The Mindform Podcast

What if the voice yelling at you inside your own head isn't actually you? What if your rage, your anxiety, your worst habits are all trying to protect you?

In this episode, Frank sits down with Nell Pennington — a certified Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapist with almost 30 years in health, first as a nurse and now as a counsellor whose own adult ADHD diagnosis shaped her deeply compassionate, neuroaffirming approach to therapy. Together they explore the radical idea that the mind isn't singular — it's a whole internal family of parts, each with its own role, wound, and good intention, waiting to be understood rather than fixed.

In this conversation, they cover:

Why your inner critic might actually be trying to protect you

The difference between "managers," "firefighters," and "exiles" inside you

Why self-sabotage might be two parts of you fighting for the same goal

What it really means to access your "Self" — and why it can't be forced

How ADHD reframed Nell's whole understanding of her own mind

What "successful" IFS therapy actually looks like day to day

---

Learn more about Nelida Pennington: https://ifs.nz/


---

Mindform is an exclusive membership platform that gives you access to an ever-expanding toolkit for mental mastery and a community of passionate psychitects.

Apply to join Mindform or get the free Psychitect's Toolkit at https://mindform.io/podcast

What if the biggest threat to your relationship isn't your partner — it's your nervous system? What if "good communication skills" are useless the moment your body thinks it's being chased by a lion?

In this episode of the Mindformed Podcast, Frank Lawton sits down with Elizabeth Earnshaw — licensed marriage and family therapist, certified Gottman Method therapist, and founder of A Better Life Therapy in Philadelphia. Elizabeth's central argument: most relationship conflict isn't a communication problem, it's a stress problem — and until you treat the body first, no technique will stick.

In this conversation:

Why couples with great communication skills still have the exact same fight every time

The physiological "stop action" technique for breaking an argument before it escalates

Why 20 minutes (not 5) is the magic number your body needs to reset

The difference between co-regulating and dysregulating with a stressed partner

How to run a "stress audit" on your life — and split it into shed, prevent, and adapt

The simple questions that pull stress out of a partner instead of pumping more in

---

Find Elizabeth at elizabethearnshaw.com or @LizListens. Books mentioned in this episode:

'Til Stress Do Us Part — how stress, not your partner, is the real relationship killer

I Want This to Work — Elizabeth's first book on building stronger relationships

The Couples Therapy Flip Chart — a clinical tool used by therapists in couples sessions

---

Mindform is an exclusive membership platform that gives you access to an ever-expanding toolkit for mental mastery and a community of passionate psychitects.

Apply to join Mindform or get the free Psychitect's Toolkit at https://mindform.io/podcast

What if the self-doubt you've been trying to fix is actually proof you care? And what if the harder you work to outrun it, the worse it gets?

In this episode, Frank sits down with Dr. Jill Stoddard — clinical psychologist, TEDx speaker, ACT trainer, and author of Be Mighty and Brace No More — to unpack why imposter syndrome is misnamed, misunderstood, and why the conventional advice to "just build your confidence" tends to backfire for most people.

Dr. Stoddard makes the case that psychological flexibility — not confidence — is the real antidote to self-doubt, fear, and avoidance.

Topics covered:

Why "imposter syndrome" is a flawed term — and what the research actually says

The gap trap: why waiting until you feel ready keeps you stuck

How acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) builds resilience without toxic positivity

Pain reprocessing therapy — how the brain creates chronic pain and how to rewire it

Speaking truth to power: Jill's personal story and her upcoming podcast We the Sunlight

Why discomfort practiced in small ways builds capacity for the big moments

🎙️ This is Episode53 of the Mindform Podcast, hosted by Frank Lawton.

🔗 Find Dr. Jill Stoddard:

Website: www.jillstoddard.com

New Podcast (Sept 2025): We the Sunlight

Books: https://jillstoddard.com/books

Be Mighty

Imposter No More

The Big Book of ACT Metaphors

Mindform is an exclusive membership platform that gives you access to an ever-expanding toolkit for mental mastery and a community of passionate psychitects.
Apply to join Mindform or get the free Psychitect's Toolkit at https://mindform.io/podcast

What if the relentless drive to know everything, control everything, and fix everything is actually making you less human? And what if the path to wisdom, meaning, and flourishing begins not with more answers — but with a deeper relationship with the unknown?

Frank sits down with philosopher John Cottingham — Professor Emeritus at the University of Reading and Honorary Fellow of St. John's College, Oxford — whose latest book The Humane Perspective (Oxford University Press) is a bold call for philosophy to reconnect with lived experience, emotion, and spiritual reality. John argues that our culture's obsession with left-brain detachment — from academia to AI to tech utopianism — is cutting us off from what makes us most human: vulnerability, transcendence, and the humility to acknowledge our limits.

Topics covered:

Why philosophy's obsession with detached logic misses the point of being human

The "epistemology of involvement" — and why being porous is more powerful than being critical

AI, tech billionaires, and the dangerous fantasy of total control

The longing for transcendence and why even a well-fed, comfortable life leaves us yearning

What Augustine, Aquinas, Freud, and Jung all agree on about self-knowledge

Why religion is a practice, not a theory — and what that means for non-believers

The Humane Perspective by John Cottingham — Oxford University Press

 johncottingham.co.uk

---

Mindform is an exclusive membership platform that gives you access to an ever-expanding toolkit for mental mastery and a community of passionate psychitects.
Apply to join Mindform or get the free Psychitect's Toolkit at https://mindform.io/podcast

What if everything you've been told about managing anxiety is making it worse? What if the kindest thing you can do for your kids — or yourself — is to stop trying to fix the feeling?

Dr. Alissa Jerud is a psychologist, Penn faculty member, and author of Emotion Savvy Parenting. She specialises in anxiety disorders, OCD, PTSD, and emotional regulation, using her ART framework — Accept, Regulate, Tolerate — to help people build a fundamentally different relationship with discomfort.

In this conversation, Frank and Alissa explore why our instinct to soothe anxiety is the very thing that sustains it — and what it looks like to actually let it be.

Topics covered:
- Why anxiety misfires — and why that doesn't make it your enemy
- The exposure therapy process: what 10–20 sessions really look like
- The "fly at the picnic" analogy that reframes everything about acceptance
- Why popular anxiety advice in the media is doing more harm than good
- How Alissa's own parenting struggles transformed her clinical practice
- What it means to be the "rock" for your kids without fixing their emotions

---

Emotion Savvy Parenting — Available here: https://www.amazon.com/Emotion-Savvy-Parenting-Alissa-Jerud/dp/1032544945
Learn more at: alissajerud.com

---

Mindform is an exclusive membership platform that gives you access to an ever-expanding toolkit for mental mastery and a community of passionate psychitects. Apply to join Mindform or get the free Psychitect's Toolkit at https://mindform.io/podcast