Immersion

This is Part 2 of our discussion on the Paradox of Choice and dating apps.

In this episode, I’m joined by a friend to discuss his experiences navigating dating apps in a place like New York City, where the paradox of choice can feel particularly prevalent.

Throughout this larger decision-making series, we've been using Barry Schwartz’s book, The Paradox of Choice, as a guide to explore how having more options can actually make decision-making harder. We also discuss concepts from the book including maximizers and satisficers, and how these different approaches to making choices can...

If you’ve been on the apps for some time, you know that while there are more options than ever to find love presented in front of us, in many ways, it can feel harder. This is counterintuitive - so in this episode, we explore why that is the case and apply The Paradox of Choice by Barry Schwartz to the dating context.

In this episode, we cover:

- An experiment I did over the summer: dating 12 men in 12 weeks, what I learned, and the deeper psychological reason behind the experiment.
- Statistics and th...

Would you rather feel happy with your decision or make a slightly better “objective” choice?

It’s an interesting question, and in this episode, we unpack it through the lens of maximizing vs. satisficing. What does it mean to make a “good enough” choice versus the “best” choice? And what makes a choice the best one, anyway? Is it really the best choice if it leaves you filled with regret or constantly comparing yourself to others?

We’ll explore research from Barry Schwartz’s book The Paradox of Choice, alongside some of my own theories about how maximizi...

Do you struggle making decisions? The vast amount of optionality in our modern world has improved our lives in many ways, but it has also left many of us feeling frozen - trapped under the weight of our decisions and the fear of regret.

If you struggle with decisions big or small, this series on decision-making is for you. Specifically, we will ask: Do more options actually make our lives better? We will examine this in relationships, places to live, media, and more. We will also explore decision fatigue, heuristics, and research by Barry Schwartz from The...

If you imagine 12 people lined up and ask each of them what it means to be successful, you may be surprised to realize that almost everyone is using a different scoreboard. Even two people who are both trying to become more intelligent could have completely different ideas of what intelligence (and success within it) actually looks like.

We are all running different races or playing different games, so to speak. But what game are you playing? And did you consciously choose it?

In this episode, we explore the invisible rubrics we use to measure our...

Life can feel like a lot of moving parts. Work, relationships, health, money, creativity, family, fun - when everything is swirling around at once, it can be hard to step back and see the whole picture.
For more than a decade, I’ve used a simple practice to help with this: breaking my life into categories. The categories have changed as my life has changed, but I keep coming back to the framework when I want to regroup, set goals, or simply see where things stand.
In this episode, I walk through my current categories, how they’ve e...

Today we welcome Rebecca Stone to the podcast to talk about somatic therapy - the intersection of mind, body, and emotions. I had been wanting to speak to someone with this expertise because sometimes I feel like emotions are almost “trapped” in my body, and thinking my way out feels impossible. We hear a lot about the nervous system these days, but I wanted to speak to someone who works practically at the intersection of mind and body.

Rebecca teaches us about Hakomi therapy and the bioenergetics and Core Energetics models. She shares a framework of five char...

I sat down with clinical psychologist Anita, who specializes in trauma work to talk about what working through trauma actually looks like, how trauma-focused therapy works, and what healing can look like in practice.

Timestamps: 
00:00  Meet Anita & What we cover in this episode 
01:42 When Are You Ready to Work on Trauma?
03:08  What Is Trauma-Focused Therapy?
04:08  Avoidance: How Do We Avoid Looking at Trauma?
07:18  Trauma, Self-Worth & Bridging the Gap Between Knowing and Feeling
10:57  Cognitive Processing Therapy & Incremental Improvement
12:00  How Different Forms of Therapy Work Together
16:55  Corrective Experiences & Healing in Connection
18:50...

How do we make our lives feel fuller, more alive, and packed with meaningful memories? Often we stick to the same routine - watching the same shows or scrolling the same apps - even if we would rather be at a book reading by a local author, jumping in to dance at a free salsa class, or taking part in a board game meetup group.

It can be hard to know about the vast array of events happening in our cities and towns, and it can also be hard to then make ourselves go to them (assuming...

Contempt is one of the most damaging emotions in human connection - but what exactly is it, and why can it be so difficult to let go of?

In this episode of Immersion, we explore the walls that are often built between ourselves and others, sometimes unspoken and sometimes maintained for decades. These walls can form between people in romantic relationships, workplaces, the political arena, group dynamics, and even within our relationship to ourselves.

Some psychologists suggest that contempt doesn’t simply go away on its own - it persists unless we begin to break do...

Are the love languages actually still a useful tool in 2026?

The original 5 Love Languages book was published by Dr. Gary Chapman in 1992, but the framework is still talked about today - from long-term relationships to first dates and everything in between.

In this episode, we take a nuanced look at the love languages and ask:

How do we balance our past experiences and tendencies with the freedom of who we can become? In this episode, part 3 of a mini-series on identity and self-concept, we explore how psychology and philosophy can help us use identity as a tool, without becoming trapped by the story we tell ourselves about who we are.

