The Being Human Podcast with Richard Atherton

#361 How I Cured My GI Issues in 3 Months – Nora Rodden

▶️ Connect with Richard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/richardatherton-firsthuman/
 
What if many chronic symptoms - pain, IBS, migraines, fatigue, insomnia - aren’t caused by damage in the body, but by patterns in the brain?
 
In this episode of Being Human, Richard Atherton speaks with Nora Rodden, CEO and co-founder of the health app Nervana. After being hit by a car during university, Nora developed chronic back pain that persisted for five years despite countless treatments and no obvious lasting damage in her body. Later, severe digestive issues and insomnia followed.
 
Everything changed when she joined a clinical trial exploring neuroplastic pain, the idea that the brain can learn and sustain physical symptoms long after an injury has healed.
 
Through mind-body techniques including journaling, somatic awareness and visualisation, Nora eliminated her pain and restored her sleep.
 
Her experience led her to build Nervana, an AI-guided program designed to help people retrain their brain-body response and recover from chronic symptoms.
We discuss:
Facing the triple whammy of chronic pain, GI symptoms and insomnia
The "medical" trial that changed her life
The drug-free approach that cured her symptoms in 3 months
Her ground-breaking providing relief from pain
Should Advil carry a warning?
Links:Nervana App

#360 Why Therapy Can Fail Us - with author of Conscious Uncoupling, Katherine Woodward Thomas

▶️ Connect with Richard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/richardatherton-firsthuman/
 
Why do the same painful patterns keep repeating in our lives, in love, work, and relationships?
 
In this episode of Being Human, Richard Atherton is joined by New York Times Best Selling Author Katherine Woodward Thomas. Katherine originated the concept of Conscious Uncoupling through her book of the same name. She’s the author of the huge hit Calling in The One and has just released What's True About You.
 
Katherine shares how the stories we developed in childhood, which she calls “source fracture stories,” quietly shape our adult lives, relationships, and future possibilities. We think these are just “who we are,” but what if these are actually false stories developed way before we had the capacity to truly understand our lives?
 
We discuss:
The real point of manifestation (it's not the result)
When visiting the past is valuable and when it's not
Who is really the toxic one in your relationship?
What therapy gets wrong
The path forward for a merging of therapy and coaching
Links:Katherine’s Website

#359 Why Hope Is a Leadership Skill - Jen Fisher

▶️ Connect with Richard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/richardatherton-firsthuman/
 
Is hope naïve or is it the missing ingredient in modern leadership?
In this episode of Being Human, I speak with Jen Fisher, former Chief Wellbeing Officer at Deloitte and author of Hope Is the Strategy. After experiencing severe burnout herself, Jen discovered that hope isn’t wishful thinking — it’s a measurable, actionable skill grounded in research.
We explore why burnout may actually be a symptom of hopelessness, how leaders unintentionally kill hope through language and behaviour, and why cultivating agency, multiple pathways, and honest truth-telling transforms culture. Jen shares practical tools, including hope audits, hope spotting, and the power of vulnerability in leadership.
We discuss:
Burnout as a crisis of hopelessness
What real hope actually means
Leadership language that builds or kills hope
Practical tools to cultivate hopeful cultures
Links:Jen’s Website

#358 When Trust Breaks — And How to Repair It - Dennis Reina & Michelle Reina

▶️ Connect with Richard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/richardatherton-firsthuman/
What happens when trust breaks down in relationships, in leadership, in organisations?
 
In this episode of Being Human, I speak with Dennis and Michelle Reina, founders of the Reina Trust Building® Institute and authors of Trust & Betrayal in the Workplace. Drawing on decades of research and lived experience, they explain why trust is far more fragile than most leaders realise, and why rebuilding it requires courage, accountability, and choice.
 
We explore the three dimensions of trust, how victimhood traps us in blame, and why trust repair is not about forgetting but about responding differently. This is a deeply human conversation about conflict, repair, and responsibility, relevant to leaders, partners, and anyone navigating broken expectations.
 
We discuss:
Growing up with an alcoholic father
Why trust is fragile
The anatomy of betrayal
Victimhood vs responsibility
Practical steps to rebuild trust
Links:Reina Trust Building

#357 Creativity Is What Makes Us Human - Fredrik Haren

▶️ Connect with Richard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/richardatherton-firsthuman/
 
What if creativity isn’t a talent for the few, but the defining quality of being human?
 
In this episode of Being Human, I’m joined by Fredrik Haren, global creativity expert, speaker, and author of The World of Creativity. Fredrik has spent decades travelling the world studying where ideas come from and why modern organisations and education systems so often crush creative thinking.
 
We explore why creativity has little to do with confidence, why having ideas brings profound joy, and how each of us carries an “inner theme”: a unique perspective the world needs.
 
If you’re someone who sees yourself as ‘not creative’, or if you struggle to get your creativity flowing, this episode is a must-watch.
 
We explore:
How we don’t create for others
Why creativity defines humanity
How the get the ideas flowing
The joy of having ideas
Discovering your ‘inner theme’
 
Links:Fredrik’s Website

#356 What Happens When the Self Disappears? - Ken Wilber

▶️ Connect with Richard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/richardatherton-firsthuman/
 
What actually happens when the sense of “self” disappears — and does it make you wiser?
 
