What does it mean to be good?
It’s a little word that carries a lot of weight for many of us. Be a good girl. Be a good friend. Be a good leader. Do good.
Good can sound like praise, but become a cage of expectations and shoulds, a performance that chips away at our authenticity. Good is no longer something we are, but is how others see us. It leads us to people please and keep the peace at all costs. And that’s especially true for women.
All too often, when women are in leadership, their goodness is measured by how they make others feel–good, comfortable, understood. All of that matters. But when the measure of leadership becomes how comfortable other people feel around us, we lose something essential.
We perform and manage emotions instead of building trust and respect. We seek to be liked and to fit in at the cost of real integrity and effectiveness. And likability is oh-so fleeting.
Respect, integrity, and true belonging take time and discomfort to build, but they last.
My guest today has written beautifully and bravely about the cost of being good, the truth of belonging, and the courage it takes to lead ourselves and others through discomfort.
Elise Loehnen is the New York Times bestselling author of On Our Best Behavior: The Seven Deadly Sins and the Price Women Pay to be Good and the host of the podcast, Pulling the Thread, where she interviews cultural luminaries about the big questions of today, including people like Joy Harjo, John and Julie Gottman, Dr. Gabor Maté, and Esther Perel. In addition to On Our Best Behavior, she is the author of a corresponding workbook—Choosing Wholeness Over Goodness—with coach Courtney Smith (July 2025), and the co-author of True & False Magic, with legendary psychiatrist Phil Stutz. Elise lives in Los Angeles with her husband, Rob, and their sons, Max and Sam.
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We live in an age where truth twists into confusion, opinion drowns out data, and it’s increasingly difficult to figure out whose expertise we can trust.
Where did our mistrust in expertise come from? Its roots stretch back to deliberate misinformation campaigns beginning in the 1950s spread by the likes of Big Tobacco, Big Oil, and conservative church movements. Then social media poured gasoline on the fire, accelerating the spread of misinformation and making sowing division highly profitable.
Misinformation campaigns take advantage of our brains’ natural tendency to protect the familiar and mistrust outgroups. And they capitalize on the very real betrayals people have experienced at the hands of corporations, governments, schools, and healthcare systems.
Our challenge now isn’t just knowing the facts, it’s interrogating our own beliefs, asking where our evidence comes from, and resisting the pull of certainty. As leaders, we need to discern who we give our attention to, practice critical thinking, resist manufactured controversy, and platform voices committed to both truth and connection.
Today’s guest is a neuroscientist and author of Why Brains Need Friends, who works to make science accessible, relational, and rooted in respect. He doesn’t focus on winning arguments or shaming people into submission. He focuses on bridging divides, building trust, and reminding us that our brains–and our lives–are wired for connection.
Ben Rein, PhD is an award-winning neuroscientist and science communicator. He serves as the Chief Science Officer of the Mind Science Foundation, an Adjunct Lecturer at Stanford University, and a Clinical Assistant Professor at SUNY Buffalo. He has published over 20 peer-reviewed papers on the neuroscience of social behavior, and is the author of Why Brains Need Friends: The Neuroscience of Social Connection. In addition, Rein educates an audience of more than 1 million social media followers and has been featured on outlets including Entertainment Tonight, Good Morning America and StarTalk with Neil DeGrasse Tyson. He has received awards for his science communication from the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine, the Society for Neuroscience, and elsewhere.
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Have you ever thought of being an amateur as a good thing?
Many of us learned from an early age that our worth was tied to excelling at what we do and turning it into something productive. And many leaders carry the belief that they must be certain, skilled, and polished at all times.
But what if the exact opposite were true?
When we allow ourselves to dabble, to be amateurs, to be just okay at things, our brains literally become more adaptable and our nervous systems learn to stay grounded in the midst of risk, uncertainty, and vulnerability. Just as importantly, leaders who model dabbling create spaces where families, teams, and communities are safe to embrace curiosity and exploration.
Resilient leadership requires us to meet high-stakes challenges with adaptability, grounded presence, and compassion. Intentional amateurship prepares us for life’s curveballs by building those skills in low-stakes settings.
Today’s guest returns to make the case for being a dabbler as a practice of freedom, resilience, and leadership. She shows us how choosing to play, experiment, and simply try expands our capacity for presence and courage.
