into your coaching practice with expert guidance and education in this field.  Our guests today are: Dr Susan Kahn is a Chartered Coaching Psychologist and Business Psychologist, an executive coach, consultant, mediator, BPS registered supervisor and author.  She writes about below the surface dynamics at work and her research interests encompass vulnerability, conflict, leadership and resilience.  She has written three books, Death & the City: On Loss, Mourning and Melancholia at Work; Bounce Back, How to Fail Fast and be Resilient at Work and Reinvent Yourself: Psychological Insights that will Transform your Work Life. She is also a lecturer at Birkbeck, University of London, teaching coaching and organisational psychology, and is a faculty member at the School of Life, working with businesses to develop their emotional intelligence. Raul Aparici is a coach, psychotherapist, consultant and facilitator. He is the Head of Faculty for The School of Life, a global organisation focussed on delivering psychological and philosophical insights to help people learn, heal and grow. With a diverse background in literature, fitness, management and consulting, an MA in Critical theory, and an MA in Gestalt Therapy Theory, he is driven by curiosity and a desire to help others make the most out of their current situation and likes to match academic insights with commercial pragmatism. He provides Equine Assisted Coaching and Leadership Consulting with Operation Centaur in Richmond Park and he is the former Programme Director for Coaching Psychology at Birkbeck College, University of London. Your host, Dr Natalie Lancer, is a Chartered Coaching Psychologist, and British Psychological Society (BPS) Registered Supervisor. She is the Chair of the BPS's Division of Coaching Psychology and an accredited member of the Association for Coaching. She is the host of this podcast series and invites you to email any comments to docp-tcppod@bps.org.uk https://www.bps.org.uk/member-networks/division-coaching-psychology © British Psychological Society 2024

durée : 00:03:50 - Le Pourquoi du comment : philo - par : Frédéric Worms - Faire face à un obstacle nous frustre, car cela vient nous révéler une limite qui peut profondément nous mettre en colère. Jean-Jacques Rousseau jugeait la colère dangereuse et source de toutes les tyrannies. Le psychanalyste Winnicott nous aide à comprendre comment réguler sa haine intérieure ?

In the third lecture of the Sophia Lecture series, Professor Douglas Hedley embarks on an intellectual journey that explores the enigmatic nature of play and its profound impact on human life, drawing from ancient philosophies and modern psychological theories. Delving into the works of Heraclitus and Plato, Hedley examines the paradoxical relationship between play and seriousness and how this dynamic shapes our understanding of life's deepest questions. He discusses the transformative power of poetic language, the importance of embracing the child's soul, and the role of play as a bridge between our inner realities and the external world. Furthermore, Hedley reflects on mental health, cultural shifts, and the significance of the humanities in providing a sense of purpose and meaning, ultimately arguing that engaging with foundational texts and embracing play can help us navigate the complexities of modern life and contribute to our overall well-being.   Douglas Hedley is a Professor in the Philosophy of Religion at the University of Cambridge and a Fellow at Clare College. His work spans the fields of philosophy, theology, and psychology, focusing on the intersection of ancient wisdom and modern thought.   Glossary of Terms   Ion: Time period, sometimes interpreted as "lifetime" or "eternity."   Sophrosyne: Excellence in character; moderation; self-control; leading to well-being.   Resources   Ralston College  Website: https://www.ralston.ac/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@RalstonCollegeSavannah X: https://twitter.com/RalstonCollege   Douglas Hedley https://www.ralston.ac/people/douglas-hedley Homo Ludens: A Study of the Play-Element in Culture - Johan Huizinga  https://www.amazon.com/Homo-Ludens-Study-Play-Element-Culture/dp/1621389995   The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure - Greg Lukianoff Jonathan Haidt https://www.amazon.com/Coddling-American-Mind-Intentions-Generation/dp/0735224897   Playing and Reality -  D. W. Winnicott https://www.amazon.com/Playing-Reality-Routledge-Classics-86/dp/0415345464   Civilization and Its Discontents - Sigmund Freud https://www.amazon.com/Civilization-Its-Discontents-Sigmund-Freud/dp/0393304515   Modern Man in Search of a Soul - C. G. Jung  https://www.amazon.com/Modern-Man-Search-Soul-Jung/dp/1684220904   The Red Book - C. G. Jung https://www.amazon.com/Red-Book-Philemon-C-Jung/dp/0393065677   Poetic Diction: A Study in Meaning - Owen Barfield https://www.amazon.com/Poetic-Diction-Meaning-Wesleyan-Paperback/dp/081956026X   Plato. "Laws." Translated by Benjamin Jowett, The Internet Classics Archive. https://classics.mit.edu/Plato/laws.html   Homer. "The Iliad." Translated by Samuel Butler, The Internet Classics Archive. https://classics.mit.edu/Homer/iliad.html Quotes   "Does it mean a lifetime, time, or eternity is nothing but a child playing? Playing checkers or draughts. Kingship belonging to the child. Does this mean that living like a child is somehow to live like a king? Or is it a claim about the universe that all is chance?" - Douglas Hedley (on the enigmatic utterance of the ancient philosopher Heraclitus) [00:03:34]   “Meaning cannot be generated by human conventions… but only on the assumption that meaning is grounded in the logos and indeed the transformation of consciousness through poetic language." - Douglas Hedley [00:08:29]    Chapters    [00:00:00] - Introduction to the Sophia Lecture Series and Professor Hedley [00:02:00] - The Enigma of Heraclitus' Riddles on Time and Play  [00:05:00] - Plato's Laws on Play and its Role in Life  [00:08:00] - The Transformation of Consciousness Through Language  [00:10:00] - The Significance of Mental Health and Play in Contemporary Society  [00:19:00] - Exploring Donald Winnicott's Theory of Play  [00:29:00] - Carl Jung and the Concept of the Daimon  [00:54:00] - The Legacy of Play in Philosophical and Psychological Thought  [00:58:00] - Q&A Session: Academia, Play, Suffering, and Self-Understanding  [01:12:00] - Concluding Reflections  

What roles do the inanimate objects in the psychoanalyst's office play in the treatment?  Paintings on the walls, bookcases, armchairs, carpets, sculptures, and of course, the couch are simultaneously objects of external reality which are part of the frame, and they may also become part of the internal reality of the patient.  Can these objects have an important effect on the progress and process of analytic treatment? It is these questions that Jacqueline Godfrind will address in this podcast episode.   Starting from theories of objects as autistic, transitional, resemblances and fetishized, put forth by Tustin, Winnicott, Searles and Kestemberg, she will broaden the reflection based on her own clinical observations of her analysands during a period when she redecorated her office. These objects, she illustrates, can become transferential objects, rich with important meanings and may support sensory or archaic investments, and this is even more the case in certain patients with fragile structures.    Jacqueline Godfrind is a full member and training analyst of the Belgian Society of Psychoanalysis of which she was scientific secretary, president and president of the teaching commission. She has long participated in training in child psychotherapy where she was a lecturer at the Free University of Brussels. She has further led multiple supervisions in various fields. In addition, she has a background as a child analyst and a long practice as an adult psychoanalyst.  Her writings and publications are many including: The two currents of transference and Psychoanalysis beyond speech - the body which contain her reflections on the treatment clinic, and How femininity comes to women which addresses her interest in the feminine. She has participated in the production of several collective works, notably on topics as wide ranging as acting out in the treatment, and also in the work titled What is operative in the treatment, which won the Oedipus prize.   A subtitled version of this podcast is available on our YouTube channel: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLhxiwE76e0QaOquX3GujdwNLFsgxUQNXz&si=yf381EDu3pess6Yz You can download a copy of the paper here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1zzvBBjMdz5zs5RuFg3MswZfvuINkmNSp/edit?usp=share_link&ouid=100400904585889441765&rtpof=true&sd=true   This Podcast Series, published by the International Psychoanalytical Association, is part of the activities of the IPA Communication Committee and is produced by the IPA Podcast Editorial Team. Co-Editors: Gaetano Pellegrini and Nicolle Zapien. Editing and Post-Production: Massimiliano Guerrieri.   This episode has been produced in collaboration with Julia-Flore Alibert.   To stay informed about the latest podcast releases, please sign up today.   This episode has also been published in French.    

The NYT's Kevin Roose has 18 new friends—none of whom are human. His new friends are AI personas that he made with Noma, Kindroid, and other AI companion apps. There's fitness guru Jared, therapist Peter, trial lawyer Anna, and over a dozen more. Kevin talked to them every day for a month, sharing his feelings, asking for parenting advice, and even using them for “fit” checks. This isn't the first time Kevin has had an…unusual interaction with an AI persona. A year ago, he was the target of Bing's chatbot Sydney's unhinged romantic affections. Kevin has gone deeper into the world of AI companions than anyone I know. He is a tech columnist at the New York Times, cohost of the Hard Fork podcast, and the author of three books. In this episode, I sat down with Kevin to learn more about his interactions with AI. We dive into: Why AI companions aren't just for lonely people or shy teenagers Why AI personas are better friends than ChatGPT How AI companions can be used to safely explore different social contexts The risk of young people relying on AI for friendship The icks of AI dating and intimacy How to use AI to articulate what you value in your relationships This is a must-watch for anyone curious about how AI is changing the way we form relationships. If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT here. It's usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every Follow him on X Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Kevin Roose Hardfork, the podcast that Kevin cohosts Kevin's latest book about being human in a world designed for machines Kevin's piece in the New York Times about his experience making AI friends Two of the apps that Kevin used to create AI companions: Kindroid and Nomi Dan's piece that explains why AI writing will feel real through psychologist D.W. Winnicott's theory Every's piece that explores AI companion app Replika

