Pulling The Thread with Elise Loehnen
Writer Elise Loehnen explores life’s big questions with today’s leading thinkers, experts, and luminaries: Why do we do what we do? How can we understand and love ourselves better? What would it look like to come together and build a more meaningful world? Sales and Distribution by Lemonada Media https://lemonadamedia.com/
Episodes
August 13, 2026 • 57 mins
David Epstein is a journalist and the #1 New York Times–bestselling author of Inside the Box (which we’re talking about today), Range, and The Sports Gene. He tells some fascinating stories that he uncovered during his research that challenge or complicate a lot of cultural perceptions about: freedom (often, sadly, the death knell of creativity!), originality and innovation (turns out there is an optimal level of newnes...
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August 6, 2026 • 58 mins
Claude Steele is a social psychologist, a professor of psychology at Stanford University, and the author of Churn: The Tension That Divides Us and How to Overcome It. Churn refers to the stress we often feel in diverse settings in everyday life; it’s the psychological reaction to being under identity threat—which is something we can all experience based on any myriad number of identity factors. Steele explains how churn...
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July 30, 2026 • 58 mins
If you’ve been tuning into July’s special series of sorts, thank you, and I hope you’ve also been enjoying revisiting these conversations from the archives, or maybe you’re discovering them for the first time. Today, we have a big one with Jungian analyst James Hollis, PhD, who is the author of many, many books that are incredibly meaningful to me. And this conversation still lives up to how much I love his ...
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July 27, 2026 • 50 mins
I’m thrilled to be back on the podcast mic again—I’ve been healing from a double mastectomy and I’m doing well! Thank you to everyone who has been thinking of me. This update covers: the surgery experience, the energy healers and lymphatic masseuse I’ve been working with, a few essential things I bought for the recovery phase, something my friends did that was a huge help, and the mini revelations that...
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July 23, 2026 • 60 mins
This special episode initially ran early in 2025 but I wanted to bump it up for those of you who missed it and also because I honestly think Richard Rohr is worthy of a re-listen. If you’re not already familiar with Richard Rohr, he’s a wonderful Franciscan friar, the founder of the Center for Action and Contemplation, and one of my most profound teachers. I really loved and highly recommend his book The Tears of Things...
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July 16, 2026 • 66 mins
Gabor Maté, MD, is renowned for his work on addiction, stress, trauma, and understanding and healing from illness. He has written several books, including The Myth of Normal. As part of a special series of sorts this month, I’m turning back to a conversation I had with him a few years ago about his perspective on the relationship between how we live, the culture we live in, and our health.
For the show notes, head to elise...
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July 9, 2026 • 55 mins
I believe this is the most-listened-to episode ever on Pulling the Thread. It’s a conversation that I had with therapist Esther Perel in 2023 that still stands to this day—but that’s Esther for you. I think it also highlights how difficult it remains for many of us to get comfortable with conflict in our relationships, and to disagree and even fight, productively, with someone else. Whether you tend to avoid frict...
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July 2, 2026 • 50 mins
Hi, friends. For those who are interested, I’m saying more about this in my solo episodes, but as I was preparing to recover from a non-life-threatening (and yet major) health surgery, I spent some time thinking about what would be meaningful to share with you all for the next few weeks or so. And I landed on a shortlist of conversations that I’ve had on Pulling the Thread over the years that resonated with listeners, t...
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June 29, 2026 • 54 mins
I spent the past month largely recovering from a (successful) double mastectomy—it was very intense, and I also had amazing care, from my team at UCLA, and from my family and friends. I am healing well and my prognosis couldn’t be better—I’m very lucky that intervention was early and I am not fighting for my life. I recorded this episode before my surgery—I did this for a number of reasons: to record t...
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June 25, 2026 • 63 mins
Mark Wolynn is a pioneer in the field of inherited family trauma, the director of the Family Constellation Institute in San Francisco, and author of the recently updated classic It Didn't Start with You (there’s also now a companion workbook). I find his work endlessly fascinating. Here, he helps us see how inherited family trauma, attachment trauma, and unconscious loyalty is often unknowingly affecting our lives—and, ...