Karen Walrond is an award-winning author, speaker, and leadership coach on a mission to create a kindness revolution.
Her books encourage readers to identify their values and inner light and use them to make the world brighter for others. Audiences around the world have left her keynotes inspired with hope and a renewed determination to serve. And her one-on-one leadership coaching sessions, workshops and retreats, rooted in the tenets of positive psychology coaching, have helped hundreds of clients unearth their gifts and past triumphs to lead with confidence, compassion and kindness.
Karen and her family split their time between Houston, Texas, USA and Bath, Somerset, UK.
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We’ve all had bad bosses.
We might have even been one. At the very least, we’ve probably let people down who counted on us.
We all carry burdens from our past that show up in how we lead. And we’re all confronting systems that foster toxic workplace cultures where overwork and blurred boundaries are the norm, spaces that don’t feel safe or generative, and where there is little to no accountability.
The question we face is simple, but urgent: How do we want to lead?
Our leadership can reinforce toxic systems and norms. Or we can learn to recognize our own burdens and do the work to become more aware, adaptable, and flexible. We can create spaces where people feel seen, heard, and valued, even when systems feel unstable or unfair.
Because leading is about deciding, in every moment, whether we respond from our burdens or from our values.
And my guest today helps us reflect on those choices and decide how we want to lead through her own lived experiences with bad bosses.
Mita Mallick is a Wall Street Journal and USA Today bestselling author who is on a mission to fix what’s broken in our workplaces. She’s a corporate change maker with a track record of transforming businesses and has had an extensive career as a marketing and human resources executive.
Mallick is a highly sought-after speaker who has advised Fortune 500 companies and start-ups alike. She is a LinkedIn Top Voice and was named to the Thinkers 50 Radar List. She’s a contributor to Harvard Business Review, Fast Company, Adweek, and Entrepreneur. Mallick has been featured in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, Time Magazine, Forbes, Axios, Essence, Cosmopolitan Magazine and Business Insider.
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How we care for ourselves is inextricably connected to how we lead.
In a culture where we moralize health and sell wellness as a symbol of worth, where we’re obsessed with productivity and optimization, our relationships with food and our bodies go beyond personal struggles.
They shape how we lead, how we show up for others, and how we define success. When leaders model extreme routines, restrictive regimens, or performance-based wellness, they may unintentionally perpetuate shame and comparison–even if they intend to inspire or be helpful.
This isn’t a dismissal of health. Caring for our bodies, feeding ourselves well, and seeking movement that feels good and helps our bodies be strong are powerful acts of self-respect.
But when an obsession with performance and purity–whether through hustle culture or “clean” living–erodes our self-trust and amplifies our inner critics, it becomes a leadership issue.
Today’s guest is an eating disorder specialist who understands how shame, perfectionism, and chronic striving get tangled up in how we feed and care for ourselves, and how we show up in the world. Unburdening our relationship with food and body isn’t just about health; it’s a powerful leadership move.
As a clinical psychologist, Dr. Jeanne Catanzaro has specialized in treating eating issues and trauma for close to 30 years. She trained in psychodynamic psychotherapy, Somatic Experiencing and Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) before discovering the Internal Family Systems (IFS) model. Dr. Catanzaro served as the director of a day treatment program for eating disorders for two years and is currently the Vice President of the Internal Family Systems Institute. She is the author of the book, Unburdened Eating: Healing Your Relationships with Food and Your Body Using an Internal Family Systems Approach.
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What does it take to lead when your story becomes the story, and the stakes are survival and justice?
When you’ve experienced relational trauma or institutional betrayal, as Judith Herman wrote in Trauma and Recovery, “The ordinary response to atrocities is to banish them from consciousness.”
But silence protects systems, not survivors.
When we do speak up, at best we’re often told to move on, and at worst we might face violent pushback. The stress and fear from the blowback can all too easily silence us and chip away at our integrity and adaptability if we don’t do the important work to address the toll it takes.
But when we give ourselves permission to feel the overwhelm, and still take one step forward, we shift from silence into action. Sometimes that step is public and loud. Sometimes it's private and steady. All of it counts. There is no one right way to advocate for change.
My guest today did more than just share her story; she used it to create meaningful change in her home state of Texas. In this conversation, we discuss what it means to bear the weight of your trauma while advocating for others, the emotional toll of being a public face for change, and what it looks like to keep showing up, even when the system makes it difficult.
