Dr. Aldrich Chan is a neuropsychologist, psychotherapist and founder of the Center for Neuropsychology and Consciousness. An adjunct professor at Pepperdine University, Aldrich's research on the default mode network, mindfulness and trauma bridges neuroscience with ancient Taoist philosophy. He is the author of Reassembling Models of Reality (2021) and Seven Principles of Nature: How We Strayed and How We Return (2025).

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In this conversation, we explore Aldrich's synthesis of neuropsychology, Taoism and evolutionary mismatch theory — his SAD theory (separation, alienation, discord), the seven principles of nature (CPR WEST), subcortical midline structures and our original experience of connectedness, and what it means to live in alignment with nature.

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🔗 Links
Aldrich's website: https://www.drchancnc.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/draldrichan
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/drchancnc
Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@drchancnc
Book: https://geni.us/7principlesofnature

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⏳ Timestamps:
00:00 Intro - Neuropsychology meets Taoism
00:43 Seven Principles of Nature and the CPR WEST acronym
03:58 The SAD theory: separation, alienation and discord
04:53 The default mode network
06:29 The triple network: DMN, salience and central executive
10:05 The boat metaphor
12:58 Separation as a natural phase
15:16 Alienation and evolutionary mismatch theory
17:21 Movement mismatch
19:09 Social connection as the most obvious mismatch
21:07 The agricultural revolution's consequences
27:44 Discord and dualism
31:01 The nature–culture debate
36:23 CPR WEST unpacked
39:14 Creativity and uncertainty
41:18 Certainty is the death of a question
43:55 Vipassana and reframing the stress response
45:07 Two stress pathways
51:06 Chaos and order
52:57 Relationship and neuroecology
54:03 Multi-level selection theory
57:59 Ego boundary dissolution
1:00:58 Subcortical midline structures
1:02:04 Jung and archetypes as brainstem activity
1:05:28 Jung called himself a Taoist
1:06:03 Shadow integration and wholeness
1:08:42 Dynamic equilibrium
1:12:03 Flow states
1:13:52 Spontaneity and play
1:18:26 Transformation
1:19:52 Wrapping up
1:22:05 Where to find Aldrich
1:23:14 Guest recommendations

Dr. Erik Goodwyn is a practising psychiatrist with a background in neurobiology who bridges the worlds of neuroscience, Jungian psychology, and fantasy. Erik is co-editor-in-chief of the International Journal of Jungian Studies and has written dozens of academic papers along with books on the neurobiology of the gods, dreams, and archetypes. Last year he published his first fantasy novel, King of the Forgotten Darkness, which won the Literary Titan Golden Book Award.

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In this return visit, we dive deep into who actually creates the dream – the Invisible Storyteller that isn't your conscious self. We explore the neuroscience behind this, discussing the Default Mode Network, Salience Network, and Executive Control Network, and what they reveal about dreaming, meaning-making, and the deeply non-egoic nature of consciousness. Erik shares clinical insights into Dissociative Identity Disorder as evidence of an underlying organising principle, we tangle with what it means for consciousness to be "non-egoic," and we work through his groundbreaking definition of archetypes through Cognitive Metaphor Theory. It's a conversation that challenges everything you think you know about who you are.

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🔗 Links
- Erik's website: https://erikgoodwyn.com
- Erik's YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@theimaginarium

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⏳ Timestamps:
00:00 Intro - The Invisible Storyteller
01:39 Greeting and reflections on James's reading
03:35 What is the Invisible Storyteller?
06:01 Jung's avoidance of reductionism through mythic language
08:16 The Default Mode Network and dreaming
10:27 The three networks: default mode, salience, and executive control
15:27 Memory consolidation, identity formation, emotional regulation, future planning
18:29 Is the Invisible Storyteller the unconscious?
22:18 Deeper processing independent of conscious ego
25:58 Recurrent dreams and the role of conscious engagement
28:40 The Invisible Storyteller as meaning-making
31:07 Dreams versus storytelling: memory Olympics and metaphor
36:58 The role of the right hemisphere and symbolism
41:04 The Invisible Storyteller as process or personality?
44:18 Dissociative Identity Disorder and organising principles
50:33 DID as evidence of an organising intelligence
55:43 The specificity of dissociative amnesia
58:22 Non-egoic consciousness and emergent properties
1:02:14 Consciousness arising from complex systems
1:05:44 AI image generation as analogy for dream creation
1:10:56 The Invisible Storyteller as personality versus ancestry and genome
1:15:32 Jungian vision and updating Jung's theory
1:18:40 Archetypes through Cognitive Metaphor Theory
1:22:37 Spontaneous thoughts and universal challenges
1:25:58 Primary metaphors and innate mappings
1:29:20 Danger and darkness as innate mappings
1:32:17 Definition of archetype and falsifiability
1:34:47 Building on Gary Clark's work and Anthony Stevens
1:36:25 Gratitude and future conversations

Adriana Forte is a Brazilian-born writer, facilitator, and developmental thinker currently based in a rural intentional community in Bellingen, New South Wales, Australia. Originally trained as a journalist, Adriana has spent years investigating the intersection of women's cyclical biology, embodied knowing, and the structures of modern life. She runs retreats and workshops through her Substack platform C-Lab (A Lab for a Cyclically Informed Society), and is currently completing a book on the spell of modernity and the role of the matriarch as a force for cultural repair.________________

In this conversation, James sits down with Adriana to explore one of the most under-examined questions in contemporary culture: what happens when society is built around a linear, continuous model of productivity — and half the population runs on a fundamentally cyclical one? Drawing on her own journey from Brazil through Hong Kong and India to off-grid life in rural Australia, Adriana maps the hormonal landscape of the female cycle and argues that the oscillation between estrogen and progesterone doesn't just produce moods — it produces a distinct mode of subjectivity, perception, and thought. We explore the cultural erasure of rites of passage, the psychological costs of the contraceptive pill, the wisdom encoded in perimenopause and menopause, and why Adriana believes the matriarch — the post-menopausal woman — may be the missing counter-energy to the relentless forward drive of modernity. The conversation moves through evolutionary biology, embodied philosophy, grassroots community-building, and genuine hope for a more rhythmically intelligent future.________________

You can find Adriana's work at:

Substack (C-Lab): https://theclab.substack.com/

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⏳ Timestamps:
0:00 Intro - Our Bellingen Connection
5:41 How Adriana ended up on this journey
12:56 Critique of Modernity and Birth Interventions
15:23 Rhythms and female psychology
24:38 A map of the menstrual cycle
39:11 The Influence of Modernity on Women’s Psyche
45:59 Transgender and phenomenology of hormones
52:01 The oscillating nature of female psychology
59:25 The spell of the System on modern psychology
1:09:15 The challenge of organising around cyclical society
1:15:03 Adriana’s Matriarch Book
1:18:43 Where to get more from Adriana
1:19:39 Adriana’s Guest Recommendation