Training Without Conflict™ Podcast Episode Five: Dr. Doug Lisle & Dr. Jen Howk

In this episode of the Training Without Conflict™ Podcast, Ivan Balabanov interviews two of his biggest inspirations, Dr. Doug Lisle and Dr. Jen Howk.

Dr. Lisle and Dr. Howk are the hosts of the very popular Beat Your Genes Podcast.

Dr. Doug Lisle received his undergraduate education from the University of California, San Diego (summa cum laude). He completed his Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology at the University of Virginia, where he was awarded the Presidents Fellowship and was a DuPont Scholar. He was then appointed Lecturer in Psychology at Stanford University, and worked on the research staff at the Department of Veterans Affairs at the National Center for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder in Palo Alto, California. His research and clinical interests have broadened to include health and wellness, self-esteem, relationship satisfaction, the treatment of anxiety disorders and depression, and optimizing achievement motivation. In addition to his work with Esteem Dynamics, he is currently the Director of Research for the TrueNorth Health Center and also serves as the psychologist for the McDougall Wellness Program, both located in Santa Rosa, California.

Dr. Jen Howk earned her B.A. with honors from the University of Washington, and her M.A. and Ph.D. from Harvard University.

Her academic research explores how state-society relations shape vulnerability, resilience, and social well-being. Her Ph.D. dissertation, “Too Dysfunctional to Govern: Trauma Capital and State Retreat in Rural Alaska,” explains how claims of historical and ongoing trauma, distress, and vulnerability in communities that lack alternative markers of status and success can become a stable source of social capital that paradoxically reinforces underdevelopment and inequality.

Dr. Lisle and Dr. Howk are now in the process of co-authoring a book based on Dr. Lisle's new method of approaching human psychology and wellbeing. He describes this approach as Esteem Dynamics – its core insights adapted from a revolutionary biological approach to psychology. Central figures having major influence on Dr. Lisle’s thinking include Richard Dawkins, John Tooby and Leda Cosmides, David Buss, Steven Pinker, and Geoffrey Miller. All of these individuals are considered academic A-list thinkers in evolutionary theory and human psychology. Somewhat surprisingly, insights from these trailblazers has yet to reach mainstream clinical psychology, and thus major advances stemming from some of the world’s greatest thinkers have yet to be systematically applied to problems of helping people improve their lives. Esteem Dynamics is the first such effort – born of Dr. Lisle’s 25-years of clinical experience wedded to the deep insights into human nature now available via evolutionary psychology.

Check out Dr. Lisle and Jen Howk's Esteem Dynamics

Check out the Beat Your Genes Podcast

Dr. Jen Howk's Podcast Howk Blocked Podcast

Dr. Lisle's TedX Talk about The Pleasure Trap

Dr. Lisle's Book "The Pleasure Trap: Mastering the Hidden Force that Undermines Health & Happiness"

Ivan Balabanov is a 2-time World...

The Pleasure Trap: Mastering the Hidden Force that Undermines Health & Happiness

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