BKRVW02: Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport. This is a helpful book reviewing how we can change our behaviors with digital media in ways that benefit our lives. Cal does a wonderful job looking at the pitfalls of social media and “Attention Engineering” and how that can impact our lives negatively. He offers practical ideas to implement towards regaining our lives back in more meaningful ways then trying to live through digital interfaces. It is worth a read if you are considering changing how you use digital media and in particular social media, because you have found that it often leaves you unsatisfied.

Episode 41. How to Keep a Relationship Part 2. Ulland and Jo complete their discussion of habits and patterns for healthy communication. This episode reviews role-reversals, and valuing emotional intimacy.  These episodes will be followed by an episode reviewing how one ends a relationship from a DBT perspective.

Episode 40. How to Keep a Relationship Part 1. Ulland and Jo review habits and patterns of healthy communication which lay the foundations for relationships worth keeping. They review a dialectical approach, stress tolerance, integrity, wisdom, sharing emotional space, accountability, and self reflection.

BKRVW01: Drunk Tank Pink by Adam Alter. This is the first book review by Ulland for this podcast. Due to having a life to live, and in this case the Packers needing to win one more game today to be in the Superbowl, Jo is not present. This book is worthy of a read for ease and interest. There are lot of interesting ideas for how humans are easily influenced by environment in both good and not so good ways.   This is a good book to read if you want to know what lights or colors are best for you for various reasons, why heat waves in the South should be avoided, yet why you might be more willing to drive south than North because it oddly feels “downhill” rather than uphill both ways like our parents lived life. I would also refer you to Sensation by Thalma Lobel, PhD.

Episode 39. Not a cult? Why so much Kool-Aid? In this episode Ulland and Jo review how DBT may be confused as being a closed group, often misunderstood by other treatment providers from other models. It has been accused as being cult-like from outsiders—just like most cults are accused of being cults from outsiders. They review Theo Dorpat’s book on Gaslighting, Double Binds, and Covert Control in psycho analysis. The unit has a culture of care, but not a CULTure. And . . . the Kool-Aid IS delicious.

Episode 38. Black Friday Dog Adoption. In this episode Ulland discusses his family’s difficulty adopting a previously not-so-loved canine. Jo provides moral support and some feedback with respect to dialectical approach, catching missed opportunities and repairing in the moment. We review the importance of grieving the loss of pets. Children learn how to deal with loss and be more able to grieve future losses.

Episode 37. Interview2: Matt.  In this episode Ulland and Jo invite Jo’s good friend Matt to a conversation. Matt skips the “pleasantries,” willingly jumping into the deep end. He shares the importance of healthy adults, particularly when our own parents are struggling emotionally. He discusses how people in their suffering unintentionally cause suffering in others, which leads to a discussion of how it can be difficult to grieve loss because the common assumption that we must also be angry. We discussed how participants in 12 step programs helped Matt, as a child, makes sense of his experiences. Ulland and Jo answer Matt’s question about what we think would useful for ministers to know form a therapist’s point of view. Jo ties the conversation into core concepts that have been reviewed in previous podcast episodes.

Episode 36. Welcome to 2020, if we are not there already. In this episode Ulland and Jo discuss New Year’s resolutions. Jo provides some helpful pointers at how to view resolutions more as intention, and how to use behaviorism to lead to greater success with change. We review how any change is best accomplished through connecting intent within values.

Episode 35. Happy Holidays. In this episode Ulland and Jo talk a little about the holidays which leads to a discussion about fitting back into a family system after experience personal changes. In general, they suggest decreasing expectations, practicing radical acceptance and keeping a dialectical stance. Both explain that there often can be a sadness to radical acceptance of distance in relationships around the holidays. There can be a new stillness to be found through practicing being skills and mindfulness. And, why is it again that we HAVE to do things a certain way for the holidays if we don’t actually WANT to?

Episode 34. While in Atlanta at the 2019 ISIT DBT conference, Ulland and Jo finish an interview with Izzy and Julianna, a mother-daughter dyad from a family they worked with over two years ago. They share what it was like to transition home and adjust to life as usual. They discuss how it was to be more congruent with emotion and far more skillful than before, sometimes in relationships that are not reinforcing of emotional vulnerability and effectiveness.