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MindSight for BeBalanced AI

MindSight for BeBalanced AI

Written by: Sondre Risholm Liverød
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 MindSight is a journey into the hidden architecture of the human mind — its emotions, defenses, contradictions, and search for meaning. Created by Norwegian psychologist Sondre Risholm Liverød, this podcast challenges the way you think about yourself and others. Each episode combines psychological insight and philosophical depth. The goal is simple: to say something new about what you’ve long been thinking, or something obvious about what you’ve never considered. Through reflections on everyday life, existential dilemmas, and the unconscious patterns that guide us, MindSight explores what it truly means to be human. Now translated and narrated in English using advanced AI, MindSight brings Sondre’s distinctive voice and ideas to a global audience. If you haven’t learned something new about the psyche — or at least smiled at your own absurdity — by the end of an episode, it’s time to listen to another one. Part of BeBalanced.AI, a digital platform for mental training and psychological growth. BeBalanced.ai is a new way to work with your inner life. Inside the app you’ll meet a personal AI therapist trained on years of clinical psychology, podcasts, and therapeutic practice. You can talk or write freely, get thoughtful reflections, and receive guidance that evolves with you over time. BeBalanced.ai also adapts to who you are. By taking a Big Five personality test in the app, you get coaching, exercises, and insights tailored to your psychological profile — so your mental training becomes truly personal. Think of it as therapy, coaching, and self-development in one intelligent, always-available companion.BeBalanced.ai Hygiene & Healthy Living Psychology Psychology & Mental Health Self-Help Success
Episodes
  • Fun Facts About Happiness

    Fun Facts About Happiness
    Jan 11 2026
    Welcome to a new episode about happiness—one of those elusive topics that seems to be on everyone’s mind, yet is so difficult to define. Most of us want to be happy, but what does that actually mean? Is it a fleeting feeling, a lasting state, or something deeper altogether? Today, we’re going to explore the phenomenon of happiness from several angles: what science tells us, how our minds can trick us, and why chasing pleasure might not be the answer. We’ll also look at some surprising research findings, reflect on the role of our upbringing and beliefs, and consider what it really takes to cultivate a sense of well-being that lasts. So, whether you’re someone who feels generally content or you find yourself often searching for that next boost of joy, I hope you’ll find something here that resonates. Let’s dive in. Happiness is a topic that’s fascinated philosophers, scientists, and ordinary people for centuries. We all know those moments of euphoria—maybe after a good workout, a delicious meal, or a big success at work. But does that mean we’re truly happy? Or is happiness something that runs deeper than those bursts of positive emotion? Research suggests that happiness isn’t just about feeling good in the moment. For example, studies show that physical activity can significantly boost our mood by increasing the production of serotonin, dopamine, and endorphins—those feel-good chemicals in our brains. But even then, the happiness we feel after a run or a dance class is temporary. It fades, and we return to our baseline. One particularly interesting study from Northeastern University in the US suggests that two ingredients are essential for happiness: first, filling your life with new and satisfying experiences, and second, appreciating what you have rather than focusing on what you lack. It’s a simple formula, but not always easy to live by. On the flip side, there are also factors that seem to block happiness. Long-term research from the University of Maryland found that the more television people watch, the less happy they tend to be. In contrast, those who spend time reading or socializing report higher levels of happiness. Age and gender also play a role. A report from the University of Ulster in Ireland found that boys are generally less happy than girls in childhood, but this trend reverses as people age. Women tend to be happier than men until around age 47, at which point men report feeling happier, while women’s satisfaction tends to decline. Of course, there are many exceptions to these patterns, but they offer some food for thought about how happiness shifts over the course of our lives. Money is another topic that always comes up in discussions about happiness. How much money do you really need to be happy? According to a study published in Nature Human Behaviour, the answer depends on where you live. Generally, wealthier people need more money to feel happy, while those with less are often content with less. And here’s a surprising fact: people over 65 tend to be happier than those in their late teens and early twenties. This might be because younger adults face more life decisions and challenges, while older people have often settled into a rhythm and have fewer major upheavals. There’s also evidence that happiness can actually help you live longer. People who describe themselves as happy are less likely to get sick and seem to age more slowly. They also tend to make healthier lifestyle choices without even trying. So, happiness isn’t just a nice-to-have—it’s a factor that can shape the quality and length of your life. But what exactly is happiness? Is it just a series of pleasurable moments, or is it something more stable? Some traditions, especially in the East, suggest that happiness is a kind of baseline—a level of well-being that stays relatively constant, regardless of life’s ups and downs. You might rate your happiness on a scale from one to ten, and while it can fluctuate, it tends to return to a certain set point. This idea is supported by studies comparing lottery winners and people who have experienced serious accidents. Initially, those who win the lottery report a huge surge in happiness, while those who suffer major setbacks, like losing the ability to walk, report a sharp drop. But after about a year, both groups tend to return to their previous levels of happiness. This phenomenon is known as hedonic adaptation. It means that no matter what happens—good or bad—our happiness tends to stabilize over time. So, if chasing external success, pleasure, or possessions only brings temporary happiness, what should we focus on instead? This is where the wisdom of Buddhist monks and modern psychologists often overlaps. Matthieu Ricard, a former cell biologist who became a Buddhist monk and author, argues that happiness is not about external achievements or fleeting pleasures. Instead, it’s about cultivating a stable sense of well-being ...
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    17 mins
  • Atlas of the Heart

