Think Act Be Podcast - Ep. 202: Seth & Joel — What Gives Psychotherapy the Power to Make Life Better?

Ep. 202: Seth & Joel — What Gives Psychotherapy the Power to Make Life Better?

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09/13/23 • 49 min

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Think Act Be Podcast

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

Topics we touched on included:

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

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

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

Find Joel online at his website, follow him on Twitter, and read his blog on Psychology Today.

Topics we touched on included:

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

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

Find Joel online at his website, follow him on Twitter, and read his blog on Psychology Today.

Previous Episode

Ep. 201: Seth & Joel — What If You Don't Need to Fix Yourself?

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

Topics we touched on included:

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

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

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

Find Joel online at his website, follow him on Twitter, and read his blog on Psychology Today.

Next Episode

Ep. 203: Seth & Joel — How Much Can Be Accomplished in One Therapy Session?

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

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