Summer Willis is an endurance athlete, advocate, and mother of two who ran 29 marathons in a year to raise awareness for sexual assault survivors. She is the namesake of the Summer Willis Act, landmark consent legislation passed in Texas. Through storytelling, extreme challenges, and her nonprofit Strength Through Strides, she empowers others to turn pain into purpose.
Content note: discussion of sexual assault
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What do you care about these days?
Caring is the currency of leadership, but here’s the paradox: when we care too much about too many things, we can lose sight of the things that truly matter.
So the question is: How do you direct your energy toward what you value, without becoming overwhelmed by the sheer volume of things you could care about?
The most effective leaders are those who can connect deeply with their teams, foster trust, and create a sense of safety and belonging. They lead with empathy, not just strategy.
But perfectionism and overfunctioning can lead us to feel like we need to be everything to everyone, at the expense of our well-being and, ultimately, the quality of our leadership.
For many of us, the path to effective leadership begins with finding your enough. When you shift your lens to honoring your enough, you stay connected to your values and to the people and causes that matter most to you, without tipping into exhaustion.
My guest today offers a model of what it’s like to care deeply without losing yourself in the process, and of finding joy and community along the way.
Ashlee Piper is a sustainability expert, commentator, and speaker whose work has been widely featured on television and in print media. She is the author of Give a Sh*t: Do Good. Live Better. Save the Planet. and No New Things: A Radically Simple 30-Day Guide to Saving Money, the Planet, and Your Sanity.
Piper has spoken at the United Nations, SXSW, and has a popular TED talk. She is the creator of the #NoNewThings Challenge, for which she received a 2022 Silver Stevie Award for Female Innovator of the Year, and is a professor of sustainability marketing. She holds a BA from Brown University and a master’s degree from the University of Oxford. She lives in Chicago in a home that’s 98 percent secondhand and can often be found singing Seal’s “Kiss from a Rose” at any not-so-fine karaoke establishment.
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We persist for what matters most—for the people we lead, and the people we love.
But persistence can start to feel like just another weight to carry, another demand that drains us.
And people are tired. So many of us are balancing caregiving, leadership, advocacy, a constant firehose of urgent crises, and maybe sneaking in some rest. So sure, persistence sounds good, but how do we keep going without flaming out?
We learn how to prune our proverbial gardens.
Pruning, whether a tomato plant or an out-of-control to-do list, requires focusing on the present so we can remove what no longer serves, while protecting what still has life in it. It’s persistence in action. It’s what keeps us from burning it all down and walking away or from our commitments taking over our lives.
Today’s guest offers us a masterclass in persistence. She started small. When resistance showed up, she didn’t just push through. She revisited her vision. She stayed in relationship with mentors and worked in community. And over time, she has built a global movement for disability, visibility, equity, and justice.
On today’s 35th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act, Tiffany Yu shares a reminder that persistence isn’t about doing it all right away or quitting when it’s too much. It’s about staying focused, refining our vision, and staying connected to supportive people and your mission.
Tiffany Yu is the CEO and Founder of Diversability, a 3x TEDx speaker, and the author of The Anti-Ableist Manifesto: Smashing Stereotypes, Forging Change, and Building a Disability-Inclusive World. She started her career at Goldman Sachs and was named to the 2025 Forbes Accessibility 100 List. At the age of 9, Tiffany became disabled as a result of a car accident that also took the life of her father.
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How do we lead in the face of fear, when the stakes feel sky high and relentlessly personal?
The realities of political violence, hostility, and burnout shape how we show up. And they can chip away at your generous heart, opening the path for cynicism and doubt.
But if we can focus on what matters most, feel through our emotions–and help others do the same–and orient our gaze forward to the vision of our lives, work, and world that we want, we create an energy that cynicism can’t easily break down, even through setbacks.
We need to protect our hope and conviction that change is possible. The future is not a done deal. We have choices about how it unfolds.
In this Unburdened Leader conversation, we explore what it takes to lead with clarity, protect our capacity, and still believe that change is possible, even when everything around us tries to tell us otherwise.
Amanda Litman is the cofounder and president of Run for Something, which recruits and supports young, diverse leaders running for local office. Since 2017, they’ve launched the careers of thousands of millennials and Gen Z candidates and in the process, changed what leadership looks like in America. She’s the author of two books: When We’re In Charge: The Next Generation’s Guide to Leadership and Run for Something: A Real-Talk Guide to Fixing the System Yourself, a how-to manual for people running for office.