You might make a self-deprecating joke about riding the hot mess express, or saving for your kids' future therapy, but the truth is? Behind the closed doors of the therapy room, so many women share that they fear they are a "bad mom," and there's nothing funny about it. Listen as we get honest about : the fact that nearly every mom sometimes feels like a "bad mom" and fears that she is failing at motherhood. how apps like BabyCenter, and internet mom groups, created a generation of "responsibilized" moms how parenting information has separated moms from their intuition the unrealistic, unconscious expectations that many of us have for ourselves or our children how early motherhood experiences, including postpartum depression and anxiety, can contribute to the feeling of being a "bad mom" Winnicott's "Good Enough Mother" (aka the one time psychology DIDN'T blame moms for absolutely everything) why it is important to challenge the idea of being a bad mom and practice self-compassion. This is SO MUCH EASIER to do in community, so we'll be continuing the conversation in the facebook group, and we'd love you to meet us there! Plus, Andrea sings the praises of a beloved pre-k teacher; Jessica reacts - strongly - to the idea of the "good enough" mother; and Andrea and Jessica discover that they were both bloggers in the early internet days (who knew?). As we head towards Mother's Day, we want YOU, our beloved listener who is also a mother, to know this: You are exactly the mom that your children need. So make all of the "bad mom" jokes that you want, but remember - you are more than good enough, just the way you are. Happy Mother's Day! Like this episode? Check these out: 44. Isn't this Supposed to be Fun? (February 27, 2024) - in case you don't enjoy the daily grind of motherhood, and that makes you feel like a bad mom (spoiler alert - you're not!) 37. Exploring Mommy Wine Culture During Dry January (January 9, 2024) - talk about societal pressures! Also, I think we should all take a moment to reflect on the fact that 20% of women in the US in the 1950s were being prescribed valium up to 4x a DAY to deal with their daily difficulties, so... you're probably doing fine. 22. So You Lost Your Shit... (September 20, 2023) - in case losing your shit makes you feel like you're a bad mom... at least you're in good company! This is never not going to be one of our favorite episodes. WE WANT TO CONNECT WITH YOU!! Whether you want your own question answered on Hot Take Thursday, want to discuss the latest Honest Women episode, or just want a place where you can be real with other people and talk about life honestly... the best place to do that is our BRAND NEW FACEBOOK GROUP!  Join here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/honestwomenpodcastcommunity And if you have a real-world scenario you want us to discuss, a bug in your bonnet about something going on in the world, or just want to say hello, and you don't have facebook, please email us: hello@honestwomenpodcast.com Follow Honest Women Podcast @honestwomenpodcast Follow Jessica: @jlhutchisonlcpc Follow Andrea: @andreaburkly Learn more about the Honest Women Podcast: www.honestwomenpodcast.com Honest Women is the podcast for every woman juggling the demands of modern life (while trying to keep her shit together) and finding that it's all just a little more difficult than she thought it would be. Your hosts, Andrea Burkly and Jessica Hutchison, are two very real mental health professionals who are taking honest conversations from inside their offices to the outside world. Disclaimer: Please note while this podcast features two therapists, and may feel very therapeutic, this is not therapy! Please be entertained, and know that through our creative content, we are not providing mental health care. No diagnosis. No treatment. No medical advice. Just creative content. Please seek appropriate mental health support in the real world. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Introduction:  David Rothauser, MA, MS, PCC, PsyA is an executive coach, coach supervisor, educator and psychoanalyst who has worked in leadership & human development for over 20 years. David brings together expertise in these areas to offer a unique forum for growth and development.  David trained in executive coaching at Columbia University, psychodynamic group leadership at the Centre for Group Studies, psychoanalysis at the Centre for Modern Psychoanalytic Studies and Coaching Supervision at Oxford Brookes University. David offers individual and group supervision for coaches and is currently the Chair of Coaching Supervision for the Association of Coaching, US region. On a personal note David lives outside of Philadelphia with his wife and two children. Podcast episode Summary:  Supervision is explored through the prism of a live case that I brought to David as my Supervisor. David shares his approach and illuminates what can often remain mysterious & behind closed doors. We both opine on the value of Supervision and how it can bring relief and clarity from a place of being stuck as well as significant personal development. Questions asked & points made throughout the Episode:   o    Who are you? And could you share a bit about how you got to where you are today? David reminded us of his professional identities and when encouraged to go further went on to say that he is a husband, a father of toddlers which means it makes up a big part of his learning journey today. David went onto say that he is a patient in his own therapy, in individual and group therapy & a supervisee with multiple supervisors. o    Supervision has been a vehicle for David, over his career to support his development. o    The invisible parts of our practice means we do not get to see how we take care of our work. o    What interests you or intrigues you about a psychoanalytic approach to team and individual coaching? David is a trained psychoanalyst and he used psychoanalysis for his own development for his work as a coach in the professional world. David started coaching in the educational sector. o    David may not have encountered psychoanalysis if it wasn't for his sister who was training to be a therapist while David was training to become a school teacher early in his career. Looking across both domains David felt that the field of Psychoanalysis for postgraduate work felt richer and more compelling. David noticed his field was more behaviourally focused whereas his Sisters field was more about people working hard to make meaning. That field was focused on what makes people tick and how can work get done more effectively. David began to dabble and have experiences with psychoanalysis.  He continued & pursued his interest, studied more and at this point is a graduate of two psychoanalytic institutes and has his own psychoanalytic practice. He does not think of his coaching perse as Psychoanalytic.   o    David is interested in being effective. This work has helped David explore cases where he was stuck, where the reasonable and rationale approaches of other disciplines have not been of help. Psychoanalytic training & supervision provides a space where we can access more parts of self & engage creatively when the counter transference is puzzling, when for example emotions are difficult and we don't know what to do and where we are stuck. This realm has been a major orientation for David,  where the emotional and relational fields are enhanced with a psychodynamic lens. o    What do your clients appreciate about your approach and do they even know? What is common about David's Supervision sessions is that there is a feeling of relief and an opening up for new creative possibilities. o    David takes an understanding based approach and in a lot of ways David draws on different disciplines, education, sociology, philosophy and psychoanalysis. When we are stuck we don't understand what is happening. It calls for more meaning making. o    At this point I re-introduced a case I had brought to David for Supervision. My case is a small team about whom I was stuck. I was curious to see if David, for the sake of my podcast listeners, could help me decode the approach David took, the potency of supervision & how it served me and my client at the time. David wondered too. o    David shared that there is something about this work where there is a mystique about it. There are many kinds of supervision some for example where there is direct observation of a coach coaching with their client. The supervisor will observe a person actually coaching whereas a psychodynamic approach happens behind closed doors. o    We decided to try and David asked “how shall we try” Whilst I endeavoured to revisit the case David suggested that “we back up a little” to share how he thinks about the work o    A unique contribution of coaching & team coaching is offering an opportunity to the client to see themselves in new ways, to access their own creativity so that they can make new choices about what they want to do and how they want to be with others. No matter the discipline or theoretical orientation CBT, positive psychology, a PhD in coaching psychology or whatever the way we relate has a profound impact on the quality & outcomes of the work o    One area of work that can always be expanded and deepened is the work we do on ourselves. It is a lifelong process to know yourself and to use yourself. The difficulties we experience with clients like fear, hopelessness, anxiety, shame and not having access to our minds is natural o    Many of us in the helping professions are drawn to this work, either consciously or unconsciously because of the roles we picked up from our family of origin. That was when we were first introduced to our emotional lives. There were things we learnt about our feelings that were going to be acceptable and those we learnt to avoid. Our interpersonal tendencies around openness and avoidance were learnt in our early families. o    Often the feelings that pose challenges for our clients are feelings that we have learnt to avoid or step around. As a supervisor they are the clients David hears about from his supervisees & the ones he brings to his own supervisor. o    I shared my experience of working with my client and the feelings that were evoked in me especially the ones, fear of rejection, that I find intolerable. This is the value of talking. o    Psychoanalysis is the talking cure and coaching is a kind of talking cure too and supervision is too. o    In supervision with David, we dreamed up my case together. In our collaborative dialogue I was able to speak what might have been unspeakable for the client, to say more and more and more about what was happening. David pays attention to his supervisees and their subjective experience. He works to help supervisees make meaning and understand what is inside of them. David is happy to work & to talk about what to do but he leans more in terms of helping clients reach understanding. o    Many of us come to supervision to wonder what to do and the question becomes to what end? o    Looking for ways “to do” can  sometimes be about avoiding  the work of understanding and meaning and sometimes not. Brainstorming things to do or interventions to offer can provide avenues to see a way forward. Using our imaginations for example in a session like “what do I really want to say to this client in a world with no consequences” “what would I tell these people?” Some of those kinds of imagination exercises can be freeing. o    The unconscious is not a civilised place. It can be unruly. This is how we can get stuck with our cases when some of our more unruly parts get activated & our more professional parts are hard at work to make sure those parts do not get air time. That is why it is important in a supervision space to create a playful open space for any words to be expressed. o    How to deal with resistance on teams? Resistance is a word that can bring up a lot of resistance. The view of resistance that is helpful is that resistances are defences. They are needed to protect. There is no such thing as a relation without some form of protection. Peoples reluctances tell us something, they communicate something to us to us non-verbally. We will get a feeling that something is afoot or that this is a no go topic. Sometimes resistances show up not just in the non-verbal field but in the behavioural field, coming late to sessions, cancelling sessions etc.. these are all forms of behavioural resistances. o    Freuds ideas about resistance, the original psychoanalytical conception, or resistance to free association was what he was interested in. He gave instructions to patients to say everything which was of course an impossible task. It was Freuds observation that something would interfere with the patient saying everything and he called that interference the resistance. Each person resisted the task of “saying everything” in a unique way. Freuds idea was that it was the transference or the patients expectations of the authority figure that made up the fuel for the resistance. o    Freud had a particular method of intervention and there are many others ways of working with resistance today that are supportive, relieving and safety making for clients to find new ways to get the self-protection they need. o    What are some of those ways of working with Resistance? A coaching client brought a case to David where the client of the supervisee was not doing the work, the reflection work, the work in between sessions and the coach was left with the feeling that they were doing all of the work. The coach had an uneasy feeling that something was not right. It did not feel to the coach that the client had any real skin in the game. David and his client imagined how to join the clients resistance. Just be like the client, not in a tongue in cheek sarcastic way but simply meeting the client where they are. If you have an ambivalent client it is not going to be helpful to be eager with them o    The coaches mindset – a supervisee who already had the idea that there was resistance with her client enabled David and his client to work on the idea that the client was trying to protect themselves in the coaching process and they were then able to be curious about how and why that was the case. Resistance is important it is serving a protective function is a very different conversation than what can happen in coaching where a diagnosis is made and a conclusion drawn, for example this client is un-coachable o    Resistance is mysterious because they are hidden or non-verbal in so many cases. So one feature of resistance in this work is that we feel it and it lives in our body before we can put thought or words to it. o    If as a coach you feel those feelings you may or may not chose to reveal them to your client but you can of course speak to them in supervision. It is case dependent. o    Winnicott's idea about the use of an object is an important idea that David takes into his coaching.  For any of us to make use of another is a developmental proposition. David needs to know how a client makes use of him. He wants to know how he is perceived and how what comes from him might be perceived and made use of. David needs to have an imagination about that, a sense that the client will give him and he treads carefully assessing the appetite or motivation a client has for the work. It tends not to go so well in a coaching or other helping profession to give something that the client is not asking for. It is a primary task in the coaching relationship to understand what is wanted. o    Coaches can be busy “cooking up stuff” to feel useful and of value especially in the face of uncomfortable feelings. o    The phenomenon of not knowing can be very hard for everyone, being in the mystery of how the client is making use of our work or the work with us can be unnerving especially as each of us has a relationship with not knowing. o    We explored so many topics across this podcast and David bemused that we did not speak to the unconscious. He chose “to leave it out there” as something we could pick up on another conversation and podcast. o    David ended the podcast by sharing information about his practice. He occasionally has spaces in supervision groups and individual supervision programs and he is available on LinkedIn and he is happy to talk. o    Finally after being asked how he wanted to close the conversation David shared how he didn't want to close the conversation. He really enjoys talking with me about these topics and looks forward to more opportunities like this in the future.     Resources shared across this podcast 1.     https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidrothauser/ 2.    Donald Winnicott English paediatrician and psychoanalyst

Parler aux animaux, entendre le langage de la nature, être touché par la beauté, savoir s'arrêter pour regarder le ciel, rêver et inventer, créer du lien et grandir avec les autres : nos enfants font tout cela d'instinct, quand souvent, nous leur demandons de se dépêcher… Et si c'était eux la clef pour comprendre le monde et l'améliorer ? Dans son dernier essai, « Ce que les enfants nous enseignent » (éd. Les Liens qui libèrent), la psychanalyste et psychologue spécialiste de l'enfance Sophie Marinopoulos, propose de regarder le monde avec des yeux d'enfant, et en le lisant, on entend un plaidoyer politique pour une enfance respectée et une société plus alignée sur ses enjeux humains et relationnels. Dans ce texte, on puise surtout une philosophie capable d'inspirer notre façon d'être parents, d'être mères et d'être au monde finalement. Sophie Marinopoulos Sophie Marinopoulos est psychologue, psychanalyste, spécialisée dans les questions de l'enfance et de la famille. Formée par le professeur Serge Lebovici, elle s'est inspirée de la clinique de Françoise Dolto, de l'américaine Selma Fraiberg et du célèbre pédiatre psychanalyste D. Winnicott. Depuis 1980 elle se consacre à écouter les parents, les accompagner dans les défis de la vie, les temps de crises. Elle a travaillé à la maternité du CHU de Nantes pendant 25 ans et dans un centre médico psycho pédagogique pour les enfants et adolescents. Depuis 1999 elle a échangé son bureau avec une cuisine, pièce familière qui devient son lieu d'écoute. Là, elle se met à table avec les parents et les enfants, créant ainsi un concept original d'accueil collectif des familles : les Pâtes au beurre. Aujourd'hui elle dirige la structure de Nantes et préside la Fédération Nationale pour la Prévention et Promotion de la Santé Psychique. Elle est l'autrice de nombreux ouvrages, parmi lesquels Dites-moi à quoi il joue je vous dirai comment il va et Elles accouchent et ne sont pas enceintes (éditions Les Liens qui Libèrent). Elle est l'autrice de nombreux ouvrages, parmi lesquels Dites-moi à quoi il joue je vous dirai comment il va et Elles accouchent et ne sont pas enceintes (éditions Les Liens qui Libèrent). Ce que les enfants nous enseignent, Sophie Marinopoulos, Les Liens qui Libèrent, janvier 2024. Vous aimez le podcast Mères ? Partagez avec nous votre commentaire avec 5 étoiles sur votre appli podcast : votre avis aide le podcast à remonter dans le classement, à vivre et à s'enrichir de nouveaux épisodes. Pour proposer un sujet ou un témoignages, écrivez à Marine sur contact@leslouves.com.

