What If Nothing’s Wrong With You?

About What If Nothing’s Wrong With You?

Hi! We're Paula D. Atkinson and Lisa Kays, hosts of the What If Nothing's Wrong With You? podcast, and we're so grateful you found us. We are two psychotherapists who have been in the field for a long time, and we started this podcast to invite you into our ongoing conversations that explore the mental health field, psychotherapy, freedom and sanity. We investigate the history of psychotherapy, the way it is practiced, the roots of treating "mental illness", who among us is usually diagnosable, and the ways in which perhaps psychotherapy creates more harm than healing.

Publisher

WINWWY

Category

health & fitness

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

20 Feb 2024

Latest episode

29 Jul 2026

Latest episodes

1 of 35 episodes have a transcript.

1. 

   29 Jul 2026TRANSCRIPT

   Resigning From Shoulds - Final Episode (Ep. 34)

   Paula D. Atkinson and Lisa K. Kays interview each other about how resigning from "shoulds" liberates joy and intuition, offering a path to trust yourself and refuse harmful expectations.

2. 

   9 Apr 2026

   Black & White Thinking (Ep. 33)

   Binary (Black-and-White) Thinking: Why We Do It, How It Controls Us, and How to Get Free Paula D. Atkinson and Lisa K. Kays, discuss binary (black-and-white) thinking and how it shows up in culture, education, media, and clients’ decision-making. Lisa shares reflections from Jane Goodall’s “famous last words” interview, emphasizing that there is no single “right” way to live and that the task is to be yourself. They define ambivalence (having mixed feelings) and cognitive dissonance (stress from holding conflicting beliefs or actions) and connect binary thinking to control, authoritarianism, and white supremacy culture’s “only one right way.” They explore how constant judging fuels anxiety, rumination, and defensiveness, why accepting being “the asshole sometimes” reduces manipulation, and how improv’s “yes, and” rewires rigid thinking toward nuance, paradox, and liberation.

3. 

   9 Mar 2026

   Mental Health In Chaos(Ep. 32)

   What If Nothing's Wrong With You? Mental Health In Chaos (Ep. 32) (Episode recorded September 2025) Paula D. Atkinson and Lisa K. Kays discuss the core question “What if nothing is wrong with you?” in the context of todays societal chaos and fascism, especially in Washington, DC, where ICE activity and arrests are creating fear, restriction, and powerlessness. They note many clients “relapsing” into coping behaviors like food restriction, increased drinking, bingeing, and shopping, framing these as attempts to regain control or soothe, and warn that shame and self-ranking reinforce the very dynamics of white supremacy and fascism. They argue there are often no good options, encourage choosing with agency rather than conforming or rebelling, and emphasize “permission” over perfection, empathy without suffering Olympics, and supportive relationships. 00:00 Welcome and Big Question 00:58 Thunderbolts Movie Takeaways 04:34 Pop Culture and Fascism Jokes 05:26 Unicorn Girl Scam Podcast 10:28 Societal Chaos and Relapse 12:33 Life in DC Right Now 18:00 Control Soothing and Shame 21:11 Suffering Olympics and Empathy 22:39 Resisting In Groups 23:33 Empathy Without Centering 24:40 No Win Dilemma 27:09 Permission Over Perfection 28:50 Activism Without Burnout 30:03 Middle Path Agency 33:45 No Good Options 36:38 Drop The Virtue Tests 39:38 Shame Helps Fascists 41:24 Closing And Reviews

Inside a recent episode

Resigning From Shoulds - Final Episode (Ep. 34)

Published 29 Jul 2026 · Transcript excerpt

[…] And I do that a lot. It's not like I'm walking around. I'm actually apologizing more, which is interesting because I check myself. I don't need someone else to say like that hurt me or bothered me. I actually... Check myself and can kind of be like, oh, I don't love that. I just did that. Sorry about that. But it's like, don't apologize. Yeah. On behalf of what some white man thinks you should be doing. Only apologize for yourself. And what I often say when I work with people is if you are apologizing. You need to know the crime. I want you to be able to identify an actual crime, meaning you committed harm to someone else, or you are in violation of your own values and integrity. […]

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

YouTube views

4,657,782,905

Score snapshot 15 Sept 2025

Apple Podcasts (US)

4.9 / 5

30 ratings

Spotify

4.9 / 5

17 ratings

Podcast Authority Score: 44 / 100

A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.

Quality

17

Social presence

0

YouTube

93

Engagement

85

Contact What If Nothing’s Wrong With You?

Guest appearances

Does not typically book guests

Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.

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