Before launching Run for Something, Amanda worked on multiple presidential and statewide political campaigns. She graduated from Northwestern University and lives in Brooklyn with her husband, two daughters, and their sometimes rowdy dog.
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Nostalgia can be a balm. Especially when we’re in what feels like a never-ending season of upheaval and change, where every time we start to get our footing, something shifts yet again.
When we’re in the throes of change–in the liminal space, the in-between, the in-betwixt–we as human beings are neurologically wired to seek out what’s known, to reach for comfort and what feels like home. And nostalgia does that for us. It’s no wonder we look back fondly on simpler times, real or imagined.
Because nostalgia isn’t necessarily the truth. And nostalgia doesn’t always serve our growth. Connecting over “Remember when?” can too easily divide us when it becomes a rigid longing for a past that excludes and harms others or ignores painful truths.
So many of us are living and leading in the confusion, disorientation, and discomfort of these liminal spaces of change. Which is why I invited today’s guest to join me for a conversation about the pulls of nostalgia, the discomfort of liminal space, and the courage it takes to lead ourselves and others through uncertainty without losing our way.
Chris Hoff, PhD, LMFT is a narrative therapist, educator, podcaster, and founder of the California Family Institute. His work explores the intersection of psychotherapy, poststructural theory, and speculative futures. Chris is known for his ability to translate complex ideas into pragmatic tools for clients and clinicians alike. He is the host of The Radical Therapist Podcast and co-editor of An Encyclopedia of Radical Helping. Chris’s teaching, writing, and consulting center the creative, relational, and political dimensions of healing and change.
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When you hear the word, feedback, what comes up for you?
Most of us do not have a neutral relationship with feedback. It’s tangled up with our past experiences, workplace power dynamics, cultural expectations, and–importantly–our early relational wounds.
But at its core, feedback is a deeply relational act that has the power to help us unburden rather than re-wound.
Which is why it’s so frustrating that feedback in leadership and workplace culture is so often done without care, rendering the process performative, detached, and isolating.
Some of the constraints that can hamper authentic feedback in the workplace are necessary and protective, but it feels like we’ve lost the plot for the role and purpose of feedback, and in some cases, have abandoned it altogether.
But it is possible to navigate these complex systems intentionally and with clarity. We can make feedback a tool for accountability, care, and growth that helps leaders strengthen their self-awareness and be better advocates for their teams.
My guest today helps us unpack how leaders can cultivate a feedback culture that allows for mistakes, growth, and realignment.
Therese Huston, Ph.D., is a Cognitive Neuroscientist and Faculty Development Consultant at Seattle University. She was the founding director of the university’s Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning and is now a consultant for its Center for Faculty Development. Her latest book Sharp: 14 Simple Ways to Improve Your Life with Brain Science is out now from Mayo Clinic Press.
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The leaders I work with want to be the kind of leaders who can handle complexity without defaulting to blame, shame, or shutting down.
But when visibility and accountability collide with unhealed relational wounding, it doesn’t matter how many books we’ve read or retreats we’ve attended; our bodies remember. And it can feel deeply uncomfortable.
Discomfort is part of the gig, though. If we let it, it moves us towards being better humans to ourselves and others. True accountability may not always lead to repair and reconnection, but it is a profoundly relational and humanizing practice led by values, justice, and grace.
But when discomfort turns to shame, accountability feels threatening rather than connective. And when we fear accountability and its discomfort, it causes more harm.
The work of unburdening is never entirely over, but as Dr. Richard Schwartz reminded me in today’s fifth anniversary conversation, the more unburdened we are, the more accountable we become. The more we desire justice. The more we want to see change.
It’s a powerful affirmation of what’s possible when we commit to being Unburdened Leaders.
Richard Schwartz began his career as a systemic family therapist and an academic. Grounded in systems thinking, Dr. Schwartz developed Internal Family Systems (IFS) in response to clients’ descriptions of various parts within themselves. He focused on the relationships among these parts and noticed that there were systemic patterns to the way they were organized across clients. He also found that when the clients’ parts felt safe and were allowed to relax, the clients would spontaneously experience the qualities of confidence, openness, and compassion that Dr. Schwartz came to call the Self. He found that when in that state of Self, clients would know how to heal their parts.
