Shows / Psyche Magazine
Psyche Magazine
Psyche audio helps you to better understand yourself and others through expert guides, provocative ideas and personal life stories. We address psychological questions and puzzles from a range of perspectives including philosophy, history, anthropology and more. You will discover practical knowledge and insights to help you navigate everyday challenges, overcome difficulties and find meaning, wonder and spirituality. Psyche is a nonprofit digital magazine. With a dedication to pluralism and…
Episodes
Psyche MagazineBeing in a crowd doesn’t make you part of a mindless mob
It’s often assumed people lose their minds in a crowd. Research on riots, festivals and sports tells a more uplifting story. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineHow to think like a Hegelian
For Hegel, your thoughts aren’t trapped in a cerebral box: they act on the world, making meaning and expressing your freedom. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineClimbing gives me a break from my brain
When I took up indoor climbing, I didn’t anticipate the special appeal it held for someone with ADHD. Psyche audio helps you to better understand yourself and…
Psyche MagazineMother Teresa was virtuous, but she was wrong about virtue
There’s more to virtue than how we treat other individuals. ‘Structure-facing virtues’ tie the personal to the big picture. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineHow to enter a state of flow
That moment of sweet immersion in the task at hand: that’s flow. With some strategy, you can experience it more often. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineFree-range fraud
An animal rights group offered a rare job opportunity. How hard could it be to play along?. Psyche audio helps you to better understand yourself and others…
Psyche MagazineWhy we should learn to embrace the middlebrow
Stranded between ‘low’ and ‘high’ art, the middlebrow is unfairly condemned. It’s a ‘both/and’ mode capable of greatness. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineIn praise of not-quite-friends
Learning about the Korean concept of ‘jeong’ helped me understand the importance of my not-quite-friends at the gym. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineAfter the performance
For 19 years, the NBA superstar Carmelo Anthony mastered the version of himself the world demanded. Retired from basketball, he confronts a harder question…
Psyche MagazineYour deepest regrets help you see yourself more clearly
Far from being a waste of time, the regrets that haunt you reveal more about who you are than your successes ever could. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineWhy some men seek refuge in ever bigger muscles
Diagnoses of muscle dysmorphia or ‘bigorexia’ are rising. A psychoanalytic lens offers an explanation – and a healthier path. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineMake some noise
As a girl, I felt I should change my voice. Anne Carson’s writing on the ancient Greeks shows how old that pressure is. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineDon’t turn away from tragedy, but do witness intentionally
Chronic exposure to the world’s horror has a mental cost. Being an effective witness requires a more sustainable approach. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineHow to become the person you want to be
Close the intention-action gap and live the way you want, using insights from the cognitive neuroscience of habits. Psyche audio helps you to better understand…
Psyche MagazineWhat ancient art tells us about modern psychedelic medicine
Millennia-old rock paintings reflect a wisdom about healing that should inform today’s evolving psychedelic treatments. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineWhen the world stopped moving
I wanted to outrun my thoughts. But in the stillness of prison, I had no choice but to face myself. Psyche audio helps you to better understand yourself and…
Psyche MagazineJung’s archetypes are a mirror that shows who and what we are
Psychedelics and neuroscience seem to support his ideas about ancestral dreams and fears – but with an evolutionary twist. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineWhat draws well-meaning parents to authoritarian parenting?
In my therapy room, I’ve seen the costs of the controlling impulse. Winnicott and Rogers show us healthier alternatives. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineHow to rediscover the joy of drawing
As a child, you knew the thrill of conjuring with a pencil. Reclaim that pleasure with these activities (no talent needed). Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineThe joy of falling down together
My reluctant participation in a line-dancing class showed me how moving as one promotes feelings of group unity – and joy. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineI am that I am
Ego death obliterated my gender identity, but then I stumbled upon the Public Universal Friend. Psyche audio helps you to better understand yourself and others…
Psyche MagazineBeing lonely taught me how to be me
When I moved to a new city where I had no friends, Olivia Laing’s book helped me find my own rhythm and enjoy time alone. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineHow to imagine a better future for yourself
Feeling unclear or pessimistic about what’s ahead? Your ‘best possible self’ is a tool for seeing things differently. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineDoes modernisation erase cultural difference – or amplify it?
We understandably fear the flattening effect of modernity. But global data from China to Peru tells a hopeful story. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineA college fling
It was a three-week stint of make-outs, music, and not much else. But it meant more than he knew. Psyche audio helps you to better understand yourself and…
Psyche MagazineSame art, different name: would you see or hear it the same way?
