by Mike Langlois
Gamer posing as therapist. Dogs, video games & politics since 1969. Think of me as the therapist version of your cranky GenX older brother who wants to hang out in the basement rumpus room, talk about questionable things and plot rebellion. <br/><br/><a href="https://mikelanglois.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast">mikelanglois.substack.com</a>
Language
🇺🇲
Publishing Since
12/16/2024
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March 9, 2026
<p>Some of you are aware that I have a friend and colleague in Iran, a bright graduate student who I have been mentoring. When the Twelve Day War began and Zoom failed we used Instagram and email. Now, during this current war, when email and Instagram have failed us, and my words have failed me, I turned to AI music composition, to translate a section of Freud’s essay “On Transience” into Farsi, and the result was the video you can listen to here. If, like me you do not speak Farsi, Freud’s original excerpt is written below. I wonder what he would have made of all of this. I wonder what history will make of us.</p><p></p><p>“My conversation with the poet took place in the summerbefore the war. A year later the war broke out and robbed theworld of its beauties. It destroyed not only the beauty of thecountrysides through which it passed and the works of art whichit met with on its path but it also shattered our pride in theachievements of our civilization, our admiration for manyphilosophers and artists and our hopes of a final triumph overthe differences between nations and races.It tarnished the loftyimpartiality of our science, it revealed our instincts in all theirnakedness and let loose the evil spirits within us which wethought had been tamed for ever by centuries of continuouseducation by the noblest minds. It made our country smallagain and made the rest of the world far remote. It robbed us ofvery much that we had loved, and showed us how ephemeralwere many things that we had regarded as changeless.We cannot be surprised that our libido, thus bereft of so manyof its objects, has clung with all the greater intensity to what isleft to us, that our love of our country, our affection for thosenearest us and our pride in what is common to us have suddenly grown stronger. But have those other possessions, whichwe have now lost, really ceased to have any worth for us becausethey have proved so perishable and so unresistant? To many ofus this seems to be so, but once more wrongly, in my view. Ibelieve that those who think thus, and seem ready to make apermanent renunciation because what was precious has provednot to be lasting, are simply in a state of mourning for what islost. Mourning, as we know, however painful it may be, comesto a spontaneous end. When it has renounced everything thathas been lost, then it has consumed itself, and our libido is oncemore free (in so far as we are still young and active) to replacethe lost objects by fresh ones equally or still more precious.It is to be hoped that the same will be true of the losses caused by thiswar...”</p><p><p>Gamer Therapist: Playful Subversions is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.</p></p> <br/><br/>Get full access to Gamer Therapist: Playful Subversions at <a href="https://mikelanglois.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4">mikelanglois.substack.com/subscribe</a>
March 2, 2026
<p>Hi Folks, </p><p>Here’s a webinar I did a while back on Video Games in Psychodynamic Psychotherapy. It doesn’t get you any CEs, as I am trying to minimize how much I participate in the CE industry. Knowledge should be available to all, and although I do hire myself out and accept paid subscribers, I also try in parallel to offer people access to things regardless of if they can pay.If you want to hire me as a consultant I won’t say no, and if you purchase a paid subscription here I’ll say “Thank You.” But I’ll never hide stuff here behind paywalls, and I hope that it benefits you and the therapists, patients and gamers in your life.</p><p><p>Gamer Therapist: Playful Subversions is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.</p></p><p></p> <br/><br/>Get full access to Gamer Therapist: Playful Subversions at <a href="https://mikelanglois.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4">mikelanglois.substack.com/subscribe</a>
December 4, 2025
<p>In this episode, I sit down with integrative psychotherapist, yoga teacher, and poet <strong>Brittany Robertson, LICSW</strong>, whose work centers on embodiment, liberation, and deep relational healing for “the strong sensitive one.” Our conversation moves quickly from her professional bio into something far more personal, playful, and unexpected: how a <strong>mini-trampoline</strong> became an essential tool in her therapeutic life, self-regulation, and resistance to professional compliance.</p><p>We explore the <strong>slow creep of disembodiment</strong> that so many therapists experience: the spell of seriousness, the pull of productivity, the dopamine hit of “getting to the next appointment,” and the ways early-career clinicians can confuse adrenaline for aliveness. Brittany names the cultural and institutional forces—capitalism, burnout, training norms—that can flatten clinicians and sever them from the playful parts of themselves.</p><p>What emerges is a rich conversation about <strong>compliance vs. creativity</strong> (a theme dear to this podcast). We talk about how systems groom us to feel “adult” through commutes, checklists, and policing our own embodiment—and how therapists often mistake being dutiful for being effective. Brittany beautifully describes how trampolining helps her practice a different truth: that play, silliness, and bodily curiosity are not indulgences but <strong>pathways back to presence</strong>.</p><p>She explains how the trampoline enables a kind of descending into the body—a gentle, respectful, non-urgent form of embodiment. Not a workout, not a performance, not progress. Just buoyancy, feedback, and the freedom to be “beautifully messy.” We even talk about the literal and metaphorical act of <strong>resisting gravity</strong>, and how the trampoline can function as a tiny rebellion against internalized compliance.</p><p>By the end, the trampoline becomes less a wellness gadget and more a symbol of something wider: the ongoing project of reclaiming play, resisting urgency, and making therapy a place where embodiment and aliveness can actually happen.</p> <br/><br/>Get full access to Gamer Therapist: Playful Subversions at <a href="https://mikelanglois.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4">mikelanglois.substack.com/subscribe</a>
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Gamer posing as therapist. Dogs, video games & politics since 1969.
Think of me as the therapist version of your cranky GenX older brother who wants to hang out in the basement rumpus room, talk about questionable things and plot rebellion. <br/><br/><a href="https://mikelanglois.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast">mikelanglois.substack.com</a>
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