How Conscious Awareness Shapes Leadership, Therapy, and Collective Healing: An interview with Pardis Mahdavi, PhD

The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide with Curt Widhalm and Katie Vernoy

How Conscious Awareness Shapes Leadership, Therapy, and Collective Healing: An Interview with Pardis Mahdavi, PhD

Curt and Katie chat with Pardis Mahdavi, PhD, about how consciousness and intentional awareness can transform therapy, leadership, and community. Pardis shares how cultivating our “inner state," moving from suffering to a “beautiful state,” impacts how we lead, connect, and heal collectively. She offers practical ways therapists can integrate mindfulness, breath mastery, and curiosity into their work to help clients (and themselves) live with greater awareness and alignment.

About Our Guest:
Pardis Mahdavi, PhD is an author, educator, and entrepreneur. She has written seven non-fiction books and two edited volumes, including Book of Queens (2023) and Riding (2024). A former university president and global human rights expert, Pardis now leads Entheon Journeys, focusing on consciousness, leadership, and transformation. Her work has been featured in Time, Ms. Magazine, Huffington Post, and the Los Angeles Times.

Key Takeaways:

• Consciousness work deepens mindfulness into an ongoing framework for intentional living and healing.

• Therapists can help clients identify and shift their inner “state” from suffering toward beauty, calm, and connection.

• Preventive practices such as meditation, journaling, and breath mastery support long-term wellbeing and resilience.

• Leadership and therapy are energetic processes: awareness of one’s own state affects how others experience us.

• Community healing grows when curiosity replaces critique and connection transcends identity barriers.

More Info & Full Show Notes:
https://mtsgpodcast.com

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Creative Credits:
Voice Over by DW McCann
Music by Crystal Grooms Mangano