Midlife Crises

Epizode

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  E32: Finding Happiness & Purpose in the Second Half of Life 29.04.2026 49min

  In this episode, we discuss the book "From Strength to Strength: Finding Success, Happiness, & Deep Purpose in the Second Half of Life" by Arthur C. Brooks. In the opening segment we get a brief report from Alvin on his recent adventure in the canyonlands of Utah, and we do a Gen Z Word of the Day segment in which we see if Alvin knows what the word "cracked" means. In the main segment (9:10) we do a deeper dive into fluid vs. crystallized intelligence, how the transition from fluid to crystallized intelligence is related to midlife crises, discuss our general agreements and some minor critiques of this general thesis, why most of us tend to lean into our crystallized intelligence later in our careers, and how embracing our crystallized intelligence likely leads to more eudaimonic happiness. We end the discussion reviewing some of Brooks's suggestions for finding happiness later in your career and how these lessons might help you transition to a more fulfilling retirement.
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  E31: Trends in Midlife Vitality Across Generations & Countries 17.02.2026 50min

  After a long absence from the podcast we are back. In the first segment we read a glowing review of the podcast, we report on our recent midlife crises in action, and give one area where we are optimistic about the future. In the main segment (16:30) we discuss an article in which a group of psychologists report on how Gen X midlifers compare to the previous generations in terms of quality of life, and how midlife-aged adults in the U.S. compare to their counterparts in other countries. As always, please like and subscribe to the podcast, and youcan reach us at [email protected]. You can also follow Alvin Shultz and Jack Eichler on Facebook or LinkedIn.
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  E30: The Birthday Episode - The Impact of Reaching a New Decade in Life on the Search for Meaning & Purpose? 13.05.2025 54min

  We are excited to be back for our 30th episode and to celebrate our 2nd year anniversary of the podcast. In the opening 10 minute segment we reflect on how the podcast has helped us cope with midlife issues, and Jack tells a story about a recent grad student who recently quit a job in industry to pursue a career in teaching. In the main segment (11:30) we discuss a paper where researchers try to find evidence that people tend to search more for meaning and purpose in life when they reach a new decade in chronological age. Are men more likely to cheat on their relationships, are we more likely commit suicide, and are we more likely to run a marathon for the first time when we are at a "nine-ender" age? We discuss the research evidence for all these behaviors. We end the episode by reflecting on our current transition from age 49 to 50 and how this is or is not impacting our search for meaning and purpose in life. Email: [email protected] Media: message Jack Eichler or Alvin Shultz on Facebook.
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  E29: Coping with Aging Parents (with special guest host Carolyn Lambert) 15.02.2025 1h 17min

  In this episode we have brought on special guest host Carolyn Lambert to tackle the topic of coping with aging parents. Carolyn is a certified parent coach who was a guest on the podcast back in episode 11, and she is currently acting as a caregiver for her father who recently sustained a serious physical injury.In our opening segment Jack reports to Alvin and Carolyn whether the book Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck has made him cry yet, we briefly discuss an article by Harvard business school professor Arthur Brooks, in which he argues that pushing yourself to do things you are likely to fail will make you happier, and we introduce a new segment called Wisdom from Alvin's youth where Alvin reads an entry from his high school journal.In our main segment (28:00) we discuss two papers related to dealing with aging parents. The first looks at how demographic shifts over the past 100 years have resulted in middle aged folks being confronted more frequently with caring for aging parents, and the expectations and resentments mid-lifers might have with respect to these caregiving situations. The second paper discusses the different coping strategies we tend to use when caring for our aging parents, and we discuss these with Carolyn in the context of her current situation in which she is caring for her father.  As always, we hope you leave us a five star review and follow us in your podcast feed, and please share the podcast with all of your friends and family in your social media platforms. Arthur Brooks article: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2025/01/to-succeed-fail-better/681492/?gift=JlCQzt3MIZaHNzn12_BIC6Ii6LGkjfV5Ze_XJr6BLhw&utm_source=copy-link&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=shareEmail: [email protected]: you can friend Jack Eichler and Alvin Shultz
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  E28: The Holiday Blues - Myth or Reality? (And an Unexpected "New" Christmas Movie) 22.01.2025 1h 12min