    Atlas of the Heart
    Jan 11 2026
    Welcome to a new episode about emotions and emotional intelligence. Today, we’re diving into the fascinating world of our feelings—how they shape our thoughts, our health, and our relationships. Most of us, if we’re honest, don’t really know how to pinpoint exactly what we’re feeling, or why. But here’s the good news: emotional intelligence isn’t something you’re either born with or not. It’s a set of skills you can learn and practice, just like tennis or computer programming. By giving ourselves permission to truly experience all of our feelings, we can reduce stress, improve our well-being, and build richer connections with others. If we suppress or ignore our negative emotions, they only grow stronger and more toxic. So, in this episode, let’s explore what it means to become emotionally intelligent—why it matters, how we can develop it, and what happens when we start to see our emotional lives with more nuance and depth. I’m so glad you’re here. Let’s get started. Let’s begin with a simple truth: emotions are central to our lives. They influence our thinking, our physical health, and the way we relate to others. Yet, most of us haven’t really learned how to identify or understand our feelings. We might assume that because we’ve had emotions since birth, we must be experts by now. But the reality is, emotional intelligence isn’t something we’re born with. It’s not tied to IQ, and even people who are naturally sensitive or compassionate can struggle to navigate their own emotions. In fact, researchers tell us that emotional skills are something we need to practice throughout our lives. There’s no graduation day from the “school of feelings.” Instead, we’re all lifelong students, learning to explore, understand, and manage our emotions as we go. So, what does it actually mean to be emotionally intelligent? At its core, emotional intelligence is about learning to identify and manage our feelings. It’s about giving ourselves permission to feel both the pleasant and the difficult emotions, without judgment. It’s also about recognizing the role emotions play in our social lives—how they affect our relationships and how we can support others in handling their own feelings. To do this, we need to become what some call “emotionally aware” or “emotion researchers.” This means being open-minded and curious, not labeling feelings as good or bad, but simply noticing them, understanding where they come from, and learning how to regulate or express them in healthy ways. It’s important to note that emotional intelligence doesn’t mean we’ll never lose our temper or say something we regret. We’re still human, after all. But it does help us recognize why we react the way we do, and gives us tools to handle those triggers more skillfully next time. The encouraging part is that emotional intelligence can be taught and learned—by adults, by children, in classrooms, and in workplaces. For example, studies have shown that even just 16 hours of training can significantly improve people’s ability to recognize and name their emotions. That’s a small investment for such a big payoff. Today, I want to take you on a journey through what you might call an emotional map or atlas—a way of understanding the landscape of our feelings. This idea is inspired by Brené Brown’s book, “Atlas of the Heart,” where she explores 87 different emotions. Compare that to the 16 basic emotions some psychologists work with, or even the 200-plus states recognized in Buddhist traditions. The point isn’t to overwhelm ourselves with labels, but to recognize that our emotional lives are far more nuanced than we often realize. Brené Brown calls this “emotional granularity”—the ability to notice and describe the subtle differences between our feelings. It’s about being aware of our emotions, but also being able to explore the shades and layers within each one. Think of it like this: just as a material can be broken down into smaller and smaller parts, our emotional states are often made up of many different thoughts and feelings working together. Emotional granularity is about understanding all those parts, seeing the full picture of what we’re experiencing. Brown uses a powerful metaphor to explain what it’s like to lack emotional awareness. Imagine standing in complete darkness, seeing a light in the distance, but having no idea what obstacles lie between you and that light. You stumble around, bumping into things you can’t see, feeling lost and disoriented. That, she says, is what it’s like to move through life without understanding your emotions. You’re missing the map, the compass that helps you navigate your inner world and connect with others. When Brown surveyed 7,000 people and asked them to name the emotions they’d felt in the past year, the average person could only list three: sad, happy, or angry. Three words, out of a possible 87—or ...
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    21 mins
  • The Cure for Anxiety & Restlessness