“My interest is to rather than continue with the psychoanalytic tilt which has tended to try to find the words - to find the areas of the analyst that has words to engage with these states and then help the patient transform these states into something thinkable and communicable. [In contrast] my interest has been to take the patient where they are; it's kind of a radical way of saying ‘meeting the patient where they are', and find our way and lend ourselves to engaging with them in their own idiom, using Bollas's term, in their own way of being and to find ways to be with them that don't necessarily rely on talking about things and making things known.”   Episode Description: We begin by considering patient's non-represented mental states and their manifestation in somatic and motoric registers. Robert describes his understanding and approach to clinically engage those who "barely experience continuity of the self or subjectivity in themselves or others." He recommends 'companioning' with them. This entails not trying to "move the patient out of these regressed areas into greater relatedness ...but to welcome these other dimensions and their full expression within the analytic space." We consider the role of enactive engagements, the non-verbal vs the pre-verbal and 'radical neutrality'. He presents a case where the patient and analyst shared music, food and not discussed emotional intimacy between them that he felt was vital to enable the patient to emerge as a 'real person'. We close with speaking of Robert's professional history of working early on with psychotic individuals and finding that his approach enabled them, often to their surprise, to feel heard. He also describes his attunement to the experience of being an 'other' that emerged from his growing up as an 'other' - a Jew in London.       Our Guest:  Robert Grossmark, Ph.D., ABPP, is a psychoanalyst in New York City. He works with individuals, groups, and couples. He is on the teaching and supervising faculty at the New York University Postdoctoral Program in Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis, The National Institute for the Psychotherapies Program in Adult Psychoanalysis, The National Training Program in Psychoanalysis, National Faculty Member, the Florida Psychoanalytic Center and lectures at other psychoanalytic institutes and clinical psychology training programs nationally and internationally. He is an Associate Editor for Psychoanalytic Dialogues. He is the author of The Unobtrusive Relational Analyst: Explorations in Psychoanalytic Companioning and co-edited The One and the Many: Relational Approaches to Group Psychotherapy and Heterosexual Masculinities: Contemporary Perspectives from Psychoanalytic Gender Theory.      Recommended Readings: Grossmark, R. (2024) The Untelling, Psychoanalytic Dialogues. In press.   Grossmark, R. (2019) The anguish of fatherhood, Psychoanalytic Perspectives,  16 (3), 316-325. Grossmark, R. (2023) A child is being murdered: A contemporary psychoanalytic treatment of a compulsion to child pornography, Psychoanalytic Psychology, 40: 25-30   Bach, S. (2011) Chimeras: Immunity, interpenetration and t he true self. Psychoanalytic Review, 98(1): 39-56   Winnicott, D. W. (1974). Fear of breakdown. International Review of Psycho-Analysis, 1(1-2), 103–107.   Bollas, C. (2011) Character and interformality. In C. Bollas, The Christopher Bollas Reader (p. 238-248)   Ogden, T.O. (2017) Dreaming the analytic session: A clinical essay. Psychoanalytic Quarterly, 86: 1-20.   Stern, D.B. (2022) On coming into possession of oneself: Witnessing and the formulation of experience. Psychoanalytic Quarterly, 91: 639-667   Symington, N. (2012) The Essence of psychoanalysis as opposed to what is secondary. Psychoanalytic Dialogues. 22, 4, 395-409

In this episode I speak with Dr. Emma Svanberg, an award-winning clinical psychologist and author of the recently released, "Parenting For Humans." Dr. Emma is the founder of The Psychology Co-operative and co-founder of Make Birth Better CIC. She also facilitates a vibrant parenting community on Facebook called The Village – A Parenting Community For Humans. I ask Dr Emma about the key themes from her book, exploring the beautiful analogy she uses of understanding children as ‘mapmakers' whose maps are shaped by their temperaments, environments, context, and how we as parents can guide and connect with our children - through understanding our own stories. We talk about the role of play in connection with our children, as well as boundaries in the context of technology. Dr Emma reflects on the pressures parents face today in an information-rich and distracted society, and how we can try to navigate these contexts drawing on a sense of agency and power, and calling in opportunities for presence both for ourselves and our children. You'll hear us reflect on the role of disappointment and the ruptures that inevitably occur between us and our children, and reflect on ‘good enough' and Winnicott's work as part of our parenting practice in fostering connection and growth. Website - https://dremmasvanberg.com/ Email - emma@dremmasvanberg.com Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/mumologist Buy Emma's Book: https://ebury.lnk.to/ParentingForHumans Show notes page: https://drsophiebrock.com/podcast106

In this episode, I talk about when children use have a soft toy, blanket or other object as a control pattern. This might be something they use to suppress their feelings when going to sleep or during the day when feelings bubble up. I explain about how they used to be known as 'transitional objects' in Winnicott's work, and how we see them differently in Aware Parenting. I also share my own experience of having a bunny as a control pattern for many years, and the touching experience I had in my early twenties. I offer ideas for how you can help your child if they have a control pattern like this. Then I read out the story from a child who has a bunny control pattern from my latest book, 'I'm Here and I'm Listening.' You can buy the paperback or ebook on Amazon by searching for 'I'm Here and I'm Listening' on the Amazon store in your country! Or send me a DM for the direct link! Big love xoxox You can find out more about my work at www.marionrose.net You can also find me here: https://www.instagram.com/_marion_rose_/ https://www.instagram.com/awareparenting/ www.facebook.com/MarionRosePhD

"The ability to play means we can indulge in a kind of illusion, not delusion, and make a distinction. It always amazes me that when the patient arrives, they like the routine of an analysis; nobody breaks that, it's an illusion; it is a piece of theater every time. We open the door to our patients and they lie on the couch, and yet there is something enormously gratifying as the patient works out their sense of  reality from that illusory field. I think it is exactly what the mother is able to bring to the infant - this capacity to play and this capacity to continue to evolve beyond the analysis as an internalization of that experience of being listened to and being with someone. The details of that is related to an intrapsychic surviving and non- surviving object in the analyst  who continues to think and feel and be with the patient in the consulting room.”   Episode Description: Joel begins his conversation with Jan around Winnicott's conceptualization of aggression in development and in the analytic encounter. She noted that he had a very sophisticated developmental theory of aggression which culminated with the role that the destruction of the object plays in constituting reality. Jan explains that she has elaborated Winnicott's late theory of aggression with her notion of the ‘surviving object'. She distinguishes the 'surviving object' from the 'good object', especially as it stands apart from a moralizing position. She considers its internalization as an essential condition for healthy development. They discussed the role that insight continued to play for Winnicott after he emphasized the importance of the patient's experience in the analytic process. They also consider the ‘fear of woman' as a root of misogyny. After discussing the uniqueness of the analytic setting to facilitate play, fantasy, and “magic which is not psychosis,” Jan concludes by emphasizing the importance of in-person treatment in order to have an in vivo experience of the non-retaliatory analyst.   Linked Episode: Episode 144: Why Winnicott? Joel Whitebook, PhD   Our Interviewer and Guest: Joel Whitebook, PhD is a philosopher and psychoanalyst. He is on the Faculty of the Columbia University Center for Psychoanalytic Training and Research and was the founding Director of the University's Psychoanalytic Studies Program. In addition to many articles on psychoanalysis, philosophy, and critical theory, Dr. Whitebook is also the author of Perversion and Utopia (MIT) and Freud: An Intellectual Biography (Cambridge). Jan Abram, PhD is a training and supervising analyst of the British Psychoanalytical Society and in private practice in London. She is a Visiting Professor of the Psychoanalysis Unit at University College London and is currently Vice President of the European Psychoanalytic Federation for the Annual Conferences. She is President-Elect for the EPF to start her term in March 2024. She is a Visiting Lecturer and supervisor at the Tavistock Clinic in London. In 2016, she was a Visiting Professor at the University of Kyoto, Japan, where she resided for a writing sabbatical. Jan Abram has published several books and articles notably The Language of Winnicott, Donald Winnicott Today (2013), The Clinical Paradigms of Melanie Klein and Donald Winnicott: Comparisons and Dialogues (co-authored with R.D. Hinshelwood 2018); The Surviving Object: psychoanalytic clinical essays on psychic survival-of-the-object (2022) and her second book with R.D. Hinshelwood: The Clinical Paradigms of Donald Winnicott and Wilfred Bion: Comparisons and Dialogues (2023).     Recommended Readings: ben Abram, J. (2022) The Surviving Object: Psychoanalytic Clinical Essays on Psychic survival-of-the-object New Library of Psychoanalysis Routledge   Abram, J. (2023) Holding and Containing: on the specificity of Winnicott's object relations theory Holding und Containing: Zur spezifischen Natur der Objektbeziehungen bei Winnicott. Psyche - Z Psychoanal 77 (9), 768-796 DOI 10.21706/ps-77-9-768  

Selling enemas to replace psych meds, or treat cancer, or cure autism is some dangerous shit. But Matthew has a tingling sense that the wellness enema craze promises more than false health benefits. Perhaps the coffee might be an artisanal distraction from a more existential promise: a ritual of cleansing and muscular control for a world that feels filthy, guilty, and in absolute chaos. A way of returning to a crucially innocent time when you learned to hold it all in, then given permission to let it all out, and then lovingly cleaned up when you did. Today, Instagram gives us permission to show it to the world: look at what I made! Look at how fresh and pure I am! Look at how I am polishing my innermost self. Look at this magic of making the invisible visible. Welcome to your 50-minute analysis session to process Mallory's brilliant reporting on Thursday: a tour through a labyrinth of dirt, control, differentiation, exhibitionism, shame—and possibly reclamation and integration. Chapters: How to Read an Enema Managing Filth with Freud Winnicott's the Best The Abject Political Shit Dear Kyah Butcherbox promo: Sign up today at butcherbox.com/conspirituality and use code conspirituality to choose your free offer and get $20 off. Show Notes Conspirituality 192: Coffee is Your Friend, Not Your Enema Paranoid Reading, Reparative Reading — Sedgwick Know Your Enemy: UNLOCKED: Freud and Politics (w/ Pat Blanchfield) on Apple Podcasts Freud, "Character and Anal Eroticism" | PDF THE SEMINAR OF JACQUES LACAN BOOK X ANXIETY 1962 - 1963 The child, the family, and the outside world : Winnicott, D. W. (Donald Woods), 1896-1971 : Internet Archive Kristeva, Julia. Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection. New York: Columbia University Press, 1982. Pro-Trump rioters smeared poop in US Capitol hallways during belligerent attack Are Anti-Vaxers Really Pooping Themselves Because of Ivermectin? What Donald Trump Actually Smells Like, According to Ex-GOP Congressman Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When I heard the name of the book my SelfWork guest - Rachel Marie Martin - has written, I knew I wanted her on the show. What's the title?  Mom Enough: Inspiring Letters for theWonderfully Exhausting but Totally Normal Days of Motherhood (Dexterity, September 26, 2023). In it you'll find greatly affirming letters written for moms at various stages of motherhood, from the melancholic to the "tear your hair out" to the poignant. Mom enough. It reminded me of an early psychological researcher, Winnicott,  who was the first guy to stop blaming moms for all their children's psychological problems. He called it, "the good enough mother." And I know that's what I tried to be. Good enough. A Rachel is also the founder of the popular social media community FindingJoy.net, as well as an author and host of the very popular FB page also called Finding Joy where millions of readers learn from her.  I loved having her on SelfWork - and I know you'll enjoy her thoughts about everything about motherhood. And realizing just how hard it is. Advertiser's Link: Click HERE for the NEW fabulous offer from AG1 – with bonus product with your subscription! Vital Links: You can hear more about this and many other topics by listening to my podcast, SelfWork with Dr. Margaret Rutherford. Subscribe to my website and receive my weekly newsletter including a blog post and podcast! If you'd like to join my FaceBook closed group, then click here and answer the membership questions! Welcome! My book entitled Perfectly Hidden Depression is available here! Its message is specifically for those with a struggle with strong perfectionism which acts to mask underlying emotional pain. But the many self-help techniques described can be used by everyone who chooses to begin to address emotions long hidden away that are clouding and sabotaging your current life. And there's another way to send me a message! You can record by clicking below and ask your question or make a comment. You'll have 90 seconds to do so and that time goes quickly. By recording, you're giving SelfWork (and me) permission to use your voice on the podcast. I'll look forward to hearing from you!  