  We apologize for the delay between pods, but as you'll hear in this episode Alvin experienced some chaos over Christmas and New Year's, so we were delayed in putting out our annual holiday special. Though this is coming out a little late, this should be a nice way for you to reflect on the holidays and think about some potential New Year's resolutions.In the opening segment we hear from Alvin about how his iPhone got hacked, as well some physical issues that he has been dealing with over the past couple of months. You'll learn how a UB Key can be used to protect your phone, and what a cervical myelopathy is. At minute 21:00 we have a holiday edition of our Are You Not Entertained segment where Jack reports on an unexpected movie that you can add to your Christmas movie rotation.The main segment starts at minute 35:00, in which we discuss a commentary from the Journal of Psychiatry Reform that argues the holiday blues are a real phenomenon. We briefly reflect on our own views of the holiday season, review data that suggests the winter holidays are a risk factor for death, explore how the holidays might lead to increases in anxiety and depression, and discuss some of the wellness toolkit action items that might help you deal with the holiday blues and improve general well being.  Email: [email protected] Facebook: You can friend Jack Eichler or Alvin Shultz Commentary from the Journal of Psychiatry Reform: https://journalofpsychiatryreform.com/2019/12/19/wellness-calendar-for-the-busy-physician-how-to-survive-the-holiday-blues/
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  E27 - Physical Maintenance and Growth in the Midlife and Beyond: Review of "Younger Next Year" 27.11.2024 1h 6min

  In this episode we tackle the issue of physical decline by reviewing the book "Younger Next Year" by Chris Crowley and Dr. Harry Lodge.In our opening segment we report on our informal Facebook poll about whether folks cry more from reading books or watching movies (5:45), briefly discuss the recent revelations about Cormac McCarthy's underage muse (9:50), hear a story from Alvin about one of his crazy step fathers (12:39), and we bring back our Gen Z word of the day segment (18:55).In our main segment (22:09) we review the new science of aging proposed in the book by Dr. Lodge, which focuses on how our modern sedentary lifestyle is the leading predictor of cardiovascular disease, and how routine rigourous exercise improves our health outcomes and improves the odds of reaching older age and allows us to live vital and productive lives well into our 70s and 80s. We also discuss  the suggestions proposed by Chris Crowley to build extrinsic motivation for increasing physical activity and how these resonate with us. We end by briefly reviewing Dr. Lodges' suggestions for changing  your diet and how these relate to those proposed in the book "The Obesity Code."Email: [email protected]  Facebook Jack Eichler: ⁠https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61564991623933⁠ Alvin Shultz: ⁠https://www.facebook.com/alvin.shultz
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  MLC Mini-pod: Nostalgia for Elections Past & Silver Linings (we hope) for 2024 13.11.2024 36min

  In this mini-pod we give you our rapid response to the 2024 election. We reminisce about the elections from the 1990's and early 2000's and give some brief perspective on last week's election. We hope that reflecting back on past elections and realizing many state-level elections diverged from the presidential election will help reduce the anxiety many folks might be feeling right now. Email: [email protected] Facebook Jack Eichler: ⁠https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61564991623933⁠ Alvin Shultz: ⁠https://www.facebook.com/alvin.shultz
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  E26 - MLC at the Movies: Barbie's Ultimate Existential Crisis (Plus a Debate on the Most Influential Art Forms) 06.11.2024 1h 9min

  In this episode we are excited to bring you our second Midlife Crises movie review, in which we explore themes of existential identity and death in the 2023 movie Barbie. After a brief reflection of our recent Halloween experiences, Alvin and Jack debate in the opening segment what the most impactful forms of art are. We end up comparing and contrasting movies vs. books, and we try to figure out why movies make Jack cry, but books do not. In our main segment (31:50), we discuss the Barbenheimer social meme from the summer of 2023, whether the male vs. female power dynamic or Barbie's existential crisis is the more prominent theme of the movie, the idea that Barbieland represents heaven or perhaps a Matrix-inspired parallel digital universe, Barbie's irrepressible thoughts of death, and her ultimate choice of remaining in the eternal bliss of Barbieland or becoming a human and accepting the potential pain and suffering associated with that existence.   Email: [email protected]  Facebook Jack Eichler: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61564991623933 Alvin Shultz: https://www.facebook.com/alvin.shultz
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  E25 - Cognitive Decline & Learning as Older Adults (Interview with Professor Rachel Wu) 07.10.2024 1h 36min