A mislabelled concerto and other errors and tricks show that reputation affects how art is perceived, sometimes radically. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineWe should study the history of emotions
A profile of a scholar of the history of emotions provoked a remarkable backlash. But critics of the field misunderstand it. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineWho do you think you are? There are two answers
Being seen for who you are, both existentially and metaphysically, is a gift that society should strive to bestow on all. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineTips and tools for navigating hearing loss
At home, at work and out having fun, these are the supportive tools, apps and services that have helped me and many others. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineWhy you should talk to your dead ancestors
The simple act of communicating without expecting anything in return can bring you closer to your family – and to yourself. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineThe wolverine gospel
For the biologist Jeff Copeland, salvation lies not in God but a creature as fierce and free as the mountains it roams. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineThe thinking style that makes people vulnerable to extremism
The people most drawn to ideological thinking and authoritarianism aren’t aware of what makes them so susceptible. Psyche audio helps you to better understand…
Psyche MagazineWhat moments of insight have in common
From art to science to love, the moment of insight happens when we see a likeness between different things. Psyche audio helps you to better understand…
Psyche MagazineHow to deal with relationship OCD
Repetitive thought spirals about a partner could be a sign of ROCD. But there are ways to reclaim your peace and intimacy. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineGhosts of summers past
The trauma of foster care left gaps in my memory. Could I piece together a past I couldn’t recall?. Psyche audio helps you to better understand yourself and…
Psyche MagazineMary McLeod Bethune reminds us: education must be fought for
When they snatched a book from her hands, she pushed back, passing the gift of literacy to generations of Black children. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineThe city that rewired my brain
I arrived in New Orleans feeling fractured and dislocated. Then I started haunting the jazz clubs. Psyche audio helps you to better understand yourself and…
Psyche MagazineHow to do less for your children
Being an intensive parent will make you anxious and stifle your children’s development. Help them by learning to let go. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineStruggling with creative work doesn’t mean you’re failing
It’s easy to feel lost when you’re working on something new. But that rough patch is actually an encouraging signal. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineI cognitively shuffle myself to sleep
The usual advice didn’t help my sleep problems, but then I tried an exercise that kickstarts the sleep-onset control system. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineWhy older people are happier and what we can learn from them
Around the world, happiness tends to peak later in life. It has more to do with balancing priorities than elderly wisdom. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineWhat is Roblox teaching children about capitalism?
The popular game platform offers space to create, socialise, even protest. It’s also a realm of extraction and inequality. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineThe marks we leave each day
The protagonist of On the Calculation of Volume gets a unique view of how her actions matter. What if we saw the same?. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineHow needing others became a source of shame for Americans
Self-reliance is a strange ideal because feeling lonely and sociability are both inescapable parts of being human. Psyche audio helps you to better understand…
Psyche MagazineHow to talk to someone who has dementia
Dementia makes communication more challenging, but these practices and tips can help you stay connected through the changes. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineYour daydreams know something you don’t. Look closely
Noticing the patterns in mind-wandering can reveal important needs that have yet to be addressed in real life. Psyche audio helps you to better understand…
Psyche MagazineWhat came knocking
After our dog’s death, small disturbances reshaped how we made sense of the loss. Psyche audio helps you to better understand yourself and others through…
Psyche MagazineHow to find your InnSæi
In uncertain times, an Icelandic concept can help you reconnect with your intuition and follow your inner compass. Psyche audio helps you to better understand…
Psyche MagazineWhy are we curious about some things and indifferent to others?
Many of us crave trivial details while ignoring much of the world around us. Research helps explain this selective curiosity. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineWhy some healthy habits still take so much effort
Contrary to classic habit science, certain behaviours never become easy. Recognising this can help you stick with them. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineThe art of hiking
The desert acted as a mirror that seemed to say: you are like me – harsh, inventive, and full of life. Psyche audio helps you to better understand yourself and…
Psyche MagazineSeeing grief for what it is
Faced with the pain of grief, it’s tempting to reach for words of comfort, but Yiyun Li showed me how little they offer. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineThe special kind of knowledge that can’t be put into words
Knowledge doesn’t only reside in books and lectures. As Bertrand Russell observed, there’s also ‘knowledge by acquaintance’. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineThe roots of goodness
Ervin Staub survived the Holocaust as a child. As a psychologist, he spent a lifetime asking how cruelty takes hold – and whether kindness can, too. Psyche…
Psyche MagazineWhy raves are such a reliable source of spiritual experience
Amid the pounding bass, ravers achieve a transcendence long associated with sacred practices. Neuroscience explains how. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineHow to be defiant
Staying silent often feels like the safe choice, but the costs can be profound. Here’s how to stand up for yourself. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineThe existential balm of seeing yourself as a verb, not a noun
In the therapy room, I’ve seen how rethinking what we are – and what it means to ‘be dead’ – can lighten our fears. Psyche audio helps you to better understand…
Psyche MagazineFor maximisers, bad choices really sting
We all make wrong decisions, but if you’re a ‘maximiser’ rather than a ‘satisficer’, the regret hurts all the more. Psyche audio helps you to better understand…
Psyche MagazineIt’s not always clear when someone’s lost the ability to decide
The complex changes of dementia and legal concepts like ‘lucid intervals’ show why patients and families must plan ahead. Psyche audio helps you to better…
Psyche MagazineWhich ‘you’ does your partner see?
Researchers analysed how much romantic partners agree about their personal characteristics – and where they agree most. Psyche audio helps you to better…