Welcome to Mind Tricks Radio, where we’ll explore contemporary topics in Psychology, though interviewing creative and innovative thinkers in the field. I’m your host, Dr. Aaron Kaplan. Thanks for tuning in!
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In this episode of MindTricks Radio, I spoke with Matthew Emerzian, keynote speaker, author of Make It Matter, and CEO of the nonprofit Every Monday Matters. Matthew shares how a successful career in the music industry, working with some of the biggest names in entertainment, eventually gave way to panic, anxiety, and depression. That experience forced him to rethink what success meant and led him…
In this episode of MindTricks Radio, I spoke with Parul Somani, author of The Path of Least Regret, about how to make difficult decisions when there is no perfect answer and no certainty about how things will turn out. Drawing on her experience of being diagnosed with breast cancer at age 31, during the same week her second daughter was born, Parul explains how regret can become a useful guide…
In this episode of MindTricks Radio, I spoke with Dr. Kevin Pelletier, an associate professor of English at the University of Richmond, about apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic literature—where the tradition comes from, why it has endured for centuries, and why stories about the end of the world continue to speak so powerfully to the human imagination. We talk about the deep roots of apocalyptic…
In this episode of MindTricks Radio, I spoke with Dr. Art Markman about the subjectivity of age and time—why we often feel younger than the number on our birth certificate, why time seems to speed up as we get older, and what psychology can tell us about making life feel fuller, longer, and more meaningful. We talk about the difference between chronological age and subjective age, the strange…
In this episode of MindTricks Radio, I sit down with Dr. Mathias Clasen, associate professor of literature and media and co-director of the Recreational Fear Lab at Aarhus University in Denmark, to explore why people are so drawn to frightening stories — especially stories about the end of the world. Our conversation dives into the strange appeal of post-apocalyptic fiction, from its “blank slate”…
In this episode of MindTricks Radio, I caught up with Dr. Liza Wacker to continue our conversation about perfectionism—what it is, where it comes from, and why it can quietly create so much stress, anxiety, burnout, and self-doubt. We talk about the difference between healthy striving and perfectionism, how perfectionism shows up in relationships, parenting, work, athletics, creativity,…
In this episode of MindTricks Radio, I sit down with Dr. Elizabeth Mateer, a Harvard Medical School neuropsychology fellow, writer, and Psychology Today contributor, to explore how identity is shaped by memory, attention, emotion, and the stories we tell ourselves. We talk about the idea that the self is not fixed, but continually built and rebuilt through experience. Our conversation dives into…
In this episode of MindTricks Radio, I sit down with physician and novelist Dr. Peter Weiss to discuss Progeny, his chilling dystopian novel set in a world where every newborn is taken from its birth mother and reassigned by the state in the name of equity. At the heart of our conversation is the book’s most unsettling question: what happens when a society’s drive for fairness begins to override…
In this episode of MindTricks Radio, I sit down with author and motivational speaker Carla Ondrasik to talk about a deceptively simple word that may be quietly sabotaging our goals: try. In her book Stop Trying: The Life-Transforming Power of Trying Less and Doing More, Carla argues that the language we use with ourselves matters more than we realize. When we say we’ll “try,” we often leave the…
In this episode of Mind Tricks Radio, I sit down once again with guest co-host Dr. Tyler Ralston for a lively, practical conversation about the cognitive distortion of personalization — that sneaky mental habit of assuming that other people’s behavior, moods, or even major life events are somehow about us. Together, we unpack what personalization really is (and what it isn’t), including why “don’t…