  In this episode we are excited to bring you our interview with Dr. Rachel Wu, a professor of psychology at the University of California-Riverside.  She is a developmental cognitive neuroscientist investigating how we learn across the lifespan. Dr. Wu has received more than two dozen awards and grants, including a Rising Star award from the Association for Psychological Science and an NSF Career award to investigate the role of learning new skills on cognitive and functional growth in older adulthood. Dr. Wu has published over 40 research articles during her tenure at UCR, but she also puts her research into practice. She was a violinist in a rock band for 7 years, she is a commissioned painter, and she tries to master new skills every few years to gain a better understanding of the difficulties in being an adult learner. In our interview (16:58) we discuss whether there is general cognitive decline in the midlife, the lifespan theoretical framework for how we can learn as older adults, a research study carried out by Professor Wu in which it was found that engaged learning by older adults led to long term improvements in cognitive abilities, and practical advice for you can be a successful learner as an adult (and hopefully improve your cognitive abilities later in life).     After the interview (68:00), Alvin and Jack reflect on instances in which we have completed engaged learning and how these experiences fit within the lifespan theoretical framework. Email: [email protected]  Facebook: direct message or send friend request to Jack Eichler
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  E24 - The Happiness Hypothesis, Improving Happiness in the Midlife, and Childless Cat Ladies 23.08.2024 1h 22min

  In this episode we continue our series on happiness, focusing on how one might improve happiness in the midlife. In our opening potpourri/grab-bag segment, Jack gives a quick take on the movies Defending Your Life and Joe vs. the Volcano, which were on our top 5 list of movies related to existential happiness from our last episode. Jack also recommends an episode from The Nietzsche Podcast in which Keegan Kjeldson discusses The Four Great Errors in thinking identified in Nietzsche's book Twilight of the Idols, and Alvin briefly explains how a car crashed into his house and his recent experience taking his oldest child to college. In our main segment (28:00), we give an overview of the book The Happiness Hypothesis by Jonathan Haidt. We discuss the framework of automatic processing vs. conscious decision making, factors that influence our baseline happiness, the Happiness Formula, and some of the practical tips that might help you improve your happiness proposed by Jonathan Haidt. We end the segment by explaining why we think JD Vance is wrong in asserting that childless cat ladies are unhappy, using evidence cited by psychologist Paul Bloom. As always, we thank you for listening, and please support the podcast by following us in your podcast feed, leaving us a five star review, and sharing the podcast with your friends and family. If you want to share your feedback or thoughts on specific topics from the episode, you can email us at [email protected] The Happiness Hypothesis: https://www.happinesshypothesis.com/ Article on the impact of having children on happiness by Paul Bloom: https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2021/11/does-having-kids-make-you-happy/620576/
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  E23 - Causes of Youth Unhappiness and What to Do About It? (And Our Top 5 Movies on Existential Happiness) 07.07.2024 1h 52min

  In this episode we follow up our interview with Dr. Danny Blanchflower by discussing the possible causes of the observed decreased happiness among America's youth.After Alvin tells a brief story about an internet scam he encountered while selling his car, we have a research discussion on the possible causes of the unhappiness epidemic (12:53). We discuss Jonathan Haidt's hypothesis about how smart phones and social media use have led to the unhappiness epidemic among young people, Peter Gray's hypothesis about how these trends in unhappiness are actually linked to the lack of autonomous outdoor play available to our younger generation, and Alvin provides an epidemiological perspective on this issue.We then discuss some of the recommendations put forth by Jonathan Haidt about how we might reduce device and internet usage for children and adolescents, and we highlight the recent recommendation from the Surgeon General to put warning labels on social media sites and Governor Gavin Newsome's announcement about his goal of banning phones in all California Schools (54:45).Finally, we do our combined Are You Not Entertained segment and Midlife Crises Top 5 List, where Alvin and I choose our top 5 movies related to happiness/existential growth (74:35). (Spoiler alert: we discuss the major plot points of these movies in detail)  Email: [email protected] Twitter (X): @midlifepod2023 Jonathan Haidt's book The Anxious Generation: https://jonathanhaidt.com/anxious-generation/ Peter Gray's paper on autonomous/independent play and youth happiness: https://www.petergray.org/_files/ugd/b4b4f9_f2cb98d004af4ebf9644c8daa30b040e.pdf Surgeon General's warning on social media use: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/17/opinion/social-media-health-warning.html Gavin Newsome's call to ban cell phones in CA schools: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/18/us/california-newsom-smartphone-ban.html
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  E22 - Interview with Danny Blanchflower: Father of the Happiness Curve (Plus a Discussion of the Decline in Youth Happiness) 03.06.2024 1h 37min