In this episode, we discuss:

What is the self? Are we as fixed as we think we are? In this episode, we explore identity, freedom, and self-concept through the lenses of philosophy and spirituality.

Last week, we explored how our self-concept forms through psychology. This week, we're taking the next step.

In this episode, we explore:
- Bad faith with Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir.
- Is there a permanent self? Perspectives from David Hume and Buddhism.
- Who—or what—are we beneath our thoughts? Insights from Eckhart Tolle and Alan Watts.

I'm exci...

In order to love ourselves, we first have to know ourselves. But getting to know ourselves isn't always easy. Over time, we can become attached to a particular identity or story about who we are. While that story may be true, it may only be one part of us, leaving other authentic parts hidden beneath the surface.

In this episode of Immersion, we explore how our self-concept develops, why we become attached to certain identities, and how we can begin reconnecting with who we are beneath the roles, labels, and stories we've accumulated over time.

...

Ever feel like the second dating gets stressful, anxious, or overwhelming, your only option is to hit pause and retreat? While taking space is completely valid, true relational growth actually happens in connection with others - not just sitting alone in a room meditating.

In this episode, we explore how to actively work on yourself while staying in the dating game. By leaning into attachment theory and creating safe, corrective experiences, we can use the dating process as a powerful mirror for healing, rather than something we constantly need to escape from.

What We Cover...

Part 1 was about the clinical definitions and the "why" behind limerence - this episode is about what it actually feels like to live through it. 

Limerence is a unique experience with some of the highest highs and lowest lows we can go through. 

In this episode, we are diving into the lived reality of the limerent mind. We look at how we use art and music to seek solace or feed the obsession, how obstacles keep the fantasy alive, and what happens when we constantly try to "solve" another person at the expense of ou...

Have you ever found yourself completely consumed by thoughts of someone, to the point where it feels less like a crush and more like an overwhelming, permanent presence in your mind?

In this episode, we are doing a deep, nuanced dive into the concept of limerence - a state of profound romantic infatuation, obsessive thoughts, and an intense desire for emotional reciprocation. If you have ever felt trapped by these intense feelings, or wondered why your brain seems to latch onto a specific person with such intensity, this episode is a compassionate space to understand the psychology...

Do you ever feel like your value as a person depends entirely on your last achievement, your productivity, or what someone else thinks of you? You’re not alone.

This is part 4 in our 10 part series on improving our relationship with ourselves. (See the whole self-worth series here: 
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLPJBR0a3Yz6vsH5TkuPFtd2b7YgbL11OG )

And in this episode we’re diving deep into the concept of contingent (or conditional) self-worth - that exhausting cycle of making our worth dependent on external factors. We talk about where this...

The topic of self-worth cuts deeper than self-esteem. That is because self-worth is an internal sense that you are enough, and that you are fundamentally deserving of love and respect.

In Part 3 of our "Relationship to Self" series, we are diving deep into the foundations of self-worth.

In this episode, we look at:

While self-esteem may seem like an elusive, vague concept, there are practical, everyday actions we can take to build it. In this episode, we explore the actionable frameworks outlined in the classic book, The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem by Nathaniel Branden. Together, we will dive into all six pillars: living consciously, self-acceptance, self-responsibility, self-assertiveness, living purposefully, and living with integrity. Beyond the theory, we’ll look at real-world examples and the exact tools needed to implement them, such as Branden's famous sentence completion exercises. I've also included several of my favorite quotes from the book. I hope this helps yo...

You likely know how you feel about your relationships with other people - but how do you feel about your relationship with yourself?

Whether we realize it or not, our relationship with ourselves influences nearly everything: our relationships, choices, ambitions, and even how we interpret everyday experiences.

In this new series, we'll explore that relationship from many angles, including self-esteem and self-worth, validation, comparison, limerence, trauma, self-concept, and more.

In this first episode, we explore why our relationship with ourselves matters so much - and why examining it isn't just navel-gazing or self-absorption...

There’s an often-overlooked personality trait that shapes how you process almost everything you encounter day-to-day. While traits like introversion and extraversion get all the spotlight, this core piece of our psychology is just as crucial to understand.
Originally introduced by Carl Jung, the balance between Intuition and Sensing dictates whether you prefer to live in the tangible world of facts or the world of endless possibilities.

In this episode, we explore:

If you’ve ever felt deeply grateful and incredibly sad at the exact same time, you know emotions don't always fit into neat boxes. We often view emotions as a simple spectrum, with happiness on one end and sadness on the other. But our feelings are far more nuanced than that. Instead of living on opposite sides of a continuum, our emotions operate more like individual "knobs" that turn up and down independently. In this episode, we explore how embracing this complexity can enrich our lives, help us move away from black-and-white thinking, and deepen our connections with others. We...

We’ve all heard the basic advice: turn off notifications, put your phone in grayscale, or just "try harder." But if you’re like me, those tips didn't stick. After years of experimentation and diving into the psychology of habit formation, I’ve finally found a system that is working for me.

In this episode (Part 2 of our series on technology), we are moving past the philosophy and getting into more specific action steps. We’re talking about building friction, managing decision fatigue, and finding the "why" that actually keeps you away from the screen.

In thi...