How to be Happy with Dr. Tal Ben-Shahar In this episode, you'll hear: The elements of happiness and how to be happier The role that rest plays in reducing stress and the importance of exercise as medicine “Perfect” vs. “good enough” and why the ego is stopping us from being happy The impact of the pandemic and social media Teenagers and Advice for when comparison makes you unhappy Dr. Tal Ben-Shahar joins us from his home in New Jersey, where he recently launched the world's first fully accredited master's degree program in happiness at Centenary University. Tal is an expert in the field, having received his BA in Philosophy and Psychology and Ph.D. in Organizational Behavior from Harvard. He tells us that, as a young man, his squash training informed his understanding of what it takes to become an expert and excel throughout his life. Tal's dedication to the sport led him to play squash professionally and, eventually, to win the Israeli National Squash Championships. After being injured during his time in the Israeli Army, he left professional sports but was soon recruited to play at the amateur level for Harvard. There, he won the U.S. intercollegiate squash championships and eventually returned to his alma mater to become a lecturer. Tal first began thinking about the nature of happiness when he found that success in Squash was not bringing him happiness. Years later, the same realization came to him again when he found that success academically and socially in college was not causing him to feel happy either. This situation made Tal do the unthinkable… leave his computer science program and move to philosophy and psychology. He had to figure out, “Why aren't I happy? And how can I become happier?" This move kicked off what would become an incredible career and a lifelong dedication to studying the science of happiness.  Dr. Tal has become an accomplished writer, with his books on positive psychology and leadership being translated into more than thirty languages and appearing on best-seller lists around the world. In addition to what Tal has achieved at Harvard, he has also taught happiness studies at Columbia University, consulted and lectured for companies like Microsoft, Intel, and Google, and given expert interviews on programs like NPR and Armchair Expert.  Throughout his career, one thing Tal has found to be true is that success has nothing to do with happiness. Rather, happiness will lead to success. One way we can see this happening is with the “flow state." When you are in the "flow,” you are having “peak experience” and “peak performance." Flowing can make us feel happy, but before we can know if we are happy, Tal tells us it's important to define happiness.  Most people equate happiness with pleasure, but it is so much more than that. Pleasure is one element of happiness, but there are others as well: spiritual well-being (meaning and purpose), physical well-being (exercise, nutrition, and rest), intellectual well-being (curiosity and lifelong learning), relational well-being (time spent with others and impact on our community), and emotional well-being. Emotional well-being is the element that encompasses pleasure but also requires being able to deal with painful emotions. Dr. Tal says, “The first step to happiness is allowing in unhappiness.”. Many of us are missing one or more of these elements. There are billions of people worldwide experiencing burnout, and Dr. Tal tells us this is not due to their being more stressed, but rather that there is not enough rest time to take care of all of these aspects. Oftentimes, people just feel like busyness is just a fact of life. Still, by evaluating what we really want in life and understanding that perfection is not realistic but good enough is good enough, you can change your expectations and, in turn, shift your perspective. There is a time for the highs and a time for the lows, but most of the time, we just need to be neutral. Tal calls embracing and accepting that most of life is neutral, with spikes in the highs and dips into the lows, emotional flexibility. He tells us to “surrender to the emotion." Embrace it. The pandemic is another factor that impacted our happiness. However, one especially alarming trend that Tal has been giving voice to is rising depression rates among teenagers. These recent unprecedented increases are mainly attributed to their widespread use of smartphones. Tal notes that the technology itself isn't the issue, but the lack of boundaries around smartphones is. Technology is radically impacting the self-esteem of men and women, but, to a greater degree, teenage boys and, most radically, teenage girls. Fortunately, Tal has advice on how to do a reality check for our children (and ourselves) when we start comparing our bodies and lives to the ones we see online. Practicing gratitude daily develops an appreciative mindset that will serve us much more than the depreciative mindset so many of us have developed as a result of impossible comparisons. But keep in mind that it's not so much what you say to your children; it's about how you model behavior for them.  This kind of practical and insightful perspective is what Dr. Tal Ben-Shahar's Happiness Studies Academy is all about. The goal is to help individuals become happier themselves and empower them to help others do the same. With a year-long certificate program and a two-year, fully accredited master's degree program, Tal is giving future leaders in the field a way to learn about happiness from multiple perspectives. To learn more about these programs, visit happinessstudies.academy/cihs/  In this episode, you'll hear: The elements of happiness and how to be happier The role that rest plays in reducing stress and the importance of exercise as medicine “Perfect” vs. “good enough” and why the ego is stopping us from being happy The impact of the pandemic and social media Teenagers and Advice for when comparison makes you unhappy Follow the podcast:  Listen on Apple Podcasts (link: https://apple.co/3s1YH7h)  Listen on iHeart (link: https://ihr.fm/3MEY7FM)  Listen on Spotify (Link: https://spoti.fi/3yMmQCE)    Resources: TalBenShahar.com Dr. Tal Ben-Shahar on Instagram Jean Twenge  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi on Flow Ellen Langer on Mindfulness “The Good Enough Mother" by D. W. Winnicott    Connect with Mathew Blades:  Twitter - twitter.com/MathewBlades Instagram - instagram.com/MathewBladesmedia/  Facebook - facebook.com/mathewbladesmedia/  Website - learnfrompeoplewholivedit.com/   Additional Credits: LFPWLI is managed by Sam Robertson   In this episode, you'll hear: The elements of happiness and how to be happier The role that rest plays in reducing stress and the importance of exercise as medicine “Perfect” vs. “good enough” and why the ego is stopping us from being happy The impact of the pandemic and social media Teenagers and Advice for when comparison makes you unhappy

Abby and Patrick welcome psychoanalyst and clinical social worker Brian Ngo-Smith, President of the American Association for Psychoanalysis in Clinical Social Work (AAPCSW). Focusing on his paper “This Couch Has Bed Bugs: On the Homelessness of Psychoanalysis and the Psychoanalysis of Homelessness,” they talk about psychotherapy with unhoused clients and tensions between the priorities of psychoanalysis versus social work, the desire to help, and our society's hatred of dependence. Turning to D.W. Winnicott's ideas about hate in countertransference, they explore how unacknowledged hatred by caregivers for their patients manifests not only interpersonally but also in institutional behaviors and broader social policy. They also discuss Brian's recent work on the eros of care, including a paper entitled “Porosity and Preoccupation: Queer Thoughts on Psychoanalytic Care,” which he will deliver as the Gertrude and Ernst Ticho Memorial Lecture at the National Meeting of the American Psychoanalytic Association in New York this February. Articles discussed include:D.W. Winnicott's classic essay, “Hate in the Counter-Transference,” available here: Thttps://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3330380/pdf/348.pdfBrian Ngo-Smith, “This Couch Has Bed Bugs: On the Homelessness of Psychoanalysis and the Psychoanalysis of Homelessness,” Clinical Social Work Journal 46:1, March 2018.Brian Ngo-Smith, “Porosity and Preoccupation: Queer Thoughts on Psychoanalytic Care,” to be delivered at the 2024 National Meeting of the American Psychoanalytic Association in New York on February 10th from 2-4pm. Brian's website is here: www.ngosmiththerapy.comHave you noticed that Freud is back? Got questions about psychoanalysis? Or maybe you've traversed the fantasy and lived to tell the tale? Leave us a voicemail! 484 775-0107 A podcast about psychoanalysis, politics, pop culture, and the ways we suffer now. New episodes on Saturdays. Follow us on social media:Linktree: https://linktr.ee/OrdinaryUnhappiness Twitter: @UnhappinessPod Instagram: @OrdinaryUnhappiness Patreon: patreon.com/OrdinaryUnhappiness Theme song: Formal Chicken - Gnossienne No. 1 https://open.spotify.com/album/2MIIYnbyLqriV3vrpUTxxO Provided by Fruits Music

En este episodio estamos (des)aprendiendo sobre nuestra identidad en las redes sociales. Específicamente: Cómo se han ido creando las mismas Cómo hemos aprendido a interactuar con ellas Qué nos dice nuestra identidad digital sobre nuestro mundo interno Episodios complementarios para seguir la conversa: E018 - ¿Qué es el pensamiento blanco o negro?⁠ E059 - ¿Para qué vivir una vida más pausada? ⁠E071 - ¿Se puede disfrutar de la soledad? ¿Quieres más contenido así? Suscríbete a ⁠⁠⁠"adentro"⁠⁠⁠, mi newsletter semanal Únete a ⁠⁠⁠"acompañar"⁠⁠⁠, mi club de journaling Artículo mencionado en el episodio: Pensándome en lo digital - newsletter "adentro" por Mariana Plata Investigaciones mencionadas en el episodio: Balick, A. (2012) TMI in the transference LOL: Psychoanalytic reflections on Google, social networking, and ‘virtual impingement'. Psychoanal Cult Soc 17, 120–136. https://doi.org/10.1057/pcs.2012.19 Stadter, M. (2013). The influence of social media and communications technology on self and relationships. In J. S. Scharff (Ed.), Psychoanalysis online: Mental health, teletherapy, and training (pp. 3–13). Karnac Books. Winnicott, D. W. (1958). The capacity to be alone. The International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 39, 416–420. Arte del podcast: ⁠⁠⁠Carola Gelabert⁠⁠⁠ Canción: Golden Days por ⁠⁠⁠Chris Brain

"The fact that music is so important for our constitution - that music is almost how we move in the world, that our own bodies are played through by musical forms, that the way we relate to our own way of being in the world is sort of mediated by music - this is powerful stuff. But it's not always very fitting to us. We hear a lot of music in our lives, we don't always choose what we hear. We don't choose our analyst's musicality, we don't first check what kind of musicality an analyst has. We are bombarded by music; music can be imposed upon us, it can make us feel within ourselves in a way that doesn't feel right to us. There is a lot of complexity here as we think about this matter of music being so central to us. But we can find the music that works for us, but we don't create the music. It belongs to the realm of collective cultural life. There is a lot of struggle in music, and in the analytic setting there is a lot of struggle - because for many patients a lot of the work rests on whether there can be any shared sensory experience or not.”     Episode Description: We begin with recognizing that the process of human musicalization begins in utero and forms the basis of much of psycho-somatic-social life. Peter, Michael and Adam's written collaboration, Here I'm Alive - The Spirit of Music in Psychoanalysis is intended to be a musical book about psychoanalysis - a representation of how music binds us to the individual and cultural domains of life. We discuss rhythmizing consciousness, atavistic vs enhancing music, and the blues as a companion soundtrack for loss and tribulation. We take up the relationship between Freud's dream book and his joke book, how present analytic melodies contain aspects of the past, and how dissociation requires a remusicalization of the psychoanalytic situation. We close with Adam reading a paragraph which includes "The capacity of the sexual drive to propel the body back into musical movement and transmute the seizure of trauma into conducted energy to ground the current."   Our Guests:   Peter Goldberg, Ph.D., is a Personal and Supervising Analyst at the Psychoanalytic Institute of Northern California, Chair of Faculty at the San Francisco Center for Psychoanalysis, and on the faculty of the Wright Institute in Berkeley. He has presented widely and written on a range of clinical and theoretical topics, including the evolution of clinical theory in psychoanalysis, sensory experience in analysis, the concept of the analytic frame, the theory and treatment of dissociative states, non-representational states; and the impact of social trauma on individual psychology. He is in private practice in Albany, CA.   Michael Levin, Psy.D. is a Training Analyst and Faculty Member at the San Francisco Center for Psychoanalysis. He has taught and presented on topics including the work of Laplanche, phenomenology, and psychoanalysis, and the place of psychoanalysis in cultural and intellectual history. He is in private practice in San Francisco.   Adam Blum, Psy.D. is an Adjunct Faculty Member at the San Francisco Center for Psychoanalysis. He has written and presented on psychoanalysis and the music of Björk, Kendrick Lamar, Frank Ocean, Stephen Sondheim, Aretha Franklin, and Michael Jackson. He is in private practice in San Francisco.     Recommended Readings and Videos:   Nicholas Spice, “Winnicott and Music” (2001), in The Elusive Child, ed. Lesley Caldwell (London: Karnac, 2002).    Peter Sloterdijk, “Where Are We When We Hear Music?” (2014), in The Aesthetic Imperative: Writings on Art (London: Polity, 2018).   Francis Grier, “Musicality in the Consulting Room,” International Journal of Psychoanalysis 100:827–51.    Sondheim Teaches "My Friends" from Sweeney Todd (video) .    Byung-Chul Han, The Scent of Time: A Philosophical Essay on the Art of Lingering (London: Wiley, 2017).   Maurice Merleau-Ponty, The Phenomenology of Perception (London: Routledge, 1962)   The Late Late Show with James Corden, “Paul McCartney Carpool Karaoke” (video).   Harmut Rosa, Resonance (Cambridge: Polity, 2019).    Meshell Ndegeocello, The Omnichord Real Book (2023) (album), Blue Note Records.  

"Instead of the analyst being in a position where they know something about the patient, they are with the patient. As Winnicott says in his late work, if you are a philosopher in your armchair, you have to come out of your armchair and be on the floor with the child playing. I don't think that one should act that out with an adult patient- however  it is that approach to actually being with the patient, listening to the patient's words, listening to their state of mind without preconceived ideas. That's almost impossible, but  Winnicott says that psychoanalysis is an objective study, an objective way of looking at things without preconceived ideas, without preconceived notions. It links with what you said about ‘normative' - if we go into the consulting room feeling that our patients need to be as we are or need to fit in some kind of norm, then I don't think this is psychoanalytic. I think it is against the whole aim of psychoanalysis.”   Episode Description: Jan begins her conversation with Joel by sharing her background in theater and the steps she took to train as an analyst. She describes what drew her to Winnicott and how she sees him as broadening, not replacing, Freudian thinking. She distinguishes her understanding of Winnicott from others who believe that, by speaking of the importance of the environment, he minimized constitutional factors and the unconscious. She interprets what he meant by the environment in terms of the ‘psyche-body' and the mother's unconscious. Jan discusses a paradox in Winnicott in that he offers a positive theory of health while also being uniquely non-judgmental and non-pathologizing. She concludes with a controversial observation that a five times weekly in person training analysis is essential to achieve a deep regression that will familiarize analysts with the primitive parts of their personalities so they will be able to accept and deal with those parts of their patients' personalities.   Our Interviewer and Guest: Joel Whitebook, PhD is a philosopher and psychoanalyst.  He is on the Faculty of the Columbia University Center for Psychoanalytic Training and Research and was the founding Director of the University's Psychoanalytic Studies Program.  In addition to many articles on psychoanalysis, philosophy, and critical theory, Dr. Whitebook is also the author of Perversion and Utopia (MIT) and Freud: An Intellectual Biography (Cambridge).   Jan Abram, PhD is a training and supervising analyst of the British Psychoanalytical Society and in private practice in London. She is Visiting Professor of the Psychoanalysis Unit, University College London, and is currently Vice President of the European Psychoanalytic Federation for the Annual Conferences. She is President-Elect for the EPF to start her term in March 2024. She is a Visiting Lecturer and supervisor at the Tavistock Clinic, in London. In 2016, she was a Visiting Professor for the University of Kyoto, Japan, where she resided for a writing sabbatical. Jan Abram has published several books and articles notably: The Language of Winnicott, Donald Winnicott Today (2013), The Clinical Paradigms of Melanie Klein and Donald Winnicott: comparisons and Dialogues (co-authored with R.D. Hinshelwood 2018); The Surviving Object: psychoanalytic clinical essays on psychic survival-of-the-object (2022) and her second book with R.D. Hinshelwood: The Clinical Paradigms of Donald Winnicott and Wilfred Bion: comparisons and dialogues (2023).   Learn more about Jan Abram    Recommended Readings: Abram, J. (2007) The Language of Winnicott: A Dictionary of Winnicott's use of terms Routledge   Abram, J. (ed) (2016) André Green at the Squiggle Foundation Routledge   Abram, J. (2008) Donald Woods Winnicott (1896 – 1971): A brief introduction Education Section Int J of Psychoanal 99: 1189 - 1217   Abram, J. (2021) On Winnicott's Concept of Trauma Int J of Psychoanal 102: 4 10  

This podcast was recorded over the course of the pandemic, and this is the very first episode. A lot of what I saw in real time ended up being prescient in retrospect. I went back and listened to it recently, and decided it was worth sharing with my readers and listeners. I hope you enjoy it, as a historical artifact at least. As a production note, all of it was recorded by me, edited by me, written by me, etc. It was only me around. Because it was a pandemic. So who else was gonna do it? This is the the first of the number of these episodes that I will release in this feed.Owen Muir: On February 11th, 2020, the World Health Organization announced the official name for the disease-causing virus responsible for the 2019 novel coronavirus outbreak, first identified in Wuhan, China. The new name of this disease is abbreviated as COVID-19.Owen Muir: So Quinn, what's the best way to avoid getting coronavirus?Quinn: Coronavirus. You have to get dirty when your hands get dirty.Owen Muir: You have to get dirty when your hands get dirty. How about what you shouldn't touch with them? Should you touch your face?Quinn: No.Owen Muir: Should you touch your nose?Quinn: No.Owen Muir: How about your mouth?Quinn: No!Carlene MacMillan: So we came up with a name.Owen Muir: Oh. Well, what is it?Carlene MacMillan: Well, it's remotely possible.Owen Muir: Oh, that's the name.Carlene MacMillan: Yeah. Well, it's remotely possible. The podcast about uncertainty, anxiety, and existential despair.Owen Muir: Maybe you could say it a little bit slower because it's important to say things slow enough for the audience to keep up.Carlene MacMillan: Well, it's remotely possible—the podcast is about uncertainty, anxiety, and existential despair.Owen Muir: So as not to get confused, here are some introductions. My name is Dr. Owen Muir, and I'm your host. After that, you heard Quinn Muir, my four-year-old. Teaching us how to say no to touching different parts of your face. Subsequently, Carlene MacMillan, MD, told us the name of the show.Owen Muir: You're going to hear a lot of other teammates on the show coming up, and I'll introduce them as they come along. In COVID-19, CO stands for Corona, VI stands for virus, and D stands, unsurprisingly, for disease.Michelle Bernabe, R.N.: It's kinda eerie. Because it's a beautiful day in New York City.Owen Muir: Thanks, Michelle. Next up, you will meet RJ, our awesome IT manager.R.J. Smith: I got on the subway and realized I hadn't been there in three weeks. And I thought how lucky I was not to get infected.Tracy: I'm Tracy. I'm, I think I'm reacting normally. Like, the right amount of anxiety. , I'm not so much concerned about me getting it. Like, if I get it, I'll probably be fine.Owen Muir: This is Tracy. She's one of our Winnicott coaches and TMS technicians.Owen Muir: Jacqueline is also a TMS technician and Winnicott coach.Jacqueline Caso MSW: honestly, I haven't done anything different. , I'm not super concerned; more concerned about the panic than the virus itself. I think people a little probably going to freak out.Owen Muir: There are many types of human coronaviruses. Including some that commonly cause mild upper respiratory infections, COVID 19 however, is a new disease caused by a novel coronavirus that has not been previously seen in humans. We're a mental health practice. But we realized something big was happening.Owen Muir: Next up, I talked to Michelle Bernabe, RN, my co-host, about mentalizing:“So you see, we wanted to mentalize and tried to define that. Do you want to do that?Michelle Bernabe, R.N.: Define mentalization?Owen Muir: Yeah.Michelle Bernabe, R.N.: I want to define mindfulness of self and others.Owen Muir: Mindfulness for the both of us.Michelle Bernabe, R.N.: Mindfulness for the both of us. Okay, so here I am on my second hour of Twitter. Scrolling, scrolling, reading about all the exponential predictions of how America's healthcare system will be completely burned and then collapse because there are not enough beds. And I have convinced myself I will... Be without a bed needing a bed in two weeks' time.Owen Muir: People in the United States might be worried or anxious. Friends or relatives living or visiting areas where COVID-19 is spreading may become infected. Some people are worried about the disease. Fear and anxiety can lead to social stigma, for example, towards Chinese or other Asian Americans or people who were in quarantine.Owen Muir: That is where we come in as mental health professionals.Michelle Bernabe, R.N.: Well, I mean, how do you think they're feeling?R.J. Smith: Scared?Michelle Bernabe, R.N.: Scared about what?R.J. Smith: Being sick.Michelle Bernabe, R.N.: Right now, isn't it just so much more than being sick?R.J. Smith: No, I don't know. To me, it's just being sick.Michelle Bernabe, R.N.: Really?R.J. Smith: Yeah, and weaponizing the illness.Owen Muir: As we prepared to do this show, I talked to a lot of my colleagues about their fears.Owen Muir: One of our social workers, Erica, has asthma.Erica Zajac, LSW: I'm concerned about suffering. If I get sick, my lung functioning is already not optimal. Dying is a part of life. The dying part is not the problem because then my brain, which goes 5 million miles an hour, will be thinking constantly while I'm there that I'm suffering.Owen Muir: Stigma hurts everyone by creating more fear or anger towards ordinary people instead of the disease that is causing the problem. In the days leading up to making this show, we had a lot of conversations. Started out jokey, and in retrospect, it sounds tone-deaf.R.J. Smith: Yeah, and I knew for sure that I had...Michelle Bernabe, R.N.: Coronavirus.Owen Muir: To be perfectly clear, RJ doesn't have coronavirus.R.J. Smith: Yeah.Michelle Bernabe, R.N.: And how do you feel this morning?R.J. Smith: Like, I have coronavirus, but I probably don't. I probably already had it.Owen Muir: Sometimes it's safer to feel like you've already got the disease in a pandemic.Michelle Bernabe, R.N.: Yeah, that's what we were getting to.R.J. Smith: So I'm immune now.Michelle Bernabe, R.N.: I got off track. Well, you know, in my thorough research on Twitter...Owen Muir: It's unclear if prior exposure to COVID-19 provides inoculation against future infection.Owen Muir: It was the case with both MERS and SARS, but we don't have the data on COVID-19.R.J. Smith: My mom would do this thing where she would be like, okay, now that you're sick, we need to sanitize everything in the house cause you'll get sick again. And I'll say, Mom, that's not how immunology works.R.J. Smith: I'm not going to get sick from something I've already had. She is very insistent that that was a lie made up by Who knows the overseers, I guessMichelle Bernabe, R.N.: by the Illuminati.R.J. Smith: Yes, the medical Illuminati, which is a very real thingMichelle Bernabe, R.N.: I knowR.J. Smith: Jay z's a part of it.Michelle Bernabe, R.N.: I can't tell you how I know.R.J. Smith: Oh, Tell me more. Oh, I guess you can't.Owen Muir: Carlene MacMillan chimes in about the value of social distancing and how it's different from quarantineCarlene MacMillan: You asked me to explain social distancing. I'm sitting next to you, very close. It's not social distancing.Owen Muir: It's not social distancing. Uh, you're probably already exposed to me and me to you.Carlene MacMillan: This is true, which is why I've taken this calculated risk.Owen Muir: Okay. So, what are we doing to help, not just... People's fear and anxiety about COVID-19 help slow down the spread.Carlene MacMillan: If you told me a week ago that we'd be doing something called social distancing, I would have said that was totally opposite to what we do as psychiatrists. However, times have changed. Now I understand social distancing to mean that we're taking steps to slow the spread of COVID-19.Owen Muir: Like, like what?Carlene MacMillan: So it means... If there is something we can do while maintaining a safe social distance, we're going to do it.Owen Muir: According to the CDC, that's about six feet.Carlene MacMillan: That's right.  It's about Six feet.Owen Muir: for us to make it six feet or more, is there a way we can do that?Owen Muir: Sure. So that's where HIPAA-compliant Telehealth platforms come in, like Zoom. So over the past few days, we've switched over everything Telehealth. We can't do that for services people need to come into the office for, like TMS.  But for everything else, we can do it over the computer. We can make it work, and that's what we've been doing. I was talking to my psychiatrist the other day, and he pointed out a really interesting thing that people are not talking about: the difference between social distancing and quarantining and why social distancing is so important.The deal is that if you're around someone they have COVID-19, you are then going to be quarantined. So if we ran a group therapy session and one of those group patients, or even a group leader, had COVID-19, then the whole group would be down for the count, essentially, you know, locked in their house for two weeks, or whatever the CDC recommends.Owen Muir: However, if we make calculated choices by doing social distancing, we can minimize the chance of that happening, which means we'll have more freedom, more ability to make choices around our movements than if we do whatever we want.  With COVID-19, we can see change coming. Come with us and figure out how we will handle this thing together.Michelle Bernabe, R.N., featured above, writes . This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thefrontierpsychiatrists.substack.com/subscribe

