Flourishing After Addiction with Carl Erik Fisher

Wise Effort, with Dr. Diana Hill

Jul 31, 2025

In this engaging discussion, psychologist Dr. Diana Hill, an expert in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), shares insights from her upcoming book, Wise Effort. She explores the concept of 'wise effort' and how it differs from struggling against our challenges. Diana opens up about her own experiences with anorexia and the limitations of traditional treatments, emphasizing the importance of values and community support in recovery. The conversation also touches on the intersection of technology and therapy, highlighting the need for mindfulness in our fast-paced digital lives.

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ANECDOTE

Diana Hill’s Eating Disorder Journey

Diana Hill struggled with anorexia and bulimia through her youth and early adulthood.
Her anorexia brought her to hospitalization when she dropped to 72 pounds, marking a critical wake-up moment for her recovery journey.

INSIGHT

Beyond Medical Model in Recovery

Traditional medicalized eating disorder treatments failed to address the whole person.
Recovery integrates science with spirituality, compassion, and acceptance, exemplified in 12-step groups and ACT.

ANECDOTE

Leaving PhD For Healing Ashram

Diana relapsed in her clinical psychology PhD program due to stress and unhealthy perfectionism.
She left to a yoga ashram to realign her recovery and found a new approach to healing and serving others.

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My guest on the show today is Diana Hill, psychologist and ACT expert, whose new book Wise Effort: How to Focus Your Genius Energy Where it Matters Most comes out in September and deserves your attention—particularly if you're drawn to the intersection of behavioral science, modern psychotherapies, and contemplative wisdom. Diana is a leading voice in psychological flexibility, known for making complex ideas both practical and grounded.

Our conversation focuses on one of my major preoccupations: effort, right effort, wise effort--what makes effort wise and how to cultivate the wisdom to discern what you can't change from what you can. She has done wonderful work on psychological flexibility and the art of directing our finite energies toward what actually matters.

We also talk about the deeper aspects of that question: how we make peace with the fundamental difficulty of being human, how to be with discomfort, how to navigate traditional treatment versus other practices in the messiness of life.

Diana was very kind to share her own experience with anorexia and the limitations of traditional treatment, and how that shaped not just her therapeutic approach, but her psychological perspective. We explore how the conventional idea of fighting against our difficulties is often precisely what keeps us stuck, and what it looks like to work with our psychology rather than against it.

We alo talk about attachment patterns, values clarification, the wisdom of the body, couples work and intimacy, and even touch on artificial intelligence. I found it personally very helpful and enlightening and I hope you do too!

Check out my Substack posts for more links to Jud's work and our previous conversation.

Sign up for my newsletter and immediately receive my own free guide to the many pathways to recovery, as well as regular updates on new interviews, material, and other writings.