A Podcast with Charlie Swenson - To Hell and Back
by Charlie Swenson, MD · 110 episodes
GovernmentHealthFitness
This podcast series, “To Hell and Back,” is focused on the nature of hellish experiences in life, how people get into them, and to present and discuss tools for coping with hell and getting out. The various podcasts will move back and forth between different varieties of hell in life, and different tools for coping. The tools will be drawn from dialectical behavior therapy (DBT), from other treatments, and from other life experiences.
Latest episodes
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52 min
World DBT Summit Coming – Episode 127
Charlie interviews Michaela Swales and Alec Miller, the co-hosts of the DBT World Summit that takes place October 28-30. Learn all that you need to know about this amazing first-ev…
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28 min
Synchronized Swimming – Episode 126
In this podcast Charlie recalls a piece of biological research he did 57 years ago, at college. He pursued the question: how is it that the 2 billion cells of the human heart, each…
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48 min
Dialectics, Democracy, Tyranny, Trump, and the American Way – Episode 125
In the wake of the recent killing by federal agents of two adults in Minneapolis, this podcast represents an attempt to deepen my perspective on these events, on Donald Trump, and…
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47 min
Does DBT Work as a Model for Understanding and Addressing a Fascist Takeover? – Episode 124
DBT’s emphasis on behavioral specificity, validation, and dialectical thinking, while effective for therapy, must be sufficiently grounded in deep moral convictions and motivationa…
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46 min
Bystanders Get Off the Sidelines Please – Episode 123
In this podcast Charlie reviews the six categories of people in the United States insofar as they are actors in the drama between democracy and authoritarianism, highlighting where…
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36 min
Nuggets of Gold in Piles of Sand – Episode 122
In this podcast, Charlie reflects on a recent consultation as a window into the way in which memory is tethered to certain moments, as an example of Linehan’s metaphor for validati…
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1 h 01
Amputation of Morality: What to Do About It? – Episode 121
The perspective within this podcast is that our current political process is seriously dysfunctional, having been taken over by decision-makers who seem disconnected from normal hu…
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40 min
Getting Out of Hell and Into Reality – Episode 120
This podcast focuses on the fact that we spend most of our lives living in the stories we tell ourselves about reality, but not in reality itself. Hear how DBT helps us to find our…
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48 min
What the fuck? Dialectics and Improvisation in Therapy and Everyday Life – Episode 119
In this podcast, I explore what is meant by dialectics in general, dialectics in the practice of DBT, and especially what it takes to “do dialectics-in-action.” It’s way more commo…
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46 min
Wise Mind, Polarization, Dialectics, and Stopping Fascism – Episode 118
In this podcast, the third in a series, I clarify the place of dialectics in DBT as an antidote to polarization. Using some case examples, I detail how one might use dialectics. Th…
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Learning to Say No Effectively to Fascism – Episode 117
To say NO to the forces and practices of fascism in the U.S., effectively enough to stop it, can be frightening. We will borrow from the DBT skills training model, explaining ways…
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57 min
When Hell is an Attack on Democracy – Episode 116
In this podcast, Charlie draws from DBT in search of ways to understand the current assault on democracy in the United States, and to become more effective at taking care of onesel…
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1 h 19
Adapting DBT Skills When Working with Autistic Individuals – Episode 115
In this episode, the fourth in a series on autism and DBT, Charlie is again joined by Amara Brooke and Rachel Kraus, two DBT therapists who are autistic and who have subspecialties…
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1 h 24
Challenging, Changing Course, Reframing. Irreverence in Therapy and Life – Episode 114
In this episode, Charlie explains, and gives lots of examples of, being irreverent in therapy. What is the essence? What is the point? Why is it important to do? Why is it hard to…
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1 h 13
Top Ten Tips for Adapting DBT to Autistic Clients – Episode 113
Charlie moderates a discussion between Amara Brook and Rachel Kraus, both of whom are DBT-informed therapists with subspecialties treating autistic and ADHD individuals, as they co…
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1 h 15
Do we use DBT to target autism? No – Episode 112
Charlie talks further with Amara Brook about autism, neurodiversity, and DBT: how can DBT be adapted, not to target autism itself, but to help autistic folks succeed at their own l…
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1 h 00
Autism, Neurodiversity and DBT – Episode 111
It seems that the world is paying more and more attention to autism in particular and neurodiversity in general. Beginning with this episode, Charlie talks with Amara Brooke, Ph.D.…
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1 h 00
Wise Mind – Episode 110
Charlie provides an in-depth discussion of WISE MIND as used in DBT. What is it, why is it so valuable, what are perspectives on it, what are its features, how do you access it and…
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1 h 07
“As Bad A Year As It Was, It Was As Good As It Could Have Been” – Episode 109
In a manner that is absolutely true to these words from her DBT and life mentor, Seth Axelrod, Andrea Gold has completed her one year of prescribed treatment for breast cancer, wit…
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46 min
Guaranteed Success, By Design - Episode 108
Be your best by inspiring the best in others. Join Nicole and Charlie as they tap into Cem Eren’s two-decades of wisdom training elite NBA athletes, boxers, bodybuilders, beauty co…