Identity is complex and interwoven into the world around us. But as Autistic individuals who wear a mask, identity is often not entirely shaped by ourselves. Late in life discovery of autism or ADHD can set off a cascading journey of self-discovery and identity exploration. Once we start to embrace our authentic selves and explore our identity, everything can change. In this episode, Patrick Casale and Dr. Megan Anna Neff, two AuDHD mental health professionals, dive into the topic of exploring identity as late-diagnosed Autistic individuals and discuss the process of exploration and claiming an identity that embraces all our neurodivergent uniqueness, how it impacts and changes daily life and choices, and how it can shift both new and old relationships. Top 3 reasons to listen to the entire episode: Understand what unmasking and redefining identity can look like, as well as how it can impact both internal and external experiences, preferences, and relationships. Discover how breaking free from a "mask" identity can allow autistic individuals to explore their creative side, set boundaries, and authentically accept their autistic identity. Learn how to use pleasure and play to explore identity and discover your most authentic self. Give yourself permission to explore uncomfortable emotions and experiences. Be curious, dive into the things that give you pleasure, and detach from others' expectations to unlock new paths of self-awareness and understanding. Resources What is Masking in Autism? Autistic Masking Explained (blog post): https://neurodivergentinsights.com/blog/what-is-masking-in-autism?rq=masking Neuroqueer Heresies: Notes on the Neurodiversity Paradigm, Autistic Empowerment, and Postnormal Possibilities by Dr. Nick Walker (book): https://neuroqueer.com/neuroqueer-heresies  Autistic Masking Workbook: As a podcast listener, you can use this coupon code to enjoy a 25% discount on the individual workbook or the workbook for clinicians. For Personal Use, use coupon code: Unmasking25 here (https://neurodivergentinsights.com/neurodivergentstore/p/autistic-masking) For Clinical Use, use code: Unmasking25-Clinical here (https://neurodivergentinsights.com/neurodivergentstore/p/autistic-masking-therapy-resources)   Transcript PATRICK CASALE: Hey, everyone, you are listening to the Divergent Conversations Podcast. We are two neurodivergent mental health professionals in a neurotypical world. I'm Patrick Casale. MEGAN NEFF: And I'm Dr. Neff. PATRICK CASALE: And during these episodes, we do talk about sensitive subjects, mental health, and there are some conversations that can certainly feel a bit overwhelming. So, we do just want to use that disclosure and disclaimer before jumping in. And thanks for listening. MEGAN NEFF: Are we going to start this conversation, Patrick?  PATRICK CASALE: I like that.  MEGAN NEFF: [CROSSTALK 00:00:15] I mean, I was like, "Oh, snap. I'm supposed to have the social lubricant here and ease this into a organic conversation." But I'm terrible at that. PATRICK CASALE: I think about it as like the scene in Talladega Nights, if you've ever seen it, where Will Ferrell is like, "I don't know what to do with my hands." When he's on an interview. And like, "Just put your hands down." He's like, "Like this?" MEGAN NEFF: Wait, oh my gosh, that has actually, like, destroyed my life. Right now my hands are in my pocket. My whole life I either, like I used to wear skirts a lot, which is interesting because I'm very gender-neutral in how I dress now. But it had to have pockets. So, I always had pockets or a coffee mug, like a travel mug with me. Otherwise, like, my hands, I didn't know what to do with my hands. PATRICK CASALE: That's why I am always fidgeting with something in my hands or like, my dog is laying next to me right now, so I'm just petting him. He's not enjoying it. But I am like, so yeah, I am with you on that.  So, I think today I can provide the social lubricant, is that we are going to do a two-part series on identity. And part one is going to be our own thoughts on identity, unmasking, etc. And part two is we're going to read some questions that came into our social media accounts and try to give some overview and depth into those. MEGAN NEFF: Thanks for providing the thesis, for doing what my brain cannot do this morning.  PATRICK CASALE: That's [CROSSTALK 00:01:46]- MEGAN NEFF: Yeah, I don't know about you, Patrick, but identity, this is a really interesting topic to me. I think it's something I've been thinking about and talking about since the beginning of my autistic discovery because I think, especially, when you come at it later in life, so I was 37 when I self-discovered and then was diagnosed, there's a whole lot of life to unpack. And with that, a lot of core identities get kind of reshuffled in the mix. And I see this happen all the time, right? I work with a lot of people through the diagnosis process, the unmasking process, and it's a pretty intense identity exploration for a lot of people. PATRICK CASALE: Yeah, it's very intense. And I was 35, so about the same age as you. And I think that it starts to, I think, well, my brain has so many thoughts in it right now. Number one is, I think that autistic people, especially, are so analytical, and there's constantly this existential questioning happening, no matter whether you know that you're autistic or not. Like, it's constantly a process.  And number two is once you find out that you are in fact autistic, it can start to unravel these things that you thought you knew about yourself or believed about yourself. And then it becomes very hard to almost separate like, what is autistic trait tendency characteristic versus what is my actual identity? Are they intertwined? Do they overlap?  A lot of us are using identity-first language in an affirmative sense. So, I know for myself now I almost introduce myself as an autistic ADHD entrepreneur, person, therapist, whatever. So, it's really a complicated conversation. MEGAN NEFF: Okay, so that gets into, okay, my brain is also divergent. I think because this is such a big topic. So, like, what I heard in that of how you introduce yourself, you are integrating a new identity. So, that's task one, I would say. And these are not linear, I'm putting them into tasks to try and create some structure here.  Task two or another task I often see is rethinking old identities. So, like, for example, for me, my gender identity, my sexual identity, my religious identity, my professional identity, all were on the table as I was also integrating a new identity. So, it's deconstructing old identities and re-conceptualizing them through an autistic… Well, through an autistic lens, but it's more like, once I learned to break free then there was like a, I want to use the word queering here. Like, I think learning I was autistic taught me how to queer my identity. It taught me how to think more critically, and constructively, and playfully about my identity, and that's contagious when that starts to happen.  And then there can be this domino effect where all identities, or several identities start getting queered. So, queering, it means to challenge perhaps a common held narrative or social norm. It often uses storytelling, but it is a way of kind of subverting the socio-norms or the social norms. I'm sure there's other people that can describe it more succinctly. Nick Walker's work, if you're interested in the concept of neuroqueering will be a great resource. And we should add that to our notes, Patrick? PATRICK CASALE: Yeah, so it sounds like thinking about your identity from a lens where things start to blend that are no longer commonly clear, or sometimes even socially acceptable in terms of how we may have developed or how society sends messages as well.  MEGAN NEFF: Yeah, yeah.  PATRICK CASALE: I think for a lot of people identity becomes an uncomfortable conversation, in terms of like, I don't even know what my identity is, which is why so many people often default to like, "My identity is my profession, my identity is my role in the family system."  And you never really fully, truly step back and think about like, "Really, what is my identity? How do I identify? What is it made up of?" Because there are all of these different characteristics, and traits, and belief systems, and things that are important to you that create your identity.  And it's a complex conversation. And I think it's one that makes a lot of people really uncomfortable. And once you receive a diagnosis or self-diagnose, I do think you start to explore your identity through that lens. And like you said, first and foremost, like, identifying through that neurodivergent lens, and then putting these pieces together. And I think there are a lot of pieces to unpack for a lot of people. MEGAN NEFF: Yeah, so, I'll share my experience. And also, I see this experience a lot. So, my mask, right? It was all about fitting in, taking up less space, not drawing attention to myself, unless it was for my accomplishments. So, it was very tied…  It's interesting, in some ways, I was always willing to challenge social norms, but at the same time, my mask was very, like norm-driven. Like, I wanted to not draw attention to myself. And so once that got deconstructed of like, actually, all of this is kind of garbage and I'm liberated to be me, a lot of identity ripples came with that.  And I see that a lot, which I think is hard on family systems. If a person is partnered, it can be hard on the partnership. I think it's confusing for the people around the person of like, you discovered this one thing about you, but you've completely changed. But it actually makes a lot of sense when you think about going from a constricted narrative of self to an open narrative of self that is to question things. PATRICK CASALE: That's really well said. I think that's actually like hitting the nail on the head with that sentiment of going from constricted to open. And I think that what we're really trying to draw attention to is the correlation and connection between unmasking and identity, and how often they go hand in hand because when you are able to safely unmask, you are able to really start to become much more aware of the things that you enjoy, the ways that you move through the world. You no longer have to put on this facade about like, this is how I present, this is how I dress, this is how I look, this is how I speak.  So, it really can be a complete mind fuck in a lot of ways of like, okay, now that there is this openness and this understanding, that can create a lot of internal confusion too of like, "Do I even like the things that I said I liked, or used to like, or participate in?" And then you're like, "Do I even know myself?" Like, I know that I've been in that stage for, maybe last year was a place where I really was deeply in embedded and entrenched in the like, "Do I even understand what I enjoy doing for fun? Or who I enjoy spending time with?" Like, I made me question everything. MEGAN NEFF: Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. I experienced something similar. And I see that a lot. And that's part of that like social diffuse self, right? That comes with a mask of all of a sudden it's like, wait, what does bring me pleasure? What do I like? What are my preferences? Which sounds so basic and simple, but it's so complex? Yeah.  So, I'm curious, okay. We've been kind of talking up here. Let's bring it back to like our experience. How have you changed both in kind of maybe like day-to-day basic, like, what you wear? What music you listen to? But also, conceptually, how you think about yourself? Like, what identity shifts have you experienced in the last year and a half? PATRICK CASALE: I'm going to start with the easier portion of the question, which is like, how has my day-to-day changed? And I think like I've given myself permission to be open about my experiences that, you know, as an autistic ADHD human, I think that my clothing choices have changed drastically to really be sensory soothing. I definitely have started wearing more colors, too. I feel like used to be very muted. I think like very, like you said, not taking up space, not drawing attention to yourself. So, my wardrobe for so long was like black, blue, gray. And my wife was always like, "Do you want like a pattern or do you want anything?" I'm like, "No, I don't want any of that." MEGAN NEFF: We went opposite directions with clothing. I went from colorful to black. PATRICK CASALE: Yeah, I've really embraced brighter colors. And just like being more open, I think in terms of like the creative portion of myself, too. And the part of myself that really enjoys brightness and vibrance too because I think for so long, it was like very, very, very muted.  I think that, also, what else has changed? Permissions, permissions socially. Giving myself permission. I set boundaries, so say no to even not have to explain myself in social gatherings about whether or not I want to be there, whether or not I want to make eye contact, whether or not I want to participate in conversations. So, I think that a lot has changed like that, in that regard.  The more nuanced question of like, like how am I viewing myself or identity wise, I don't know, that's so complicated. I still think I'm in this phase where I'm really trying to embrace and openly like, boldly be okay with saying like, "This is who I am, and this is my identity, I am autistic." And I think that I'm just trying to be okay with taking up space because for so long, I never felt like that was something I was able to do or that I was capable of. MEGAN NEFF: I love that. There's been a lot of change in the last year and a half. PATRICK CASALE: Yeah, that's a lot change, for sure. MEGAN NEFF: How has your wife and other key people in your life responded to that change? PATRICK CASALE: My wife's been really a great support in that, in terms of like never really questioning anything. She doesn't like do a whole deep dive in terms of like, I would love for her to learn more about the autistic ADHD neuro type. I do think that she has been very supportive in my choices and like has really allowed me to say, "No, I don't want to go to this family gathering. No, I don't want to go to your friend's birthday party." Like, really being okay with that.  So, she's been easy and that's come, honestly, pretty expectedly. Friendship-wise, I think that I've noticed the more open I've been, the more communicative I've been with my friend groups, the more I've attracted the friends that are neurodivergent, that are definitely autistic ADHD or one of one of the two. And I just noticed that, you know, I definitely have lost some friendships too from just maybe their own discomfort, or ableism, or just the inability to say like, I don't want to hear about this. Like, I don't want to talk about this. MEGAN NEFF: It's become all of who you are. That's something I hear, like, people talk about the feedback they get a lot of like this has become all, like, reductionistic. People will accuse the typically autistic more so than ADHD like, "This has become all of who you are." Yeah, yeah. PATRICK CASALE: What about you? How has [CROSSTALK 00:16:02]- MEGAN NEFF: Oh, gosh. PATRICK CASALE: …shifted for you along this way of like your discovery in the last [PH 00:16:07] five years? MEGAN NEFF: I really wish like we could go back and you could, like, meet masked Megan Anna and that I can meet masked Patrick.  One, I was a lot more feminine and a lot of color. I wore, like, skirts. It's really interesting. There's something about presenting feminine to the world that was pretty baked into my mask that I'm kind of still sorting out. Very, like, high achieving. I was, you know, going through graduate program, so very people pleasing, kind of like, "Tell me what to do, I'll do it."  I rehearsed so much. So, I would probably spend hours, like, scripting and rehearsing. So, my language use, it is less scripted now. And so, even I mean, I've talked about this, when I listen to this podcasts back is really different than what would have been before.  For me, autistic discovery did lead to more exploration around gender. And I know we're going to do an episode soon on gender and sexuality, but kind of broadly, so I use she/they pronouns, and then identify, probably, a gender I think captures it most closely, I connect to some experiences. Like, I connect to the experience of being an autistic woman or the experience of being a mom, but I don't feel connected to my gender, and I now have language, or I don't feel connected to the idea of being a woman. And then I have language for that. And then the way I dress, and the energy I embody. I feel like I embody that versus the really feminine mask.  Sexuality, I've embraced my queer identity as a pansexual human. That's complicated. I'm in a, you know, hetero monogamous marriage, but even just the ability to explore what is my sexual, like, experience as a human is something that I would have had so much repression around. And like, impression management. I would say I just had a ton of impression management going all the time.  What other? Similar to you, I'm more sensory soothing. Like, cloths, everything. I go out in the world a lot less, which you know, I talk about this a lot on the podcast. So, I just don't push myself to do things that exhaust me in the same way that I used to.  I talk about mental health struggles in a way I never ever thought in my wildest dreams I would disclose. The fact that I disclose my past history with depression, suicidality, self-harm, those were things I had so much shame about, but because I now understand them, I can talk about them openly.  So, just, I would say a general openness that terrified me before, that's new. And so I mean, the idea that we even do this podcast and talk so vulnerably, like, if you had shown this to me five years ago, I would have been horrified that my future self was doing this. PATRICK CASALE: Now that your future self is present self and doing this, how is it for you to experience being open and vulnerable with the world because there are lots of people all over the world listening to you talk? MEGAN NEFF: You know, just not thinking about it is helpful. So, thanks for putting that thought in my head, Patrick.  I mean, honestly, though, I think because now it's not the Megan Anna narrative, it is a narrative that wraps into a much larger narrative, which is undiagnosed autistic adults, specifically, undiagnosed autistic women. Again, that's where I do feel attached to that experience of being an undiagnosed autistic girl growing up.  And so, it doesn't feel like I'm sharing my narrative, it feels like, you know, it's part of this tapestry of a much larger narrative. And that gives me a reason to show up vulnerably. And without that reason, and without it being part of something larger than me, yeah, there's no way in hell I could do this. PATRICK CASALE: I give you a lot of credit because I know starting out the conversation was I want to be able to drop in, and share some of this, and be more personable instead of more cognitive. I think you've really embodied that, which, you know, I think that, again, coming back to your statement of openness, you just use the word openness again. So, it really is going from that constricted, like, everything has to be really, I have to be vigilant about how I do everything. And even the things that I don't enjoy doing, I almost have to force myself through them, right?  Like, and that comes to mind for me socially up until the last couple of years. And I think that's where I always struggled the most was socially and with sense of self as most of us do. And I really think that it's allowed me to identify in a way that has just, when I think of openness, I almost think of the word permission, and I just think about permission to just be myself. And it's still a process. Like, it's not a binary process, it's not a linear process of like, identity exploration. I think I'm still trying to find that true identity that I can really exist within, feel comfortable with. And that's just a work in progress. And I think that's a constant, almost existential questioning, and like analyzing, and introspection, and really being honest with yourself about like, what do I enjoy? What do I like? What are my preferences? When something comes up, am I just people-pleasing? Am I just saying yes, to say yes because I'm so used to, like, having to show up a certain way? MEGAN NEFF: I love that. You keep going back to, like, preference, and what you like. I think starting with pleasure is so important. Just yesterday, I finally uploaded August workbook, which, oh my gosh, Patrick, I really need to rein it in. I was listening to our podcast from a few episodes ago, where I was like, "These workbooks just keep growing." This ended up being my largest workbook because it's so huge. It's 170 pages which is just, I need to rein it in.  But on the chapter on unmasking, I start with, like the number one practice is follow your pleasure. And I start with that very specifically because so many of us are dissociated from our bodies, and our pleasure, and are kind of cueing into other people's preferences. That I think is such a powerful place to start with unmasking is to follow your pleasure with curiosity because that's going to tell you a ton about yourself.  Like, for me, my unmasking, when I look back, like what was my first thing I did that was unmasking? I didn't realize it was unmasking at the time. And this feels like a silly thing to share. But I threw away, like, all of my lacy feminine underwear.  A, it's uncomfortable AF. B, I don't even know why I ever owned that shit. Like, probably because culture says women should own that kind of stuff. But I threw it away because it's really uncomfortable. And I was like, "I'm never going to wear this."  And that was a simple step of me following my sensory pleasure, my sensory preferences. And that started a whole rabbit trail of discovering both sensory delight but also gender. And so much of my identity discoveries have started by following my pleasure with curiosity. PATRICK CASALE: I love that, I love that. Especially, you know, for everyone listening, that's an easy first step for you to start examining. And again, that gives me the perception, the image. I have this image of the word permission. Like, permission to do that, permission to probably really work through like not feeling ashamed about that, for a society like creating these narratives, to have permission to say like, this is not comfortable for me, I'm not going to do this anymore.  And I think that's what we're talking about is like, and that can be simply as like, trying really, really hard to just even think about what it's like to experience a day inside and outside of your body.  Like, I think about that so often as so many of us do. And the proprioceptive and interceptive just experiences, but I am constantly thinking about, like, what it's like to even be in my body. And I don't think I've ever been so aware of that in my life. And it's almost permission to just be uncomfortable being uncomfortable. And- MEGAN NEFF: Uh-huh. PATRICK CASALE: Go ahead because you [CROSSTALK 00:25:39]- MEGAN NEFF: Oh, no, I love that, permission to be uncomfortable. How did you say it? Permission to be comfortable being uncomfortable?  PATRICK CASALE: Mm-hmm (affirmative.) MEGAN NEFF: Yeah. There's an acceptance that comes with permission that you're identifying versus resistance, which yeah, constriction resistance go together.  PATRICK CASALE: Yep, absolutely. So, it's like, I think, for me, and for so many people I've talked to the permission with being uncomfortable, like, permission being comfortable with being uncomfortable because like, I'm not going to change this discomfort, this feeling that I constantly experience for the most part, but I can at least give myself permission to be comfortable with the fact that that is my reality and that is okay.  And that has given me permission to just be like, I am uncomfortable. I'm noticing that. Like, I'm really noticing that moment by moment, I'm experiencing this feeling, or this emotion, or this sensation, and this is like, almost every day of my life. But it's okay because like, I'm not fighting so hard to change how I feel. MEGAN NEFF: Right, right, right. Yes, I have a story. I think I've shared it on this podcast before of like walking to get the mail. And instead of just like, you know, constricting my body, and like dissociating, and sprinting down to the mailbox, I let myself experience the sensory, like, elements. Let myself experience being overloaded, but with openness.  And I think this is so huge of creating space to be uncomfortable and being okay with it. I mean, it sounds a lot like mindfulness, when you talk about it kind of the way you're narrating your experience.  I had a aha moment maybe like a year ago where I was working on some mindfulness stuff. And I was like, "You know what mindfulness really is when done like this? It's a radical form of self-attunement." Which for a lot of us, we haven't accurately been attuned to by others, by the world, we haven't accurately been able to attune to ourselves because of masking. So, when we can narrate this is an uncomfortable experience for me, I am overwhelmed right now, I'm anxious right now, and when we can self-attune, that's actually pretty radical work. It sounds simple. But that's significant. PATRICK CASALE: Yeah, I agree 100%. And I will attribute a lot of this too. Like, you know, we're going to get to this in our second episode today. But a lot of you want to know, like, how do you get to this place? And a lot of it is doing your own work, a lot of it is introspection, but a lot of it has come through also just being in therapy, honestly, almost all of my life.  And the narratives have shifted, right? Speaking, again, about identity. I, maybe a couple of years ago would have went to therapy for attachment-focused work, like, relational trauma, trauma within the family system, struggles I had growing up as a child, which are all certainly related to an autistic childhood experience without a diagnosis. And I wasn't going to therapy because I was autistic at the time. Now I'm going to therapy to figure out my own neurodivergence, my own experiences as an autistic ADHD human. And I think that has shifted over time as well. And the focal point has shifted too. MEGAN NEFF: The focal point of your therapy? PATRICK CASALE: Yeah. MEGAN NEFF: Yeah, you know, I actually got this from a, I was on a podcast [PH 00:29:20] Divergent Pod and she's the one that gave me this lens, but I loved it. She talked about having the accurate lens and that's what autism diagnosis does. And I've used that language ever since. And it sounds like you bring that into your therapeutic work. You are perhaps working on the right things but not with the right lens on and now [CROSSTALK 00:29:39]- PATRICK CASALE: Exactly. MEGAN NEFF: So, work on those things but with an accurate lens, which totally changes it. PATRICK CASALE: Yeah, yep, spot on. And again, like, it doesn't change how hard the day-to-day is. I just wanted to say that too, for everyone listening. But it does give you the accurate lens and when you have the accurate lens things seem to, like, fit together easier. Like, things fall into place easier. I can make sense of things from a different perspective. And regardless of whether they are challenging or not, it allows me to at least understand them better. And for me and my brain, I need the understanding. Like, I am seeking it all the time. MEGAN NEFF: Yeah, I mean, I think, I feel like you hit on this at the beginning of our conversation, but that understanding is so foundational, especially, for a lot of autistic people, we need to understand, which is partly what can trigger that kind of huge identity crisis in the aftermath of a self-discovery, or self-diagnosis, or medical diagnosis, or however you get there.  PATRICK CASALE: However, you get there. I like that. And for those of you listening, like start with Megan's first tip. And also, I just recommend, like, when you are exploring, when you are trying to figure out what do I enjoy? What brings me pleasure? What brings me enjoyment? Double down on it, do more of it. Like, incorporate more of it into your life because we so often just default to what I think I'm supposed to do or like what I'm supposed to say yes to.  So, I just really recommend that to try to be and like Megan said, curiosity is key as well. And just being curious about your own interests and your own likes. And really, really, really trying not to shame yourself for not knowing at first because I think that's quite typical in the process, when we are starting to explore, especially, later in life, especially, if you've gone through decades of your life, you know, thinking a certain way or experiencing life in one way. MEGAN NEFF: Yeah, I love that. If I could sum it up in two words, I think I would, pleasure and play. Like, those are two things, I love how you said kind of, like, linger with the things that you enjoy. [INDISCERNIBLE 00:32:06] Winnicott who is a psychoanalytic thinker, I mean, the, okay, you don't even know who Winnicott is. He talked about play. And the way he talks about play is so fascinating. He talks about play is where culture is born, play is where identity is born, play is how a child developmentally learns who they are, play is the place of identity. And so, pleasure and play, that's where unmasking is, that's where identity discovery is. PATRICK CASALE: And one, I absolutely love that. Two, this is why identity is so complicated and so nuanced because so many of us, especially, who are late diagnosed or diagnosed in adulthood didn't have that ability to have playfulness and attunement as children. And that's why it is so, so hard to identify your identity, your likes, your dislikes as an adult when you did not have that experience in childhood and why it can be so freaking hard to drop into playfulness as an adult. MEGAN NEFF: Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. I don't know that I'll have the energy to do this anytime soon, but one project I've had in my head that I thought would be really interesting would be to go through Erickson's Stages of Identity Development, but through a neurodivergent lens to see, like, why we get stunted in certain parts more easily because of being autistic or ADHD. And I think that would actually be really interesting. I think there's a lot of ways being neurodivergent impacts our identity development, but play, like you just highlighted, being such a key one. PATRICK CASALE: Absolutely. I'm not going to hold you to that because I don't want Megan to take on more projects these days, but it's a good idea. MEGAN NEFF: You sound like my husband. He's like, "I just want you to learn how to take on less." Yeah, yeah, I need. But I mean, it would be really interesting. Someone should do it. PATRICK CASALE: All can be true. All can be true. So, this is a great wrapping-up point, I think. MEGAN NEFF: I agree, I concur.  PATRICK CASALE: You are reading the room correctly. MEGAN NEFF: You are reading the room correctly. PATRICK CASALE: Yes. So, what am I awkwardly trying to do right now? MEGAN NEFF: You're awkwardly trying to end the podcast. And then we're going to stop recording, and then we're going to record another one. But the listeners will hear it next week. PATRICK CASALE: Yes, that's it. All right. Well, thank you so much for listening to the Divergent Conversations Podcast. New episodes are out every single Friday on all major platforms and YouTube. Like, download, subscribe, and share. And goodbye.

