Hosts: Armand DiMele

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Living with Chronic Pain with Dr. Kent Robertshaw December 27, 2006

Host: Armand DiMeleGuests: Kent Robertshaw
Category: Addiction & Compulsion, Emotions & Inner Life

Chronic pain sufferers are blamed, disbelieved, and undertreated, and that abandonment can be as damaging as the pain itself. Armand DiMele and Dr. Kent Robertshaw, MD, Psychiatrist, trace how physical pain acquires an emotional life, how opiates seductively treat both, and why escalating narcotic use often signals depression and loneliness as much as bodily suffering.

Resiliency and Letting Go December 26, 2006

Host: Armand DiMele
Category: Emotions & Inner Life, Personal Growth & Change

Resilience is built on four pillars: a positive attitude, stress management, intentional participation in life, and self-care. Armand uses the year-end transition to encourage listeners to release old habits, grudges, and long-carried shame, and explores how a genuine apology can be the most liberating act of all.

The Science and Soul of Crying December 21, 2006

Host: Armand DiMele
Category: Depression & Mood, Emotions & Inner Life

Crying is not the cause of being upset but the sign of having already been upset, a release of accumulated stress hormones and toxins. Armand DiMele walks through the biochemistry of emotional tears, the handicap syndrome in animals, why suppressing tears feeds depression, and how to actually be present with someone who is crying.

Eating Well Through the Holidays December 20, 2006

Host: Armand DiMeleGuests: Roberta Maria Atin
Category: Personal Growth & Change, Society, Culture & Current Events

Why do Mediterranean immigrants gain weight in America but not at home? Armand and co-host Roberta Maria Atti open with a theory about American wheat before ranging into the psychology of celebration, how to handle holidays alone without turning sadness into anger, and practical remedies for holiday overindulgence.

The Meaning of Loyalty December 19, 2006

Host: Armand DiMele
Category: Emotions & Inner Life, Identity & The Self

What does it actually mean to be loyal, and to whom do we owe it? Armand DiMele works through loyalty in its many forms, from romantic fidelity and family bonds to political allegiance, arguing that real loyalty is a felt sense of devotion, not a pledge or an oath.

How Genes Shape Who We Are December 13, 2006

Host: Armand DiMeleGuests: Roberta Maria Atti
Category: Identity & The Self, The Mind & Neuroscience

Some people are wired to seek more risk, more novelty, more intensity, and it comes down to gene length. Armand DiMele and co-host Roberta Maria Atti break down how dopamine receptor efficiency, inherited through long or short gene sequences, shapes attention, risk-taking, sexuality, and vulnerability to addiction, and how stress hormones can actually switch genes on and off.

The Pain of Being Ostracized December 7, 2006

Host: Armand DiMele
Category: Emotions & Inner Life, Trauma & Healing

Being cast out hurts in ways that go beyond simple rejection. Armand DiMele traces ostracism from its ancient Athenian roots through race, family exile, and sexual abuse survivors silenced by the people who should protect them. Callers share raw personal experiences of being pushed to the margins.

How Memes Shape Human Behavior December 6, 2006

Host: Armand DiMeleGuests: Roberta Maria Atin
Category: Society, Culture & Current Events, The Mind & Neuroscience

Ideas spread like viruses, hijacking behavior without our awareness. Armand and co-host Roberta Maria Atti unpack Richard Dawkins’s concept of memes, tracing how cultural bits ranging from the Macarena to post-9/11 fear alerts to childhood warnings replicate, activate, and quietly condition thought and behavior.

The Psychology of Clutter and Hoarding November 30, 2006

Host: Armand DiMele
Category: Addiction & Compulsion, Identity & The Self

Clutter is a habit; hoarding is an illness, and Armand DiMele draws a clear line between them. He traces hoarding to a fragile sense of self, fear of loss, and compulsive just-in-case thinking, then takes calls from listeners wrestling with their own accumulation and the anger and grief beneath it.

The Flexibility of the Human Mind November 23, 2006

Host: Armand DiMeleGuests: Roberta Maria Atti
Category: Emotions & Inner Life, Personal Growth & Change

Gratitude and grief can coexist in the same moment, and that is the real gift of the human mind. Armand and co-host Roberta Maria Atti use Thanksgiving as a launching point to celebrate the mind’s astonishing ability to hold contradictions, process rapid change, and find connection even inside isolation.