A featured speaker for national professional organizations, Dr. Schwartz has published many books and over fifty articles about IFS.
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Fear of the unfamiliar is a powerful force.
And when it comes to autism, we don’t only have a knowledge problem, we have a courage problem.
We’ve all seen or experienced the harm that comes with labels, bullying, and social exclusion.
But reflexively protecting ourselves keeps us locked in a cycle of ignoring the need for real education beyond tropes or inspiration porn and keeps us from normalizing the varied needs and supports for autistics instead of perpetuating these supports as burdens or flaws.
So, how can we, as leaders, challenge ourselves to create a world where everyone is welcome—even those who don’t fit the mold?
We invite autistic voices to the table and platform them in the spaces we live, work, and lead. And we face our fears and discomforts, without getting bogged down with perfectionism and focusing on simply doing the next right thing.
When our director of Health and Human Services is using his position to spread narratives about autistic people that are not only inaccurate, but dangerous, we have to embrace and speak up for inclusion. Inclusion isn’t always easy or efficient, but it makes us more prosperous as a community, and courage grows becomes a contagion.
Today’s conversation will help you consider how we can move past toxic, dehumanizing views about autistic people and start leading with more compassion and understanding.
Eric Garcia is the senior Washington correspondent for The Independent who authors its Inside Washington newsletter. He is also a columnist for MSNBC and the author of We're Not Broken: Changing the Autism Conversation. He previously worked at The Washington Post, The Hill, Roll Call, National Journal, and MarketWatch.
Meg Raby is an autistic female, children’s author of the My Brother Otto series, Speech Language Pathologist, writer for Scary Mommy and full time employee of the nation’s leading nonprofit in sensory inclusion, KultureCity. At any given moment, Meg is thinking about how to better love on the humans around her and how to create positive change without causing division.
Content note: Brief, non-descriptive mentions of suicide
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We often hear the advice, “You just need to find your community.”
It sounds simple. Hopeful, even. But it can ring hollow for anyone who has tried to do it, and for those in leadership roles where they carry the additional burdens of responsibility and visibility. And it’s especially fraught advice for anyone who has experienced relational trauma.
Because true community isn’t something you stumble into. It has to be built, slowly and intentionally. And it’s often uncomfortable and messy when we’re healing from experiences where reaching for connection resulted in hurt and betrayal.
But human beings are wired for connection. We long for it. And we’re more disconnected from each other than ever.
The remedy for our loneliness is in the slow, awkward, sacred work of showing up and staying, even through discomfort and disagreement. If we lay foundations of shared dignity and respect, we can build courageously honest relationships and community in those uncomfortable spaces.
My guest today joins me to explore the intricate journey of building a true community, one that transcends buzzwords and embraces the courage to be vulnerable and honest, to disagree, repair, and stay genuinely connected.
Charles Vogl is an adviser, speaker, and the author of three books, including the international bestseller The Art of Community.
His work is used to advise and develop leadership and programs worldwide within organizations including Google, Airbnb, LinkedIn, Twitch, Amazon, ServiceNow, Meetup.com, Wayfair and the US Army.
Charles holds an M.Div. from Yale, where he studied spiritual traditions, ethics, and business as a Jesse Ball duPont Foundation scholar.
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Many things we once widely accepted as true and considered non-controversial galvanize intense debates.
Leaders are often advised to stay neutral, to not get political when these issues come up in their organizations.
Of course leaders should be mindful of what they discuss, how, and with whom. But that isn’t the same as being apolitical or neutral. In fact, our collective discomfort with being political often has less to do with neutrality and more to do with avoiding discomfort or even silencing conversations outright.
When leaders stifle discussions because they fear losing control, that’s not neutrality, that’s avoidance. And avoidance doesn’t make a space safe; it makes it fragile.
As leaders of teams from different backgrounds, lived experiences, and viewpoints, it is neither responsible nor possible to be truly neutral. But what we can do is create cultures of openness, generosity, and meaningful discussion. And in a time when science, health, food security, education, and mental well-being are being politicized, it’s essential.
In the second part of this series on science communication, my guest is an incredible leader, scientist, and science communicator. She shares critical reflections on what we can do to fight misinformation, regardless of our training and expertise.