In this episode, we dive into the concept of the "good enough mother" from the perspective of Dr Tanya Cotler, who is a Clinical Psychologist, author, and speaker specializing in reproductive mental health, infant mental health, and parent-child attachment. Tanya has studied the work of Winnicott (who is the creator of the concept of ‘the good enough mother') extensively and offers a unique lens and insight having expertise in BOTH child and adult psychology. We dive into unpacking what ‘good enough' actually means, the process of attunement mismatches and rupture-repair cycles in a child's development, and how intentional and unconscious repair contribute to building trust, resilience, and frustration tolerance in children. We centre the mother in our conversation to shift a child-focused lens, and I ask Tanya about her experience with what it's like to work with both adults and children in the context of reflecting on these theories. Tanya shares insights from her nearly 20 years of clinical and research experience, and she offers us a key takeaway we can put into practice as good enough mothers, for the benefit of both our children and ourselves. Episode show notes: https://drsophiebrock.com/podcast100 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drcotler/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/tanya.cotler Website: https://drtanyacotler.com/

"Conscience represents ethics that are not socially constructed and not socially learned but built-in. In fact, the whole of psychoanalysis is grounded in such an ethic - we all as analysts value life over death, we value truth over lies, we value love over hate, kindness over cruelty. Like those little three-month-old infants that Bloom studied at Yale, these values are grounded in our biology. They are part of what Winnicott would call our true self and they are quite distinct from the very different moral notions that wind up in our superego. After all, our superego contains our racism, it contains our sexism, it contains our heterosexism and those values are very distinct from our core values: love over hate, life over death. We all know on a fundamental level what's right and what's wrong on that very basic level, and that is the voice of conscience; we don't need God for this; it is built in biologically.”   Episode Description: Don begins by describing the difference between the narcissistically based superego from the object-oriented conscience. He sees the former as culturally derived and the latter as biologically given. We discuss how in the clinical situation persecutory guilt, i.e., superego, may often be emphasized to defend against the vulnerabilities associated with loving and being loved. We consider the use and overuse of the concept of trauma in contrast to intrapsychic conflict, and he distinguishes between empathy and sympathy. He shares his view that the edges of our political parties are imbued with the self-certainty born from the paranoid position. Ultimately, he concludes, "I'm not afraid that analysis will disappear - people who have problems with their soul will seek out soul doctors."   Our Guest: Don Carveth, Ph.D., is an emeritus professor of sociology and social and political thought at York University in Toronto. He is a training and supervising analyst in the Canadian Institute of Psychoanalysis, a past Director of the Toronto Institute, and past editor-in-chief of the Canadian Journal of Psychoanalysis. He is the author of The Still Small Voice: Psychoanalytic Reflections on Guilt and Conscience, Psychoanalytic Thinking: A Dialectical Critique of Contemporary Theory and Practice, and Guilt: A Contemporary Introduction. Many of his publications are available on his York website (yorku.ca/dcarveth) and his current website (doncarveth.com); his video lectures are available on his YouTube channel (YouTube.com/doncarveth). He is in private psychoanalytic practice in Toronto.   Recommended Readings: Carveth, D. (2016). Why we should stop conflating the superego with the conscience. Psychoanalysis, Culture & Society(2017) 22, 15-32.   Carveth, D.(2023). Guilt: A Contemporary Introduction. New York: Routledge.   Carveth, D. (2006).  Self-Punishment as Guilt Evasion: Theoretical Issues." Canadian Journal of Psychoanalysis/Revue Canadienne de Psychanalyse 14, 2 (Fall2006): 172-96.  