  In this episode we are pleased to bring you our interview with David, aka Danny Blanchflower, who is a professor of economics at Dartmouth College, research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research, adviser to the United Nations, and former external member of the Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee. In our opening segment we review our previous discussions of the u-shaped life happiness curve, why we care about the happiness of our youth, and Professor Blanchflower's connection to the social science literature related to this topic (3:40-15:30). In our interview with Danny we discuss how he became interested in exploring trends in happiness as a labor economist, how happiness is measured in social science, the original observation of the u-shaped happiness curve in which well being dips in the midlife, data from his  new paper that reports on the observed increase in depression among young people across 34 different countries, and some of the ongoing debate about the possible link between this you epidemic in anxiety and depression and cell phone/internet usage (13:50-81:45). Finally, in our closing segment, Alvin and I briefly preview some of the discussion on the possible causes of the youth anxiety and depression that we will cover in more depth in our next episode (81:50-95:48). Email: [email protected]  Twitter (X): @midlifepod2023 Professor Blanchflower's latest paper on youth happiness: https://www.nber.org/papers/w32337 Professor Blanchflower's blog: https://sites.dartmouth.edu/blanchflower/category/econwalkingabout/ After Babel Substack article from Professor Blanchflower: https://www.afterbabel.com/p/youth-health-declines-82-countries Peter Gray paper on reduced independent activity and childhood happiness: https://www.petergray.org/_files/ugd/b4b4f9_f2cb98d004af4ebf9644c8daa30b040e.pdf
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  E21 - Optimism in the Face of Adversity: Alvin's Story of Midlife Crisis (and is Jack too optimistic?) 09.05.2024 1h 4min

  This episode was inspired by a revelation that Alvin recently made to Jack in an offline discussion, and Alvin was convinced to share this story to help us do a more thorough evaluation of where we fall on the continuum of the classic midlife crisis. Given that the theme of this episode is "optimism in the face of adversity" we decided to open with a segment in which we evaluate whether or not Jack might be too optimistic at times, and then we briefly revisit the question of whether moral progress is real or an illusion. In our main segment (24:00) Alvin describes a series of events in his life that precipitated a midlife crisis, how he came out the other side of that difficult time, and how this inspired him to think about doing a podcast on this topic. We end the episode by comparing and contrasting our different life circumstances and how these have resulted in us experiencing different levels of midlife crisis. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @midlifepod2023 Fungi Adventures (guided outdoor camping excursions in Asheville, NC): https://www.andresfungiadventures.com/
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  E20 - Divorce Stories: Attachment Theory & Relationship Compatibility (Plus the Gen Z Word of the Day) 13.04.2024 1h 18min

  In this episode we follow up our recent conversation on personality and personality change with a discussion of attachment theory and how different attachment styles might impact relationship compatibility. In the opening segment we briefly revisit the issue of the reported youth mental health crisis, discuss Jonathan Haidt's new book "The Anxious Generation", and Jack quizzes Alvin on his knowledge of gen Z slang in a new segment called The Gen Z word of the day. In our main segment, we review the statistics for divorce in the United States, Alvin gives an overview of Attachment theory and the different attachment styles, and then Alvin and Jack use attachment theory to reflect on their divorces and hopefully view them in a more positive light. Email: ⁠[email protected]⁠  Twitter (X): @midlifepod2023 
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  E19 - Interview with Brent Roberts (Destroyer of Myths) Part 2: Personality Impacts on Relationships, Divorce, and Parenting (and Dungeons & Dragons Personality Types?) 20.03.2024 1h 35min

