The Anxious Achiever

For many of us, anxiety is about the day to day - whether that’s from social interaction, managing all of our work, or a more serious disorder we might be struggling with. But what about what the problem is big - like, really big? In today’s episode, we speak to Kyle Empringham, co-founder of The Starfish Canada, about his own journey to his non-profit work, which celebrates and supports youth activists. And also about climate anxiety - the feeling that more and more individuals are struggling with when faced with existential threats.

So many of us experience imposter syndrome - the idea that you feel like a fraud in your job; that you’re faking it until you make it and that any minute now, people will be able to see through it. The problem can be especially hard for high achievers. In this episode, psychologist Lisa Orbe-Austin explains what her research has shown about what we can do to eradicate these kinds of feelings.

So many people struggle with mental health issues in part because, unlike many physical ailments, you can’t always know that someone is suffering, or just how badly. In this episode we dive in with reigning Miss America Emma Broyles, the first Korean-American and first Alaskan to win the crown. While many people assume winning the crown comes with a certain amount of perfection, Broyles is breaking down those barriers by speaking openly about her ADHD and a rare obsessive compulsive disorder she battles.

Today’s guest is someone who experienced the racism in the corporate world. After years of constantly being triggered at work, she had enough, and walked away. She discusses how to heal after work breaks your heart. Minda Harts is an author, an equity advocate, and the CEO of The Memo LLC, a career development platform for women of color. And she speaks to host Morra Aarons-Mele about the kind of experiences she had at work, and how she now spends her days helping others.

Dr. Wendy Suzuki is a neuroscientist at NYU who studies neuroplasticity. She’s the author of “Good Anxiety: Harnessing the Power of the Most Misunderstood Emotion,” and she talks with host Morra Aarons-Mele about why anxiety can actually be a good thing. Plus, we hear from listener Andrea Parra, who has experienced “good” anxiety in her own life and career.

Preparing for and managing a negotiation can be hard for anyone, but for people who suffer from anxiety and tend toward rumination, it can feel near impossible. In this episode, Morra Aarons-Mele speaks with negotiation expert Christoper Voss about how to handle negotiations when you suffer from anxiety, or just if negotiations cause your anxiety to peak. Voss is a former FBI hostage negotiator and co-author of Never Split the Difference.

A career in the public eye is not for the faint of heart. Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms didn’t start out knowing she would enter a career in politics, but she followed a drive deep inside of her to serve the public. She took over as mayor of Atlanta in 2018, and faced the dual challenges of a global pandemic and increasing tensions over race and policing systems. After one term, Mayor Bottoms decided to step away and not run for re-election. We talk about how mental health impacted her decision and what she hopes for the future.

What if we all were a little nicer to ourselves? In this episode, we hear from lawyer Mark Goldstein about his own journey with depression, OCD, and breaking down stigmas. He's an example of someone who learned to practice self-compassion, a concept that psychologist and author Dr. Kristin Neff says more people could benefit from in their careers, and in their lives. Learn more about Mark Goldstein’s story: https://abovethelaw.com/2019/02/biglaw-depression-story/ Dr. Kristin Neff’s Self-Compassion Exercises: https://self-compassion.org/category/exercises/#exercises

Hear mindfulness leader Sharon Salzberg walk you through a short meditation you can use at work or any time you feel anxious.

Meditation and mindfulness have become household concepts, especially in the wake of the global pandemic. But it wasn’t always that way. In this episode, we speak to meditation and mindfulness leader Sharon Salzberg about how she began her journey, how much it has surprised her that corporate America has embraced mindfulness, and an exercise that we can all do when we are feeling stressed or overwhelmed.

When we get jobs that seem impressive to the outside world - and get sucked into a corporate, competitive culture - we don’t always end up displaying the best leadership traits. Danny Bernstein spent nearly a decade at Google, but it wasn’t until he faced his own relationship with mental health that he was really able to improve as a manager and leader. Host Morra Aarons-Mele speaks with Bernstein about his father’s struggle with bipolar disorder, imposter syndrome, bad managers, and his goals for the future. Reach out at [email protected] or on Linked In.

Many leaders succeed and thrive not just in spite of anxiety, depression, or other mental health struggles - but because of them. They make leaders more aware of themselves, and more empathetic to those around them. Gillian Stein is one such leader. She’s the CEO of Henry’s, a family-run business that’s the largest specialty photo retailer in Canada. She recently announced publicly that she has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, and she speaks with Morra Aarons-Mele about her family history, how her mental health affects her business, and what the pandemic was like for her and her company.

What does psychological safety at work mean for people with anxiety and other mental health challenges? Host Morra Aarons-Mele speaks with Amy Edmondson, a Harvard Business School professor, who has long studied psychological safety, and Christopher Yates, Ford Motor Company’s chief talent officer, about how to build a culture of psychological safety at work.

Host Morra Aarons-Mele speaks with Susan Schmitt, co-author of Healing at Work: A Guide to Using Career Conflicts to Overcome Your Past and Build the Future You Deserve, about how we can face childhood trauma, understand how it impacts our work, and use the office as a lab for changing our behavior.

Host Morra Aarons-Mele speaks with Dr. Judson Brewer, author of “Unwinding Anxiety: New Science Shows How to Break the Cycles of Worry and Fear to Heal Your Mind,” about how we can experiment with different behavior patterns. Then, she speaks with journalist Charles Duhigg, author of “The Power of Habit,” about anxiety, habits, and ADHD.

As a political staffer for Hillary Clinton, Huma Abedin was under immense pressure to achieve, while staying out of the public eye. That all changed when her husband Anthony Weiner resigned from Congress, following a sex scandal. Host Morra Aarons-Mele speaks to Abedin about private pain, public struggle, and what we can learn from her about managing the anxiety of a high-profile career.

Host Morra Aarons-Mele speaks with Danny Lakes, a Procter & Gamble employee who is on the autism spectrum, as well as Todd Ballish, a neurotypical manager at P&G, about why having a program for neurodiverse workers is a strength for the company. Then, we’ll hear from Emily Kircher-Morris, host of The Neurodiversity Podcast.

Anxious achievers are often hyper-attuned to other people and how to please them. New York Times bestselling author Julie Lythcott-Haims argues that many of us need to learn how to tune out that noise and focus on ourselves, our dreams, and our goals.

Host Morra Aarons-Mele speaks with Kathleen Smith, an associate faculty member at the Bowen Center for the Study of the Family, about how family systems theory can help us better understand leadership and relationships with coworkers.

Host Morra Aarons-Mele speaks with New York Times bestselling author Lindsey Pollak about how she maintains a public speaking career while dealing with anxiety, and why she’s finally opening up about it.

Host Morra Aarons-Mele speaks with Anu Gupta, founder and CEO of educational tech company BE MORE with Anu, about immigrating to the U.S. with his family, why he stayed in the closet so long, how he realized he needed therapy to address his anxiety and depression, and how unraveling the threads of his life helped him begin to heal.

Host Morra Aarons-Mele speaks to HBR contributing editor and podcast host Amy Gallo about why conflict is so hard and how to make conflict a force for good in your work relationships. Amy is also the author of "The HBR Guide to Dealing with Conflict," and she shares her four-step process for doing conflict better.

For many of us, the world can feel like too much right now – a never ending cascade of anxiety-inducing news. It’s something that Christina Blacken, founder and chief narrative strategist at The New Quo, calls the “mental fire.” As we struggle to handle the pressure that we feel in society right now, our own anxieties can fuel narratives and actions that are harmful to others – especially others different than ourselves. Blacken speaks with host Morra Aarons-Mele about how we can move away from rigid perfectionism, toxic competition, and conformity and toward a culture of curiosity and acceptance.

Welcome to Season 5! Host Morra Aarons-Mele speaks with the actor, writer, and director about media and film portrayals of people with mental health issues, and the role mindfulness plays in how he approaches his art and leads his team.

There’s another podcast we love: "Hello Monday with Jessi Hempel." The show explores how to make work happier, healthier, and more human. In this special bonus episode, Hempel interviews host Morra Aarons-Mele about her own journey with work and mental health, and how her experiences with depression and anxiety influence her leadership. Check out the new season of "Hello Monday with Jessi Hempel" wherever you get your podcasts.

Jessi Hempel is constantly thinking about the state of work. She’s senior editor at large at LinkedIn and host of the podcast Hello Monday. In the final episode of Season 4, she speaks with host Morra Aarons-Mele about the way work is shifting – not just in terms of where and how we work, but how it interacts with our identities, motivations, and mental health.

There’s a stereotype that most people who struggle with ADHD are white, male, and often young. In this episode host Morra Aarons-Mele speaks to Stephanie Ozuo, a career advisor in the UK, about her experience being diagnosed with ADHD as a 25-year-old Black woman.

Podcast host and author Anna Sale has built her career on difficult conversations. On her podcast, she focuses on the hardest topics we deal with as humans: death, sex, and money. And her new book, “Let’s Talk About Hard Things,” continues pushing that conversation forward. Sale speaks with host Morra Aarons-Mele about why, even in a world where people are encouraged to be more open, mental health remains one of the last things people disclose at work. They also discuss other taboo work issues that cause anxiety.

Chris McCarthy, president of MTV Entertainment Group, speaks with host Morra Aarons Mele about the role TV shows can play in changing how people view mental health and what he and others are doing to make the industry more mentally healthy for entertainment professionals. Plus, later in the episode, makeup artist Andrew Sotomayor discusses how his work on TV shows like Saturday Night Live and Pose intersects with his depression and anxiety.

When you’re struggling with mental health, the day-to-day routines of a work environment can be a lot – even for a famous author and academic, like Roxane Gay. Gay speaks with host Morra Aarons-Mele about how recognizing and enforcing boundaries helps her navigate work and stress. Later in the episode, former financial executive Bob Pozen discusses his experiences with productivity and mental health.