Author's Note: This writing was adapted from a series of conversations around race in America and edited as audio, recorded in 2020.   The podcast of this writing is the real thing, as it were.  What follows as text is edited to clarify the narrators, absent the audio.  Please consider following the podcast associated with this newsletter and leaving a 5-star review on Spotify or Apple Podcasts. Please subscribe to support high-impact content like this.The author, David Foster Wallace, described the experience of reading his novel Infinite Jest as intended to feel “tornadic,” like you're in the middle of a tornado. That's what the last several weeks have felt like.Protesters:"Racist ass police! No justice, no peace! F**k these racist ass police! No justice, no peace!""F**k these racist ass police!"Owen Muir, M.D.:I originally tried making this episode some linear narrative, and it just wasn't happening. So, welcome to the tornado of racism in America. Buckle up.George Floyd spent 8 minutes and 46 seconds gasping for breath.  Police officers, some of whom were very experienced, knelt on his back...until he didn't breathe anymore. As a psychiatrist, I often emphasize how the words we use to describe someone's death have meaning. So, I'll say, you know, completed suicide, not commit. And George Floyd was lynched.Welcome. This is about anxiety, uncertainty, and existential despair. And I recorded the narration in one take because I wasn't, like, going to get it right a second time. So much of what we say about race is calculated, polite, and wrong. So I'm not going to try to do that tonight.Here we go.Sequoiah:"Yeah. My general reaction to all this is a little more, a little more extended. The, uh, f**k".Owen Muir, M.D.:That's my teammate. She is a TMS technician at the mental health practice we worked at together. She also works in the community with patients helping put their lives together, but tonight she's a field reporter on the revolution.Sequoiah:"I am a TMS tech, Winnicott coach, and black woman. Which seems very important right now. George Floyd, Say His Name.  George Floyd, Say his Name.So I just got home from a protest in Flatbush. Police would not let us pass. We were chanting with our hands up. And after a while, they decided to push the line backward. We resisted—we stood there with our hands up. They pushed us and pushed us, and when we wouldn't..."Owen:Now, as someone with a lot of white privilege, I'm outraged at hearing this, like, wow, this is fucked up. So I called another colleague in the special operations community, and I'm not using names in this episode for semi-obvious reasons, and I heard what he had to say.Master Sergent:“The things that U. S. police forces are apparently fully within their legal rights to do, like, use tear gas, would literally have…been against the Geneva Conventions. It's an actual war crime. We cannot gas a civilian population.”Owen Muir, M.D.:The person I'm interviewing has over a decade of experience in the special operations community. He has fought and killed for our right to do what my other colleagues were in the street doing, peacefully protesting.Master Sergent:"This is a perversion of what the United States stands for. We invade countries who treat their people the way that our police forces are on camera treating Americans "Sequoiah:"People started to back up, , and run and they then started to hit us with batons. , I fell. And then we reformed the line."Master Sergent:"It's disgusting in a lot of ways."Owen Muir, M.D.:So when someone whose life has been dedicated to protecting our freedoms tells me they're upset with what they're seeing, I take that pretty seriously.Sequoiah:"Well, the other night, well, last night, when the cops and protestors were getting into, into fights and they were trying to, the cops were trying to push back the protestors, I saw them bring out the batons and, like, start attacking people...and each time they'd tell us to back up and back up and kept pushing us and pushing us. And finally, there was a frustration in the air, and people started to act out."Owen Muir, M.D.:Now, as a psychiatrist, my life has been saved by police officers on more than one occasion. I have been physically attacked in hospital settings.  The police have been called, and I have not died, and my colleagues have not died thanks to them. And this is Flatbush, Brooklyn, New York, and these people are black people. The Flatbush, at least the area I was in, is a predominantly black neighborhood.  So, look, Americans love the police.  They are a highly regarded part of society by many people, but that's not the experience for black America I have learned.Master Sergent:“There are many things you can do in that spectrum that don't involve actively using force against a human being, which makes the process easier across the board. If I don't have to hurt somebody, the only thing that is hurting another person does for me is further endanger my Troops. "Owen Muir, M.D.:Now this makes sense to me because, having run the show in a psychiatric emergency department, where I have to protect myself, other patients, and violent people themselves from getting hurt, sometimes we use violence, but oftentimes we don't.Master Sergent:"What started this particular instance has been four cops lynched George Floyd. One guy put his knee on the man. We don't do that to terrorists actively trying to kill us. ""George Floyd, Say His Name."Sequoiah:"It was at that point that they called in more backup and started to attack and arrest groups of gathered people from the neighborhood.”Owen Muir, M.D.:Police officers, when they're called to stand trial for the use of force, have a standard called a reasonable officer standard.I feel like I have to make it relevant for me--a white person—to watch humans being murdered by police and then people killing each other in the streets about it. There was an article I read about six months ago about yet another person being slammed to the ground, handcuffed behind their back, and suffocated to death by the police. I was shocked..that the person was white. Until I read several paragraphs down that he had schizophrenia. Oh, that's what made it okay. Reasonable officers can only be judged based on what someone would do in that moment of terror when they have to decide to use force.Sequoiah:"I was so emotionally spent and so exhausted. And then we saw marauding bands of police officers going down the street, just telling people to go home and attacking groups of people on the street.”"George Floyd, Say His Name.  George Floyd, Say His Name."Owen Muir, M.D.:Police officers are represented by unions. Those unions have spent 20 years bargaining for lack of accountability to protect, in their minds, their members. This means police officers have the right to huddle and discuss their stories before speaking to prosecutors. It means many other things.  But importantly, whenever any officer stands trial, the jury is instructed, per Chief Justice Rehnquist, to not use the benefit of 20/20 hindsight in judging their actions, but only what a reasonable, that is, terrified person, would do at the moment.Master Sergent:"We have an entire job in the US military to validate whether or not we killed someone the right way."Owen Muir, M.D.:The court system is what's supposed to do that for police officers. But it doesn't; it just says, eh, it's okay.Master Sergent:"That's an actual thing; we have entire organizational structures dedicated to the legality of murder,"Owen Muir, M.D.:Killing black or brown people in America, if you're a police officer, has literally never been ruled against the law. Ever.Master Sergent:"To not call it murder, to call it, to call it killing combatants, that's what a JAG does. Overseas, when they're deployed, they tell you whether or not you can kill this person. And sometimes, even though we can kill someone, we don't because they have a much higher value as an intelligence asset. Or for any number of other reasons. Or they're not actively shooting at us when we go get them. That happens a ton. Because sometimes when you see 20 or 30 goons show up outside your house, breach your door with a shotgun round, rush in, and then point all their guns at you, you won't fight back. And then, okay, well, he's not shooting back at us, so we're going to take him in, and then... "Owen Muir, M.D.:You don't get to kill someone. In the U. S. military. Deployed in the field. In Afghanistan. Even if someone's a terrorist, if they're not pointing a gun at you and about to pull the goddamn trigger.“Cause one of the things I don't want to do is vilify police officers. And, and ...”Master Sergent:"I mean, Owen, to be perfectly honest with you,  You may not want to vilify police officers, but the things I've seen police officers do in the past week while they know they're being recorded are actively the actions of villains."Owen Muir, M.D.:This hit me like a ton of bricks. This is not okay, but when people call for help, and the police arrive, they deal with a crisis. A lot of those crises involve people with mental illness, and police officers are being asked to do a thing that like is a whole medical specialty. Like, I'm a psychiatrist. It was 45 000 hours of training to learn how to calm people down when upset and have experiences we don't have access to. And, if you're called to the scene of a crisis, and someone's acting in a really strange and scary way, and you have a gun. You've been told to protect yourself, don't let yourself get hurt or let this person harm you, and you know nothing bad will happen to you if you pull that trigger. You're going to pull that trigger.  More often than not. And that's about a thousand times a year. You're about... God knows it doesn't even matter. The percentage of time you're more likely to be killed if you're black and mentally ill. The fact that we have a statistic for that is fucked up enough. Help isn't helpful for black America. And that's just a fact of life.”Master Sergent:"You know, I have friends in New York who are talking about the cruelty they see in these police officers' eyes. And what's worse, what's truly evil about this whole system is even in the throes of this violence, they're exhibiting racist and preferential behaviors towards white protesters versus black protesters. Or brown protesters. They're active, you know, taking it easier on white people because they're white. "Owen Muir, M.D.:And this is just f*****g killing me at this point. Ugh. Look, what's happening in the streets is not okay. It's not been okay for hundreds of years. And police officers are part of a system designed to keep order, and order used to mean slaves. That's just why they're there.Master Sergent:"Things I don't even f*****g think about, man. Like, I'll go for a run or a rock at night. And I'll, I'll like, sometimes I'll go on my own, but if I don't go earlier, like, T. is like, well, I guess I'll go for a run. Like, one day, I just asked, like, why do you only run with me? Why do you only run with me? And she's like, well, it depends. We're in a quiet neighborhood in Florida, and I'm a black woman like I'm; there's a bunch of Trump signs everywhere like I'm not going running on my own. I was like, wow, yeah, I've never even thought along those lines; I don't question my safety when I go places. I'm hyper-vigilant for a lot of other reasons, but like, there's never a question in my mind, like if someone attacks me, it's not, it's an unexpected event, I'm not expecting, That at any moment, someone might attack me for the color of my skin. Because I'm in the neighborhood."William Osei, M.D.:"Hey, I'm Dr. Will Osei.I am a postdoctoral fellow, an African American psychologist living in Bedstuy, Brooklyn. " Owen Muir, M.D.:Dr. Osei is a scholar of racism and multiculturalism.And helped me explain what it's like for the black kids I've treated at Bellevue all these years.William Osei, M.D.:"The average African American, this is like... This is a fact. This is not a revelation because we now have better cell phone coverage of these crimes. I remember being in Cleveland the day following Tamir Rice being murdered in the playground. And I was working with 12-year-old boys in the Cleveland school district. And I was devastated that day, and I went into that school expecting those boys to be devastated that their schoolmate, a kid they used to play with at the playground, was just murdered. And to them, it was nothing. It was more shocking because they knew a dozen people that the police had murdered. They knew that was just the latest murder that year. It just happened to be one that rose to the national conversation, but in Cleveland that year, there were probably 30, 50 police shootings.Owen Muir, M.D.:My level of outrage at watching all of this. That's privilege too.William Osei, M.D.:"Yes. "Owen Muir, M.D.:Because to understand this as anything other than the rules of engagement would be a misunderstanding.  For a long time, Black America has known to watch out when you talk to the cops because they can kill you. Nothing's going to stop them if they want to. And they do. On camera. A thousand other times every year. And I wish it were as easy as saying it was a couple or even a lot of bad apples, but that is insufficient.Master Sergent:"As far as privilege goes, I'm a combat veteran in the Ivy League. I'm an Arab Jew, but I look white enough that no one asks that question. I wear a suit, and you can't see my tattoos. And I... I can fit in anywhere from West Hampton to the slums of Bangladesh. Like, I'm good. You know what I mean? I have levels of privilege that people use to run for the presidency."Owen Muir, M.D.:But the magic of America is that white privilege runs out as soon as power wants it to. My colleague's married to a black woman.Master Sergent:"And a huge part of this is like... It's the knowledge that I'm married to a black woman. My kids will be black, and this is like their plight. "Owen Muir, M.D.:Usually, we'd have credits now. Instead, I'm going to read these names.George Floyd, Ahmad Arbery, Brianna Taylor, Trayvon Martin, Eric Garner, Iyanna Jones. Freddie Gray, Michael Brown, Sandra Land, Walter Scott, and a kid on a playground in Cleveland named Tamir Rice. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thefrontierpsychiatrists.substack.com/subscribe