Jessica Steier, DrPH, PMP is a public health scientist, advocate, science communicator, and Co-Founder and CEO of Unbiased Science. She is driven by a mission to bridge divides and foster trust through empathetic, evidence-based communication. As the founder of the Unbiased Science podcast and newsletter, she is committed to breaking free from echo chambers and tackling health and science literacy with clarity and compassion. Dr. Steier specializes in evaluation science, leveraging data and storytelling to inform health policy and program improvement. Her work focuses on building connections, encouraging dialogue, and making complex scientific concepts accessible to diverse audiences.
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The issues at stake—our health, our rights, how we educate our kids—demand a lot from us. Yet, in today’s attention economy, leaders don’t always earn influence through integrity and truth. Instead, they master the art of capturing emotions, feeding fears, and speaking to lived experiences, often amplifying misinformation rather than challenging it.
When leaders step into the fight against misinformation, they take on enormous risks and the consequences are very real, from open hostility to verbal abuse to death threats.
Staying engaged in these difficult conversations requires more than just knowledge; it demands emotional regulation, capacity for conflict, and self-awareness.
This is where unprocessed relational trauma can shape how a leader navigates conflict. But leaders who work through these wounds develop the ability to hold tension without collapsing or attacking.
Developing this capacity for conflict is critical today. Because in an era when science is under siege, how we engage in conflict matters just as much as the facts themselves.
In the first of two conversations with leaders who model how to engage with critics without feeding the outrage machine, today’s guest shares his approach to tackling conflict and misinformation in science and health spaces, one where we engage with rigor and compassion without bending to the pressures of false equivalence. He understands that courage isn’t about shouting the loudest; it’s about staying grounded in your values, standing firm in the truth, and being authentic and creative in capturing much-coveted attention.
Dr. Jonathan N. Stea is a full-time practicing clinical psychologist and an adjunct assistant professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Calgary. He’s a two-time winner of the University of Calgary’s Award for Excellence in Clinical Supervision and co-editor of the book Investigating Clinical Psychology: Pseudoscience, Fringe Science, and Controversies. Dr. Stea has published extensively, with regular contributions to Scientific American and Psychology Today, among other outlets, and has appeared on numerous mainstream television and radio shows, as well as podcasts.
His book, Mind the Science: Saving Your Mental Health from the Wellness Industry, aims to educate and embolden those who wish to make informed decisions about their mental health, to improve science and mental health literacy, and to pull back the curtain on the devastating consequences of allowing pseudoscience promoters to target the vulnerable within our society.
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Given our political situation in the United States, you may be hearing a lot of people–myself included–talk about living your values. Not just professing them, but really living them, even when it’s uncomfortable. It’s hard work that requires a lot of internal fortitude.
But we so often default to acting against our values in order to protect ourselves and those we love from real or perceived danger–to our jobs, our reputations, dignity, physical safety, and more. We try to protect ourselves with compliance, while our silence does real harm to others.
Those who have a history of relational trauma are especially likely to fear speaking up, even as they know their values and moral expectations are being violated. This collision of relational trauma with moral injury reinforces beliefs that the world is unsafe and that people in power cannot be trusted.
My guest today is a survivor of abuse and cultish communities. She leans on her experiences of relational trauma and moral injury in her writing, teaching, and advocacy. The ongoing healing of her relational and betrayal wounds allows her to lead with courage and clarity, especially when it is not easy or convenient.
Jamie Marich, Ph.D. (she/they) speaks internationally on EMDR therapy, trauma, addiction, dissociation, expressive arts, yoga, and mindfulness. They also run a private practice and online training network in their home base of Akron, OH. Marich has written numerous books, notably Trauma and the 12 Steps: An Inclusive Guide to Recovery and Dissociation Made Simple: A Stigma-Free Guide to Embracing Your Dissociative Mind and Navigating Life. She has won numerous awards for LGBT+ and mental health advocacy, specifically in reducing stigma around dissociative disorders through the sharing of her own lived experience.
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In Twelve Step programs, the first step, as I understand it, is recognizing that we are powerless to heal alone.
We cannot overcome addiction, trauma, or systemic oppression through sheer willpower or individual effort. Healing, recovery, and meaningful change require connection, support, and systems that foster growth.
All true! But we should not make a virtue out of being powerless.