Paul English is an entrepreneur, founder, and philanthropist. But throughout his many career successes, he’s battled internally with his mental health. And along the way, he learned to be more open and honest about his struggles, even when it felt risky. His bipolar disorder creates strengths and weaknesses for him professionally, but today he works hard to find balance in his own life, embrace vulnerability, and create healthier environments for his coworkers.

Investor and philanthropist Vikas Shah has been an entrepreneur since he was a young teenager. And throughout much of his career, he struggled with anxiety and depression. But for a long time, he didn’t have the words to identify how he was feeling, let alone address it. Shah shares his mental health journey, and how it has changed the way he approaches leadership and entrepreneurship today.

How do we listen to ourselves and know when to address our social anxiety, especially when it comes into play with colleagues? Host Morra Aarons-Mele speaks with Stefan Hofmann, a clinical psychologist at Boston University about social anxiety’s deep roots in natural human behavior – and how we can address it in the aftermath of the pandemic.

As offices in the U.S. begin reopening after more than a year, many people – especially those of us with social anxiety – are feeling uneasy about the return to so-called normal. Certified therapist Dr. Jenny Taitz explains how to reframe these anxieties and continue succeeding at work.

For Harley Finkelstein, president of Shopify, anxiety has always been his super power – even when he didn’t know how to put a label on it. Host Morra Aarons-Mele speaks with Finkelstein about the generational trauma of his grandparents, who survived the Holocaust, the anxiety of starting a business at age 17 to support his family, and how to channel anxiety into action.

The nature of work is changing, and more and more of us have been working behind screens even before the pandemic. That brings both downsides – and some upsides – for mental health. Host Morra Aarons-Mele speaks with SheSnaps, a Twitch streamer with a huge online following, about how she manages her screen time and why she opened up about her own depression. Plus, Jackson Jeyanayagam, a vice president at The Clorox Company, explains why he advocates for turning video off in online calls.

This last year has been rough on everyone, in so many different ways. But as we look toward recovery and adjust to life after the pandemic, it’s important to recognize the direct connections among physical behaviors, mental health, and performance at work. Dr. Christine Runyan, a professor at the University of Massachusetts Medical School and co-founder of Tend Health, discusses the ways we can calm our fight or flight response to anxiety, and why self-care really does matter.

After a year of collective trauma and private losses, stress, and heartbreaks, how do we even start to think about returning to a more normal working environment? Morra Aarons-Mele speaks with famed therapist Esther Perel about how workers and leaders can rebound after the Covid-19 pandemic and take away lessons that we never forget.

Host Morra Aarons-Mele speaks with the TED Business podcast about how she protects her energy and boundaries while working remotely.

A military pilot, an entrepreneur, and a business professor discuss how they cope with their ADHD, how it’s helped them be successful in their careers, and what they’ve learned about managing neurodiverse people.

Tanya Menon, a professor at Fisher College of Business, Ohio State University, says envy comes up a lot in the workplace – though it’s often misunderstood. But she says we can learn to draw good boundaries to better handle competition, fear, and jealousy in our careers. It’s the second episode in our two-part mini-series on envy at work.

Executive coach Nihar Chhaya explains how envy, FOMO, and the illusion of scarcity can contribute to anxiety and depression, and how leaders can cope. It’s part one of our two-part mini-series on envy at work.

Journalist and author Aarti Shahani tells host Morra Aarons-Mele how she managed overwhelming uncertainty during her father’s 14-year legal battle and channeled her anxiety into productive work. Later, her anxiety also fueled her voracious drive for career success.

Sociologist Jessica Calarco has been studying women struggling to balance work and parenting during the Covid-19 pandemic – and how workplaces can help. She says societal pressures, ideas about motherhood, and systemic failures are causing working mothers to suffer greater anxiety and depression than before the pandemic.

Host Morra Aarons-Mele speaks with veteran tech journalist Catherine Shu, of TechCrunch, about improving mental health culture in Silicon Valley. And Shu shares her own journey with depression, including the time she spent in a psychiatric ward as a teenager, and how she found her way from there into tech journalism.

For a long time, the NBA star hid his battle with mental health. But after a very public panic attack in 2017, he started speaking out. Love talks with host Morra Aarons-Mele about role modeling openness about mental health, how he manages his social anxiety as a celebrity, and why basketball both aggravates and relieves his depression.

Aaron Harvey is a successful advertising industry executive – but for many years of his life, he struggled with a form of OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder) that involves repetitive mental compulsions.

John Moe took a bold step when he decided to start a podcast featuring frank, but funny, conversations about depression. Moe was recently laid off, and his show was cancelled. He tells us how he approaches ups and downs in his career, when he seeks help, and what he does to keep everything in perspective.

Amanda Clayman, a psychotherapist specializing in financial wellness, helps her clients uncover the motivations and roots underlying their money anxieties, so they can make better financial decisions. It’s a problem she understands intimately, as an entrepreneur who struggles with financial anxiety.

Many managers and leaders misunderstand what emotional intelligence really means, despite the trendiness of the phrase. Marc Brackett, director of the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence, urges leaders to learn to understand themselves and their teams using a Mood Meter, a tool he developed to help people explain their emotions.