the goop podcast

“They could have gone in one of two directions,” says author Lacy Crawford. “Either start asking real questions and listening for honest answers and face the reckoning of what these boys had done to me. Or go the other direction and bury the girl. And that’s what they did: They buried the girl.” In Crawford’s memoir, Notes on a Silencing, she shares the story of the assault she suffered at boarding school when she was fifteen years old and the subsequent attempts to silence her. Today she joins host Elise Loehnen to talk about misplaced shame, our perception of bravery, addressing a destructive culture, and how her definition of healing has shifted with time. (For more, see The goop Podcast hub.) To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Mellody Hayes, MD, is an anesthesiologist, a healer, a spiritual teacher, and a powerful voice in the psychedelic movement. Though Hayes has worked in traditional medicine for her whole career, she says her spiritual life greatly informs how she approaches human healing—and she keeps up with medical journals and Pema Chödrön in equal measure. Today, she joins host Elise Loehnen to talk about the societal stresses that contribute to illness, how psychedelic medicine could help heal intergenerational trauma, and why love is at the center of everything she does. “When you try and shame someone into correction, you get obedience, but you haven’t won their participation,” she says. “How do we shift people? Believe it or not: We love them more; we love them harder.” (For more, see The goop Podcast hub.) To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In Katherine May’s newest book, Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times, she explores how we relate to the painful periods in our lives—and what we can gain from normalizing the need to rest and tend to our wounds. In her conversation with host Elise Loehnen, May says that one reason many of us feel ashamed about our dark periods is because we’re taught to look down on other people’s misfortunes. This in turn makes it difficult to respect our own pain. May shares what changed for her when she allowed herself to see sadness as a need and not something to run from. For example, it helped her stop feeling addicted to productivity and busyness and begin to let go of the need to control everything. “We have got to stop feeling responsible for controlling our lives because that attempt is devastating us,” she says. “And it’s a lie—we just cannot do it.” (For more, see The goop Podcast hub.) To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

GP is joined by Ed Catmull, cofounder of Pixar, former president of Walt Disney Animation Studios, and author of the New York Times–bestselling book Creativity, Inc. They talk about what it takes to establish the kind of company culture Catmull is revered for. The first step, he says, is creating a space where people feel free to speak candidly, to be vulnerable, and to take risks. They talk about what can lead a team to feel disconnected from their creativity and how to help people cultivate inspiration again. And he shares some of his insights on effective leadership: “One of the rules for the powerful people is they’re supposed to shut the hell up for the first ten or fifteen minutes,” says Catmull. “If a powerful person speaks, they set the tone for the meeting. And you’re much more effective if you enter a discussion rather than set the tone.” (For more, see The goop Podcast hub.) To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Kevin Weinfurt, PhD, is the vice chair for research in the Department of Population Health Sciences at Duke University School of Medicine. His work measures sexual function and satisfaction and how sexual well-being can be impacted by illness and other changes in health throughout our lives. Weinfurt talks about why he believes doctors tend to avoid the subject of sex and how he and his colleagues hope to change this. He also talks about the role that intimacy plays in sexual wellness—i.e., holding hands, making eye contact, and simply touching. And he explains some of the psychology around our relationship to our sex lives, like why sex can be so important to some people but not to others. (For more, see The goop Podcast hub.) To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

“The Northern Cheyenne people have a saying: A nation is not defeated until the hearts of its women are on the ground,” says Lucy Rain Simpson, executive director of the National Indigenous Women’s Resource Center. “And that was a primary tactic. If you want to break a nation down, you purposefully try to make women no longer respected.” In her role, Simpson works to safeguard Native women and children. Today, she unpacks much of what is misunderstood about the rampant sexual violence on Native land, including that over 90 percent of the perpetrators are non-Indian. She explains the impact of federal mismanagement and complacency around these crimes and why assaults against women are particularly corrosive in Native culture. And she shares ways that we can begin to break the cycle of violence, as well as a vision of what justice would look like. “If we can come back to a place where women are sacred, that gives us the foundation for building everything else up,” she says. (For more, see The goop Podcast hub.) To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

“The core of leadership should be care,” says psychiatrist Gianpiero Petriglieri, MD. “And then performance is a result of a system in which there is enough care.” Petriglieri is an associate professor of organizational behavior at INSEAD and an expert on leadership and learning in the workplace. Today, he joins host Elise Loehnen to talk about what is lost when we prize productivity above all else, why it’s important to give your team space to ask questions and be imaginative, why he thinks having vision isn’t an important quality in a good leader, and our growing tendency to intertwine our sense of self-worth with our performance at work: “Once you start working this way, where work becomes very personal, everything is existential. If you succeed, you are a success. If you fail, you see yourself as a failure.” He also shares insights about what the pandemic could teach us about productivity and how that could shape the way we do business in the future.(For more, see The goop Podcast hub.) To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Isabel Wilkerson is a Pulitzer Prize–winning, number one New York Times–bestselling author. Her most recent book, Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents, links the caste systems of America, India, and Nazi Germany. She examines how a caste system has shaped American history and the ways our lives are still defined by man-made hierarchies. In this conversation with host Elise Loehnen, Wilkerson explains the essential difference between racism and casteism and why these hierarchies negatively affect all groups. “We are, as a society, harmed by the inequities that may seem to be trained primarily on one group,” says Wilkerson. “But then these inequities spread and leach out beyond the boundaries of that seat.” The ripple effects, Wilkerson explains, include misguided policies that often impact everyone. And she shares what it takes to move beyond these artificial divisions. The first step is having a deep understanding of the history that shapes us: “If you don’t know the history, if you don’t know where you’ve been, then it’s hard to know how you got to where you are and how you can move forward.” (For more, see The goop Podcast hub.) To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Our guest today is James Nestor, journalist and author of Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art, which explores the often overlooked and undervalued function of breathing and all the ways that breath is at the center of health—and potentially illness. Nestor spent a decade studying ancestral breathing techniques and New Age technology and diving deep into studies that have brought surprising information to light. For example, Nestor tells us about the Framingham Study, which has been going on for seventy years: “They found that the most accurate marker of health and longevity wasn’t genes or even cardiovascular health. It was lung capacity and respiratory health.” Nestor shares all that he’s learned about proper technique (breathing through your nose is key) and his advice for shifting your habits. (For more, see The goop Podcast hub.) To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

GP is joined by two-time Olympic gold medalist, FIFA World Cup Champion, and New York Times–bestselling author Abby Wambach. Since retiring from her record-breaking soccer career, Wambach has become known for her work around equality and inclusion alongside her wife, activist and author Glennon Doyle. She’s also just published a young readers edition of her book Wolfpack, urging young people to break old rules and create their own path. Today, Wambach chats with GP about how to build a strong team, how to allow yourself to feel disappointed, how to get comfortable with competition and seeing others succeed, and how her son’s coming out helped Wambach heal some of her own childhood trauma. “My mom had fear for me, but I thought she was afraid of me,” says Wambach. “Those are very different things.” It’s clear why Wambach was captain of the Women’s National team for so many years—you get fired up listening to her speak. (For more, see The goop Podcast hub.) To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices