Sounds True: Insights at the Edge

Latest Episodes:

Just One Question | Lama Rod Owens: How Can I Receive Love? Nov 05, 2026

Show notes

Giving love comes easy, but can you actually receive it? Lama Rod Owens says most of us flinch at being cared for, even by something as simple as the chair we're sitting in. In this practice from his book The New Saints, he walks us through what it takes to actually let love in.

Lama Rod Owens, a Black Buddhist Southern Queen, authorized lama in the Kagyu lineage of Tibetan Buddhism, and author of The New Saints: From Broken Hearts to Spiritual Warriors, guides Tami Simon (and all of us listening) through a short meditation on receiving care, drawn straight from the pages of his new book.

In this conversation, Tami and Lama Rod explore:

Feeling supported by the seat or ground beneath you
Recalling a time someone, or something, really loved you
Letting that love move through the body, including the grief it can stir up along the way
Imagining the whole universe wanting you safe, happy, and free
Gently returning to the body and closing the practice

This one's for anyone who finds it easier to give love than to receive it, which, let's be honest, is most of us.

Taken from the full Insights at the Edge conversation with Lama Rod Owens. Find the complete interview in this feed or at https://bit.ly/new-saint

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Terri Cole: “Healing the Worthiness Wound” Nov 03, 2026

Show notes

Terri Cole calls it an invisible wound: the imprint left when a daughter never receives protection, presence, or emotional attunement from her father. This week, Tami Simon talks with Terri Cole—Sounds True's own Boundary Boss—about her new book, Father Wound, and why even women with loving fathers can carry this wound without ever naming it.

Terri Cole, MSW, LCSW, is a licensed psychotherapist, relationship expert, and best-selling author who has spent nearly three decades helping people break dysfunctional patterns and build healthier relationships with themselves and others. With Sounds True, she is the author of the trilogy that began with Boundary Boss and continued with Too Much: A Guide to Breaking the Cycle of High-Functioning Codependency. Her newest book, Father Wound: Break Unhealthy Patterns to Reclaim Your Worth and Power, examines what happens when a father or father figure is absent, abusive, immature, or simply not emotionally attuned—and why daughters of patriarchy carry a version of this wound no matter what kind of father they had.

In this conversation, Tami and Terri explore:

- How to recognize a father wound even when "my father wasn't that bad"

- Why Terri defines the father wound as, at its root, a worthiness wound

- The difference between self-parenting and re-parenting, and what healing your inner child looks like in daily decisions

- The "father wound trance": how old patterns resurface in adult relationships, and how to work with transference instead of being run by it

- Mourning the Dream, Terri's exercise for grieving the father you wished you'd had

- Why healing this wound personally is tied to healing patriarchy at a collective, societal level

Who this episode is for: anyone doing inner child work, anyone who keeps finding themselves in the same relationship pattern and wondering why, and anyone ready to ask whether their sense of worth was shaped long before they had any say in it.

Listen now, and start reclaiming your worth. →

This interview originally aired on Sounds True One, where you can enjoy early, ad-free access to episodes of Insights at the Edge: https://join.soundstrue.com/

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The Point of Insight | Enter the River Oct 29, 2026

Show notes

What do Hermann Hesse's Siddhartha, a roadside run-in with the law, and conversations with Eckhart Tolle, Caroline Myss, Rob Bell, and Liz Gilbert have in common? In this month's Point of Insight, Tami Simon follows a single image — the river — through her own life and through the teachers she's spent twenty years interviewing, and asks what it means to finally stop resisting the current and enter it.

In this Point of Insight, Tami explores:

How Hermann Hesse's Siddhartha first introduced her as a young person to the river as a symbol of timelessness and impermanence
A humbling roadside encounter with a police officer that became an unplanned teaching on the dangers of "self-congratulatory" thinking
Eckhart Tolle's answer to a question he's asked often at retreats: how do you know if you're making progress on the spiritual path?
A practice from Caroline Myss's new Spiritual Homebase community, viewing a current challenge first through the lens of fear, then through the lens of faith
Author and former megachurch pastor Rob Bell on reframing risk, and why the risk of not taking a risk is often the greater one
Elizabeth Gilbert's new memoir, All the Way to the River, her relationship with Rayya Elias, and the "two doors" conversation that changed the course of her life
The Buddhist teaching of the "stream-enterer," one of the earliest stages of awakening to an impermanent, flowing nature

For anyone standing at the edge of a change, a risk, or an uncertainty they haven't yet stepped into — press play and enter the river.

And if you’re intrigued by any of the guests mentioned in this episode, be sure to visit soundstrue.com/podcast to find their full episodes of Insights at the Edge.

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Diane Poole Heller: "The Surprising Superpowers of Insecure Attachment" Oct 27, 2026

Show notes

What if the parts of you that feel the most "broken" in relationships are actually superpowers in disguise? Tami Simon speaks with psychologist and attachment expert Dr. Diane Poole Heller about her new book, The Attachment Workbook, and why insecure attachment patterns aren't flaws to fix, but adaptive responses to understand—and heal.

Dr. Diane Poole Heller is an internationally recognized expert, author, and speaker specializing in adult attachment theory and trauma resolution. A former senior faculty member for Somatic Experiencing International, she studied for decades alongside trauma pioneer Dr. Peter Levine before developing DARE (Dynamic Attachment Re-patterning Experience), a somatic framework for healing insecure attachment. She is the author of The Power of Attachment and, most recently, The Attachment Workbook: Practical Exercises to Understand Your Patterns, Strengthen Connection, and Build Secure Relationships, part of Sounds True's Inner Workbook series.

In this conversation, Tami and Diane explore:

Why secure attachment is biological—something we're all wired for, not something only some people get
The hidden "superpowers" of avoidant, ambivalent, and disorganized attachment styles
How attachment wounds get physically trapped in the nervous system, and how the body completes what it couldn't finish
The near-death experience that redirected Diane's life's work toward love and connection
Why healing attachment doesn't require a partner, and how your relationship with yourself can be the starting point
The research-backed power of repair in relationships, and why learning to apologize well may matter more than never rupturing at all
Practical visualization exercises from The Attachment Workbook, including inviting in an imagined protector and healing the "attachment gaze"

This episode is for anyone who has wondered why connection feels so hard—whether you're a therapist, a partner, a parent, or simply someone ready to understand your own relational patterns with more compassion.

Listen now to discover why secure attachment isn't a fixed trait—it's a skill, and it's never too late to learn it.

This interview originally aired on Sounds True One, where you can enjoy early, ad-free access to episodes of Insights at the Edge: https://join.soundstrue.com/

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Just One Question | Jeffrey Rutstein: Did I Inherit My Nervous System? Oct 22, 2026

Show notes

Ever notice how a tiny criticism can send you into a full-blown spiral, and then you spend the rest of the day furious at yourself for spiraling? Dr. Jeffrey Rutstein has a theory about why that happens, and it starts before you ever had a say in the matter: with the nervous system you were born with.

Rutstein, a clinical psychologist, Hakomi-certified somatic psychotherapist, and host of Sounds True's Healing Trauma Program, talks with Tami Simon about inheriting his own mother's fight-or-flight wiring, and how a childhood encounter with Indra Devi's Yoga for Americans sent him down a decades-long path through pranayama, Hatha yoga, and Zen practice.

In this conversation, Tami and Jeffrey explore:

Why your baseline nervous system state is more inheritance than character flaw
How naming that inheritance can interrupt years of self-blame and shame
The difference between a fixed nervous system and one you can learn to shift

This one's for anyone who's ever hated themselves for "overreacting.” So…pretty much everyone.

Taken from the full Insights at the Edge conversation with Jeffrey Rutstein titled “Not Being a Prisoner To Your Nervous System.”

Find the complete interview: https://bit.ly/iate-jeffrey-rutstein

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Beatrice Chestnut: "Going Deeper with the Enneagram” Oct 20, 2026

Show notes

What if the type you've been typing yourself as isn't the whole story? Tami Simon sits down with Enneagram pioneer Beatrice Chestnut to mark the re-release of her classic guide, The Complete Enneagram, and to ask why facing our shadow, not avoiding it, is the real path to waking up.

Beatrice Chestnut, PhD, is a global expert, researcher, and educator on the Enneagram. She holds a PhD in communication studies and a master's degree in clinical psychology, and is a licensed psychotherapist, coach, and business consultant based in San Francisco. She is the author of several acclaimed books on the Enneagram, including the newly re-released edition of The Complete Enneagram: 27 Paths to Greater Self-Knowledge, widely considered a classic in Enneagram literature.