Recognizing what is beyond your ability isn’t the same as accepting that you are powerless to change. Powerlessness is, in fact, a protective response that disconnects us from our personal power.
When we conflate protection with powerlessness, we risk internalizing the very dynamics that keep us trapped in authoritarian systems—whether in families, partnerships, workplaces, faith communities, or governments.
Power-over systems create environments where speaking up feels dangerous, where challenging authority risks humiliation or exile. But no matter the system or oppression, we always retain what Right Use of Power methodology calls our personal power. And that’s precisely why authoritarian structures work so hard to make us feel otherwise.
Owning your personal power in an authoritarian system requires deep, intentional work. And we cannot do it alone.
My guest today will introduce you to the types of power in the Right Use of Power framework and help you reconnect with your personal power so that you can stand firm and do hard, scary, necessary things.
Dr. Amanda Aguilera currently serves as the Executive Director of the Right Use of Power Institute and a Trusted Advisor at The Ally Co. She has dedicated most of her career to helping people and organizations understand systems, conflict, and social power dynamics to create right relationship and a sense of belonging. She has a knack for making difficult conversations easier, complex ideas more accessible, and resistance more workable. Integrating power, contemplative practices, neurobiology, and restorative practices, she works by finding a balance of head and heart and facilitating the co-creation of strategic maps that lead us forward in a more equitable way.
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Toxic leadership stems from the burdens of unresolved trauma and difficult life experiences.
When you don’t do the work to regulate your nervous system, the parts of you that protect you through mico-managing, shaming, blaming, not trusting anyone, or worse will eventually wreak havoc on your career, those you lead, and your own capacity for discomfort.
So, what does it look like for you to commit to doing the work?
Maybe you go to therapy or coaching, or adopt practices to deepen your self-awareness and reflection. The trouble is, “doing the work” can easily turn into navel-gazing or intellectualizing. The same tools that might help you unburden can also be used to numb out. We so often are sold the idea that we will overcome and be done with it that we bypass doing the real, deep, lifelong work.
Today’s guest illustrates–literally–what it looks and feels like to commit to doing powerful work. Her gorgeous new graphic novel, Past Tense, shares her windy and beautiful journey of doing the work through the lens of Internal Family Systems.
Sacha Mardou was born in Macclesfield in 1975 and grew up in Manchester, England. She began making comics after getting her BA in English Literature from the University of Wales, Lampeter. Her critically acclaimed graphic novel series, Sky in Stereo, was named an outstanding comic of 2015 by the Village Voice and shortlisted for the 2016 Slate Studio Prize.
Since 2019 she has been making comics about therapy and healing. Her graphic memoir Past Tense: Facing Family Secrets and Finding Myself in Therapy is out now. Since 2005 she has lived in St Louis, Missouri with her cartoonist husband Ted May, their daughter and two disruptive cats.
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These days, the call for leaders to be adaptable, agile, flexible, clear, focused, and calm could lead many to think it's not okay to feel or that you need to be a robot.
We minimize our feelings and put on a brave face until we can no longer fake it, sometimes in the name of being “regulated.”
When there's a trend in language or an approach to healing, it can sometimes be reductive in how it's taught, explained, or understood. Concepts drawn from Polyvagal Theory, like regulation and activation, are no exception.
How some talk about regulation and dysregulation can create pressure to diminish our humanity so that we don't emote, and cause us to criticize someone if they're upset.
In reality, Polyvagal Theory offers a powerful addition to your toolbox for leading yourself and others well while staying aligned with your values.
When we work towards helping our nervous systems become more agile and adaptable by putting in the reps and working to understand our systems and our stories, we can offer those we love and lead a greater sense of curiosity, compassion, and connection. And we will have enough boundaries and guardrails to know when to tap out, take a break, and ask for help.
Today’s guest teaches and discusses these topics so that we can learn to regulate our nervous systems better and connect better with others.
Deb Dana, LCSW, is a clinician, consultant, author, and international lecturer on polyvagal theory-informed work with trauma survivors and is the leading translator of this scientific work to the public and mental health professionals. She's a founding member of the Polyvagal Institute and creator of the signature Rhythm of Regulation® clinical training series.
Deb's work shows us how understanding polyvagal theory applies across the board to relationships, mental health, and trauma. She delves into the intricacies of how we can all use and understand the organizing principles of polyvagal theory to change the ways we navigate our daily lives.
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