In this episode of Being Human, I’m joined by Ken Wilber, one of the most influential philosophers of human development and the founder of Integral Theory, something which played a big role in my own intellectual development. Ken shares his early awakening experience, in which he experienced a complete dissolution of the separate self, and explains why spiritual awakening alone does not equal psychological maturity or ethical wisdom.
 
We explore the crucial distinction between waking up and growing up. And why this explains how many spiritual gurus and their communities can become so toxic. Drawing on decades of scholarship, meditation, and systems thinking, Ken offers a comprehensive framework for understanding consciousness and development. This helps us to appreciate the multiple vectors and methods of human expansion. 
 
We explore:
What happens when the self dissolves
Waking up vs growing up
Stages of human development
Why maturity still matters
Links:Ken’s Website

#355 The Leadership Intelligence Everyone Ignores - Yosi Amram

▶️ Connect with Richard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/richardatherton-firsthuman/
 
What if great leadership requires more than IQ and EQ? In this episode of Being Human, I speak with Dr. Yosi Amram, psychologist, executive coach, and pioneer in developing our understanding of Spiritual Intelligence (SQ). Yosi offers a research-backed framework for translating spiritual values into practical action. Drawing on extensive empirical studies, Yosi shows how SQ predicts leadership effectiveness and personal well-being in ways traditional models miss.
 
And Yosi is not speaking only as an academic. Yosi held the record for the fastest promotion to captain in the history of his regiment in the Israeli Air Force.  He has taken two tech start-ups to IPO. He’s a man who knows how to lead.
 
We explore how to make spirituality accessible without dogma, how SQ helps leaders navigate complexity and suffering, and why meaning, purpose, and inspiration are no longer optional in modern work. Yosi also shares principles from his clinical and executive coaching work on how to lead with integrity, compassion, and presence.
 
We explore:
What SQ actually is
Spirit → action translation
Leadership + meaning + purpose
Beyond IQ and EQ
His recommendations for developing SQ
Links:Yosi’s Website
 

#354 Most Human Knowledge Work Gone by 2030 - Alastair Moore

▶️ Connect with Richard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/richardatherton-firsthuman/
 
Is AI about to take over knowledge work? And what does that mean for the rest of us?
 
In this episode of Being Human, I speak with Alastair Moore, AI strategist and co-founder of ventures helping organisations navigate the machine intelligence revolution. Alastair argues that we’ve already crossed a threshold: AI isn’t just assisting knowledge workers — it’s now performing tasks at the frontier of research, science, and complex problem-solving.
 
We explore how large models are reshaping entire categories of white-collar work, why organisations are unprepared for the acceleration curve, and what skills will matter in a world where cognition becomes a shared capability between humans and machines. This is a grounded, practical, and sometimes unsettling conversation about the next decade of work.
 
We discuss:
AI at the scientific frontier
Automation of knowledge work
Human–machine complementarities
Skills for the post-GPT economy
Links:
DeepFlow - the company co-founded by Alastair

#353 The Science of Energy Healing - Dr. Shamini Jain

▶️ Connect with Richard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/richardatherton-firsthuman/
 
Can energy healing be measured? And if so, what does it mean for medicine?
In this episode of Being Human, I speak with Dr. Shamini Jain, founder of the Consciousness and Healing Initiative (CHI) and one of the leading scientific voices bridging mind-body medicine and biofield science. Drawing on controlled laboratory studies on cells, tumors, animals, and humans, Dr. Jain explains why the evidence for biofield mechanisms can no longer be dismissed as placebo or wishful thinking.
 
We explore how ancient healing practices map onto modern physics, why the biomedical model struggles with subtle energy, and what a paradigm shift in healthcare could look like. This conversation sits at the frontier where science, spirit, and healing converge.
We discuss:
Evidence beyond placebo
What “biofield” actually means
Cancer and cell line studies
Why medicine must evolve
Links:Dr. Jain’s Website

#352 Pure Unlimited Love - with Dr. Stephen G. Post

▶️ Connect with Richard on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/richardatherton-firsthuman/
 
What if love isn’t just an emotion — but the deepest truth of reality itself?
In this episode of Being Human, I speak with Dr. Stephen G. Post — bioethicist, medical humanities professor, and founder of the Institute for Research on Pure Unlimited Love. Drawing on decades of work in medicine, neuroscience, spirituality, and ethics, Stephen explores love as a lived practice, not a vague ideal.
 
Stephen shares extraordinary stories from medicine, caregiving, near-death research, and neuroscience, including a striking insight: pure unlimited love may be the first thing we encounter when life ends. We explore why modern education and culture often strip meaning from life, how service transforms suffering, and what it means to live aligned with a deeper calling.
 
A profound conversation about love, purpose, and what truly matters.
 
We explore:
Following your calling
All are suffering
Love tough vs the 'carefrontation'
Addressing the Nature Deficit Disorder
Pure unlimited love in the workplace
Links:The Institute for Research on Pure Unlimited LoveStephen’s Website