Jessica Lamb Shapiro
The One You Feed | Personal Growth, Emotional Resilience & Purpose
Jessica Lamb-Shapiro is the author of the book Promise Land: My Journey through America's Self-Help Culture. Jessica Lamb-Shapiro has published fiction and nonfiction in The Believer, McSweeney's, Open City, and Index magazine, among others. She has been a fellow at the MacDowell Colony and the New York Foundation for the Arts, and is a graduate of Brown (BA) and Columbia (MFA).
We loved the great writing, the honest look at self-help, and the insights that she delivers. This was a really fun conversation that left us with a lot to think about.
In This Interview Jessica and I Discuss...
The One You Feed parable.
How positive thinking can become denial.
The history of self-help stretching back to ancient Egypt.
Using self-help terminology to avoid emotional intimacy.
Challenges with the Law of Attraction.
The paradox of self improvement: When should you accept yourself and when should you try to change.
When is acceptance the right course and when is it settling?
How cliches can become meaningless but yet still contain so much truth.
Finally being able to talk about her mothers suicide.
Growing up with a self-help author as a father.
Jessica Lamb-Shapiro Links
Jessica Lamb-Shapiro Homepage
Buy Promise Land: My Journey through America's Self-Help Culture
Jessica on Twitter
Some of our most popular interviews you might also enjoy:
Mike Scott of the Waterboys
Todd Henry- author of Die Empty
Randy Scott Hyde
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Available Results
Generated results are saved to your library for reuse and search.
Choose Template
Pick the result you want. You can review provider and model before generating.
A concise first-pass summary for understanding the episode quickly.
A comprehensive, source-grounded extraction of the reusable knowledge in an episode.
Technologies, AI models, technical methods, capabilities, limitations, and adoption implications.
Repeatable methods, frameworks, mental models, processes, and systems.
A dedicated analysis of warnings, limitations, trade-offs, weak evidence, and uncertainty.
A dedicated inventory of concrete resources named in the episode.
A concise first-pass summary for understanding the episode quickly.
A detailed readable summary organized by chapter or topic.
A navigable map of subjects, topic flow, and suggested chapters.
A comprehensive, source-grounded extraction of the reusable knowledge in an episode.
Reusable atomic knowledge units extracted from the episode.
A comprehensive extraction focused on health practices, protocols, claims, and safety caveats.
A comprehensive extraction focused on opportunities, strategy, markets, and company building.
Explicit actions, next steps, habits, recommendations, and things to avoid.
A dedicated inventory of concrete resources named in the episode.
A dedicated analysis of warnings, limitations, trade-offs, weak evidence, and uncertainty.
A concise first-pass summary for understanding the episode quickly.
A detailed readable summary organized by chapter or topic.
A navigable map of subjects, topic flow, and suggested chapters.
A comprehensive, source-grounded extraction of the reusable knowledge in an episode.
Reusable atomic knowledge units extracted from the episode.
A comprehensive extraction focused on health practices, protocols, claims, and safety caveats.
A comprehensive extraction focused on opportunities, strategy, markets, and company building.
Scientific findings, mechanisms, studies, hypotheses, and the limits of the evidence discussed.
Technologies, AI models, technical methods, capabilities, limitations, and adoption implications.
Investment theses, assets, catalysts, valuation reasoning, time horizons, and risks.
Chronologies, actors, causes, consequences, turning points, and competing historical interpretations.
Policies, proposals, stakeholders, arguments, implementation constraints, and predicted effects.
Career paths, skills, hiring signals, workplace decisions, transitions, and limitations of the advice.
Behavioral mechanisms, biases, motivation, habits, emotions, interventions, and evidence limitations.
Economic mechanisms, incentives, indicators, market structure, forecasts, and uncertainty.
Leadership principles, team systems, organizational design, culture, feedback, and failure modes.
Audience, positioning, messaging, acquisition, retention, experiments, metrics, and failed approaches.
Teaching methods, learning strategies, practice, feedback, assessment, and effectiveness evidence.
Theses, premises, arguments, objections, values, thought experiments, and unresolved questions.
Communication patterns, conflict, boundaries, expectations, repair methods, and contextual limitations.
Books, papers, authors, courses, and other learning resources mentioned in the episode.
Repeatable methods, frameworks, mental models, processes, and systems.
Explicit actions, next steps, habits, recommendations, and things to avoid.
Memorable statements and important claims with attribution and source context.
A dedicated inventory of concrete resources named in the episode.
A dedicated analysis of warnings, limitations, trade-offs, weak evidence, and uncertainty.