In this conversation, Tami and Beatrice explore:

The difference between personality (the protective "false self" formed in childhood) and our essential, true nature
Why each of the nine Enneagram types has its own distinct shadow challenge to confront and integrate
The 27 subtypes, and why Beatrice believes they matter far more than Enneagram "wings"
How the connecting lines, or arrows, reveal each type's specific growth pathway — and why the order matters
What each type looks like at its highest, most evolved expression
Why more people may be ready to "wake up" to who they really are now than ever before

This episode is for anyone who's taken an Enneagram test and wondered what to do next, as well as therapists, coaches, and longtime students of the system looking to go deeper with the subtypes.

Listen now to discover your own path to greater self-knowledge. →

This conversation offers genuine transmission, not just concepts about awakening, but the palpable presence of realized teachers exploring the growing edge of spiritual understanding together, and it originally aired on Sounds True One.

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Just One Question | Gabor Maté: What Keeps Me from Being More Compassionate? Oct 15, 2026

Show notes

Why do some of the most hardened people—lifers on death row, people who've killed—turn out to be, underneath it all, remarkably sensitive? Physician and trauma expert Dr. Gabor Maté has spent decades working with addicts and prisoners, and he's found a pattern that upends how we usually think about cruelty and compassion.

Dr. Gabor Maté is a physician and bestselling author whose work on trauma and addiction has shaped how millions understand pain, illness, and healing. He's the author of In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts, When the Body Says No, Scattered Minds, and, with his son Daniel, The Myth of Normal.

In this conversation, Tami and Gabor explore:

Why compassion is wired into us from birth — and what shuts it down
The neuroscience of care, drawing on affective neuroscientist Jaak Panksepp's research on emotional systems
What Gabor has witnessed firsthand working with lifers and people on death row
The difference between "orchid" and "dandelion" temperaments, and why high sensitivity can become either a liability or a gift
Why genes linked to addiction may really be genes for sensitivity

This one's for anyone trying to understand the roots of cruelty, or working through their own compassion fatigue—toward others, or toward themselves.

Taken from the full Insights at the Edge conversation with Gabor Maté titled “Gabor Maté: Healing Principles to Embody in a Traumatized World”: https://bit.ly/insights-gabor-mate

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Michelle Cassandra Johnson: "Invocations and Spellwork for Support and Protection" Oct 13, 2026

Show notes

Tami Simon speaks with author, mystic, and racial equity educator Michelle Cassandra Johnson about her new book, You Are Protected. Together they explore malevolent energies, calling on ancestors and archetypes for spiritual support, the practice of spiritual hygiene, and how spells work, sigils, and simple rituals like salt can help us stay grounded, protected, and connected to our own energy amid a turbulent time.

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Just One Question | Lissa Rankin: Can Healing Our Trauma Heal Our Bodies? Oct 08, 2026

Show notes

Physician Lissa Rankin says trauma doesn't just live in the mind, it can trigger measurable physical disease, from autoimmune conditions to chronic illness that conventional medicine can't explain. But her most provocative claim is the reverse: that healing the nervous system may be the missing piece in reversing illnesses that have resisted every other treatment.

Dr. Rankin, a physician and author of Sacred Medicine and the New York Times bestseller Mind Over Medicine, has spent years studying the link between the nervous system and self-healing, including polyvagal theory and the ventral vagal branch of the vagus nerve. In this conversation with Tami Simon, she widens the definition of trauma well beyond childhood wounds to include systemic racism, environmental toxins, and the everyday stress of simply living in the world today.

In this conversation, Tami and Lissa explore:

Why Dr. Rankin believes trauma and chronic illness are intrinsically connected
How polyvagal theory and the vagus nerve point to a physical mechanism for healing
Why "developmental trauma" can affect even people who had privileged childhoods
How collective traumas — like systemic racism and white-body supremacy — show up in the body
Why treating trauma isn't a guarantee of cure, but can still open the door to real healing

This episode is for anyone who has tried everything to heal a chronic or life-threatening illness and wants to understand what role the nervous system might play.

Taken from the full Insights at the Edge conversation with Lissa Rankin, "Is There a Holy Grail of Healing?" https://bit.ly/lissa-rankin

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Laurel Parnell: "The Evolution from EMDR to Multidimensional Integrative Healing" Oct 06, 2026

Show notes

Psychologist Laurel Parnell, a pioneer of EMDR and the creator of resource tapping, speaks with Tami Simon about her boldest evolution yet: multidimensional integrative healing. Forged in the wake of profound personal loss, this new approach draws on spirit release work, ancestral healing, and cross-cultural wisdom to ask what happens when trauma therapy meets the mystery of what isn't fully ours to carry.

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