  In this episode we are excited to bring you part 2 of our interview with Dr. Brent Roberts, Professor of Psychology and renowned personality psychologist at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. In our opening segment, Alvin shares some survey data about which Dungeons and Dragons personality types people associate with and we discuss which of these character traits we identify with most (4:49-24:10), and then Jack gives a brief summary of some new papers he found in which the economists and psychologists call each other out on their interpretations of the u-shaped life happiness curve (24:15-30:00). In part two of our interview with Dr. Roberts (30:00-1:13:17), we discuss the impact of personality and personality change on Relationships and divorce, personality disorders, the interplay between personality traits and psychopathology, personal identity and how it might change over time for individuals, and the resilience of our core personality traits to external life events. We end the interview discussing the books iGen by Jean Twenge and The Coddling of the American Mind by Jonathan Haidt, how the narratives of these books relate to parenting, and Dr. Roberts discusses issues he has with social scientists running with these types of ideas that might seem intuitive, but are not clearly backed up by the data. After the interview we briefly reflect on how our broader identities may have changed over the years but our “personality zones” have likely remained fairly stable, and we briefly discuss the point Dr. Roberts made about how what we do as parents likely has much less impact on our kids’ outcomes than we might intuitively think (1:13:21-1:33:48). David (Danny) Blanchflower papers: 2021 Perspectives on Psychological Science paper: https://bpb-us-e1.wpmucdn.com/sites.dartmouth.edu/dist/5/2216/files/2021/07/u-shape-perspectives.pdf 2023 International Journal of Psychiatry paper: https://bpb-us-e1.wpmucdn.com/sites.dartmouth.edu/dist/5/2216/files/2023/02/a-response-to-another-attempt-to-move-beyond-the-crosssectional-u-shape-of-happiness-a-reply-by-galambos-krahn-johnson-a-2.pdf Nancy Galambos paper: 2021 International Journal of Psychiatry paper: https://doi.org/10.1177/17456916211008823 Email: [email protected] Twitter (X): @midlifepod2023
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  E18 - Interview with Brent Roberts (Destroyer of Myths) Part 1: Personality Change Over the Lifespan & The Life Happiness Curve 08.03.2024 1h 26min

  In this episode we bring you part one of our interview with Dr. Brent Roberts, a renowned personality psychologist at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. We open the epidsode by summarizing our online personality test results, discuss the different domains covered in the Myers-Briggs test, and then reflect on how our personality traits may have shifted over the past 25 years (4:10-27:00). In our interview with Professor Roberts, we discuss why he pursued a career in studying human personality and personality change,  how social scientists measure personality, the Big 5 personality traits and some other domains of personality beyond the Big 5, and the general trends in how personality changes over the life span. We conclude this part of the interview by discussing how personality traits may be connected to the proposed U-shaped life-happiness curve, and Dr. Roberts discusses the differences in how economists and psychologists interpret the data related to changes in happiness over the lifespan and whether the U-shaped life-happiness curve is just a myth (27:00-1:11:28). In our post-interview wrap up, we reflect on the (hopefully) positive take-home points from the interview and we briefly discuss a paper from a team of psychologists who critique the validity of the U-shaped life happiness curve (1:11:28-1:26:00). Email: [email protected]  Twitter: @midlifepod2023 Paper about the U-shaped happiness curve (open access): https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7529452/
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  E17 - Progress By A Thousand Thoughts: The Philosophy of Nietzsche & The Lust for Life 20.02.2024 1h 52min