    The Cure for Anxiety & Restlessness
    Jan 11 2026
    Welcome to a new episode about anxiety, worry, and the ways we can meet our inner unrest with curiosity and compassion. Today, we’re diving into a topic that touches nearly everyone at some point in life—anxiety. Whether it’s a fleeting sense of unease or a persistent, disruptive force, anxiety is something most of us know all too well. In fact, about 15 percent of people will experience anxiety at a level that qualifies as a disorder in any given year, and even more will go through periods of stress, worry, or psychological discomfort. But what if there were some universal principles—simple, but not always easy—that could help us navigate this labyrinth? That’s what we’ll explore together in this episode. So, wherever you are, take a deep breath, settle in, and let’s begin this journey into understanding anxiety—and ourselves—a little better. Anxiety is a phenomenon with many faces. There are countless subtypes—generalized anxiety, panic disorder, agoraphobia, social anxiety, specific phobias, obsessive-compulsive disorder. Each has its own flavor, but they all share a common thread: a sense of inner tension, worry, or fear that can be hard to shake. And we live in a world that seems, in many ways, to be growing more anxious. Some even talk about an “anxiety epidemic,” as more and more people are diagnosed with anxiety disorders. In Norway, for example, it’s estimated that one in four people will experience an anxiety disorder at some point in their lives. Why is this happening? There are many possible explanations, but one idea that stands out is the paradox of safety. In our quest to make life ever safer—padded playgrounds, endless regulations, constant monitoring of risks—we may inadvertently be creating more anxiety. When we focus so intensely on safety, we also become hyper-aware of everything that could go wrong. To know what’s safe, we must also know what’s dangerous. And when we’re always scanning for danger, it’s easy to become anxious. This is especially apparent in children and young people. As we try to shield them from every possible harm, we may also be teaching them to be afraid. The intention is good, but the result can be more worry, more avoidance, and more anxiety. It’s a bit like trying to suppress a thought—when you tell yourself not to think about something, that thought becomes even more persistent. The same goes for anxiety: the more we try to avoid it, the more it sticks around. To understand anxiety, it helps to look at how our brains work. We often talk about two main parts: the “reptilian brain,” the ancient, reflexive part that handles basic survival responses like fight, flight, or freeze; and the prefrontal cortex, the newer part responsible for planning, self-reflection, and predicting the future. When the prefrontal cortex doesn’t have enough information to predict what’s coming, it generates a sense of unease. That’s anxiety—a signal that something is uncertain, unpredictable, or potentially threatening. But here’s the tricky part: when anxiety flares up, our rational brain—the prefrontal cortex—often shuts down. Logical reasoning becomes hard, if not impossible. That’s why it’s so difficult to “think your way out” of an anxiety attack. The goal in therapy, then, isn’t to convince yourself that your anxiety is irrational or wrong. Instead, it’s about rewiring those deep, automatic responses in the older parts of the brain. But how do we do that? One useful way to think about anxiety is as a kind of addiction. Not in the sense of substance abuse, but in the sense of habitual, automatic responses to uncomfortable feelings. Addiction, in this broader sense, is anything we do that we know isn’t helpful in the long run, but we do it anyway—buying things we can’t afford, scrolling endlessly on our phones, drinking to numb discomfort. These are all ways of coping with emotional pain, and they often provide short-term relief at the cost of long-term well-being. With anxiety, the habitual response is often worry. When we feel uneasy, our brains leap into action, trying to solve the problem by worrying about it. Worry gives us the illusion of control, the sense that we’re “on top of things.” But in reality, worry just distracts us from the original feeling and often creates even more anxiety. It becomes a loop—a habit that’s hard to break because it feels, on some level, like it’s helping. Our brains are wired to create these habit loops. When something works—even once—the brain remembers it and stores it away as the default response for similar situations in the future. Over time, these patterns become automatic, running in the background without our conscious awareness. Some researchers estimate that up to 50 percent of our behaviors are driven by these unconscious loops. That’s why it’s so hard to change them: we’re not even aware they’re happening most of the time. To ...
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    18 mins
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