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June 18, 2026 • 52 mins
After the shocking end of her marriage, Belle Burden chose not to let herself get erased. Today, we talk about what she chose instead and the person she’s evolved into since writing her stunning memoir Strangers. Burden reminds me that while we can’t always understand why people do what they do, we can learn to live tethered to our own truth.
For the show notes, head to my website.
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June 11, 2026 • 63 mins
I had so much fun reading psychologist Paul Eastwick’s book Bonded by Evolution: The New Science of Love and Connection. A lot of his work reveals the enduring myths that are engrained in our culture and our minds about attraction, compatibility, gender differences, and relationships—and why these myths have been somewhat mistakenly connected to evolutionary psychology. The way he debunks these myths is so helpful, and ...
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June 4, 2026 • 57 mins
“That’s the kind of story, that's the kind of image that I'm talking about—that really just sinks into you and won’t let go,” says psychologist Sharon Blackie. Today, Blackie returns to discuss her new book Ripening: Why Women Need Fairytales Now. Once again, her perspective is helping me make sense of who we are at different stages of our lives.
Sharon's first episode on Pulling the Thread: "How to...
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May 28, 2026 • 58 mins
“We’re all addicted to light,” says Andrew Holocek, author of Total Eclipse of the Mind: Unleashing the Power of Darkness for Creativity, Healing, and Transformation. “We’re all light junkies in the deepest possible way. And so because we're so lost in the light, blinded by the light, that I think the pendulum is swinging back. And there's a deep intimation, it may be inarticulate for a number of peopl...
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May 25, 2026 • 31 mins
As I’m heading into a series of initiations, I’m sharing a few challenges (opportunities!) that I’m sure many of you are familiar with: our struggle to prioritize ourselves, worrying over what will happen if I slow down, wanting to have faith in myself in the way that I have faith in other people and in the world. In this month’s solo episode, I’m also sharing a bit about my upcoming move from Substack...
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May 21, 2026 • 54 mins
New York Times–bestselling author Bruce Feiler is back after just a few years with another great one, A Time to Gather: How Ritual Created the World—and How It Can Save Us. Today, he reveals what he’s learned about the rise of reinvented rituals. He shares some incredible stories of people around the world who are creating rituals for all kinds of moments—from celebrating professional and personal milestones...
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May 14, 2026 • 47 mins
Ibram X. Kendi, is the author of the #1 New York Times–bestseller How to Be an Antiracist. His new book is Chain of Ideas: The Origins of Our Authoritarian Age. It is incredibly insightful and illuminating in terms of mapping out how we got to where we are, around the world. And what Kendi shares in our conversation today is also quite helpful in terms of pointing us in a new direction.
For the show notes, h...
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May 7, 2026 • 58 mins
I met Stacey Lindsay about a decade ago and worked with her for a few years—she’s a curious, compassionate journalist and writer—but I didn’t know much of her own incredible personal story until I read her new book Being 40 and had this conversation with her. We talked about the meaning of this decade of our lives, but more broadly, we talked about the scripts and checklists that women are often ha...
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April 30, 2026 • 55 mins
In 2018, health and science journalist Alexandra Sifferlin began her investigation into the American diagnosis crisis: Why are so many people being misdiagnosed? What is the cost of this error? Who is trying to change the system—and what does a better healthcare system (for all of us) look like? The resulting book—The Elusive Body—is a fascinating read. Today, we cover the major parts of Sifferlin’s investig...
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April 27, 2026 • 38 mins
I had some personal highs this April, and also a strange feeling (for me, someone who is constantly in motion, always moving forward) of being a bit unmoored—a reminder of needing to wait, of letting cycles be, of accepting stillness (or trying to, at least). I’ve also been thinking of a (related) Carissa Schumacher metaphor—the idea that each of us prefers a different part of the cycles of life: seeding, growing,...
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