  In this episode we are excited to have on Keegan Kjeldsen, a touring doom metal musician and host of The Nietzsche Podcast. We open the episode explaining why we sought out Keegan for an interview, and then Alvin gives a quick history of Nietzsche's life. If you're more familiar with Nietzsche and would like to skip straight to the interview, that starts around minute 22:00 in the audio feed. We discuss with Keegan how he ended up hosting a podcast devoted to Friedrich Nietzsche, how philosophy applies to the real world and why we should pay attention to philosophical writing, Nietzsche's idea of eternal recurrence and how that might lead one to celebrate and embrace life, the possible connection of the reevaluation of values and changes that occur in the midlife, how Nietzsche's quote: What does not kill me makes me stronger might inform our view of the potential fragility of gen z, and what books of Nietzsche's you might look at first if you're interested in exploring any of these topics further. Finally, we end with our Real or Fake segment, in which Keegan and Alvin have to guess whether a philosophy paper is real or an article from The Onion.   Email: [email protected]  Twitter: @midlifepod2023 The Nietzsche Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-nietzsche-podcast/id1573808070 Keegan's Patreon site: https://www.patreon.com/untimelyreflections Keegan's book pre-order ("The Ritual Madness of Rock & Roll"): https://www.blackrosewriting.com/biographymemoir/theritualmadnessofrockandroll  
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  E16 - Midlife Crisis on the Interwebs: What is a Midlife Crisis According to Wikipedia and Reddit? (and reminiscing about New Year's Y2K) 21.01.2024 1h 4min

  Happy new year and welcome to season two of the Midlife Crises podcast. Since we just rang in the new year, we thought it would be fun to open up season two by reminiscing about the Y2K scare and New Year's 2000 in our Where Were You When segment. In our main segment we decided to begin by identifying what the definition of a midlife crisis is and whether midlife crises are just a myth, and then Alvin summarizes an analysis of posts he did from the past month in the midlife crisis sub-Reddit page. We highlight some of the common themes and issues identified by folks dealing with midlife crises, we reflect on how some of these issues resonate with our personal experience, and we conclude by discussing how folks can hopefully embrace these changes we experience in the midlife and use them as motivation to find new purpose in life. Email: [email protected]  Twitter/X: @midlifepod2023
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  E15 - Season Finale...Top 5 Holiday Movies List & Goals/Resolutions for 2024 26.12.2023 1h 8min

  In this episode, we come up with the Midlife Crises list of top 5 holiday/Christmas movies (and no, Die Hard is not a Christmas movie...), and we reflect on 2023 and the first season of the podcast. We discuss some of the topics we plan to cover in 2024, and identify a couple of personal New Year's resolutions we would like to accomplish in the coming year. We hope everyone has a great holiday season and a happy New Year. If you have strong opinions on the Die Hard Christmas movie debate, or have other holiday movies you would like to recommend to us, please email us or hit us up on Twitter/X. Email: [email protected] Twitter/X: @midlifepod2023
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  E14 - Interview with Women's Midlife Coach Clarissa Kristjansson (and Alvin rescues an injured owl?!) 16.12.2023 1h 20min

  In this episode we are excited to have on as a guest Clarissa Kristjansson, a women’s midlife coach who is also the host of the podcast “Thriving Through Menopause.” Before getting to our interview with Clarissa, Alvin and I spend a few minutes discussing an idea for a Saturday Night Live sketch involving Spock from Star Trek, and then hear about a recent situation in which Alvin was called on to rescue an injured owl, and a story about how he was accosted by a llama during his travels in Peru. If you want to skip ahead to the interview you can jump to minute 30 in the audio feed. In our interview we discuss how Clarissa made the journey from a PhD in neuroscience to being a women’s midlife coach, the difference between peri-menopause and menopause, the typical physiological and psychological changes associated with menopause, ways in which Clarissa helps her clients adjust to these changes, how one can support their partner who is going through menopause, how women and men experience  anhedonia in the midlife, Clarissa’s perspective on how the typical journey through menopause maps onto the life happiness curve, and other topics. After the interview Alvin and I reflect on some of the take home points from Clarissa’s interview that we might put into practice, and discuss how Clarissa acts as a model of demonstrating wisdom. Clarissa's podcast: https://www.thrivethrumenopause.com/ Clarissa's women's coaching website: https://clarissakristjansson.com/about Clarissa's blog and other media resources: https://linktr.ee/thrivethrumeno Clarissa's Twitter/X feed: @thrivethrumeno Clarissa's books: https://www.amazon.com/Mindful-Menopause-Balance-Vitality-Clarity/dp/916399416X https://www.amazon.com/Potent-Power-Menopause-Perspective-Transformation-ebook/dp/B09ZHCZZVT