Odyssey & Alchemy: Men's Inner Transformation and Depth Psychology with Martin Prihoda

Martin Prihoda | Mindfulness Podcast & Men's Work Expert
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Odyssey and Alchemy is a weekly long-form interview podcast on inner transformation — men's work, spirituality, mindfulness, and depth psychology — for men ready to do the inner work. Host Martin Prihoda, former Bollywood photographer and author of The Weary Traveller, sits down for deep, unhurried conversations with therapists, teachers, yogis, and healers — exploring how men heal, wake up, and build a conscious relationship with themselves. No life hacks. No quick fixes. Real conversations about the inner life, for men in the middle of their own transformation — and anyone walking that road with them.

  1. 1 day ago

    Ep 48: DAD BUZZ #1, with Andy, Tyler and Marty

    Dad Buzz is the unfiltered, slightly inappropriate dad-talk segment from Odyssey and Alchemy. Marty, Andy, and Tyler get together to compare notes on fatherhood, teenagers, sibling chaos, retro technology, waterbeds, infomercials, and the strange challenges of raising kids in the modern world. In this inaugural episode, the dads tackle whether kids should be allowed to quit sports, how to handle sibling fights over the TV remote, what to do when you find porn on your teenager’s laptop, and whether only children are really doomed to be lonely. Expect crude jokes, questionable parenting theories, nostalgic tangents, and the occasional “psychologist take” that they may or may not follow. No credentials. No expert advice. Just three dads figuring it out out loud. Explicit language. Parenting adjacent.

  2. 20 Oct

    Ep 47: Men in Drift: Shadow Work, Stoicism & Why Insight Isn’t Enough | Alexander Osterman

    Why do men who understand their patterns perfectly well still not change? Licensed mental health counselor Alexander Osterman, author of Quit Evading: A Therapist’s Field Manual for Men in Drift, explains why insight alone doesn’t change a life, and what does. In this conversation, Martin and Alex cover: What “drift” looks like in a man’s life and how to recognize itHow to start shadow work, including the “level 10 reaction” testWhy men can be both under-therapized and over-therapizedWhat real Stoicism offers that the cold-shower internet version missesPain vs. suffering, Vipassana, and Buddhist psychology meeting Stoic philosophyIdentity collapse, grief, and why holding onto an old role keeps you stuckThe chrysalis: why transformation is messy before it’s beautifulDiscipline as a built skill, tapas, and rebuilding agency with boring daily habitsThe one thing to do this week if you recognize yourself in all of thisAlex also shares his own collapse at 26 (cancer, a seven-and-a-half-year relationship ending, moving back in with his parents) and how making his bed, applying for a job and taking a walk started the rebuild. Find Alexander’s book and work at alexanderosterman.com. Chapters: 02:24 What drift looks like03:37 Why insight doesn’t lead to action04:30 Therapy vs. coaching08:57 Alex’s own collapse and the case against insight alone12:19 Why Jung14:41 Are men over-therapized?17:20 How to start shadow work23:38 Real Stoicism vs. internet Stoicism26:21 Pain, suffering and Vipassana33:37 “Condemned to be free”36:35 What avoidance protects, and identity41:57 Grief and identity collapse45:45 The chrysalis48:16 Discipline and tapas50:15 Working with men vs. women51:16 Rebuilding agency day to day52:23 One thing to do this week

  3. 1 Oct

    Ep 46: Your Inner Child Has a Security Guard: Dr. Julie Gowthorpe on Trauma & Self-Nurturing Therapy

    What if the thing sabotaging your next big move isn't fear — it's a security guard who's been on duty since childhood? Dr. Julie Gowthorpe is a registered social worker and founder of Gowthorpe Therapists in Ontario, where she and her team provide trauma-informed care for individuals, couples, and families — including specialized work with police, military members, and First Nations communities navigating intergenerational trauma. Her new book, Heal Childhood Trauma, lays out what she calls self-nurturing therapy: learning to become the parent your inner child never had. In this conversation we explore inner transformation through the lens of attachment and the body — the four attachment styles formed in childhood and how they quietly run your adult relationships, why nervous system regulation (not willpower) is what actually lets someone stop bypassing pain through alcohol, humor, or compulsive behavior, the ACE study and how early trauma shows up decades later at the cellular level, why men specifically tend to be "fine, fine, fine — until they're not," and how intergenerational trauma gets passed down through parents who were never taught how to nurture in the first place. Martin and Julie also get into the Buddhist metaphor of the two bags we carry — one full of everyone else's shortcomings, one full of our own we can't see — and why your "villains" are often the clearest mirror into your own unhealed parts. This is a conversation about what's actually on the other side of doing this work: not happiness, but freedom — the kind where your shoulders drop and you trust yourself to respond with wisdom instead of react from fear. https://drjuliegowthorpersw.com/ If this conversation moved something in you, a rating or review helps more people find this work. Martin's book, The Weary Traveller's Guide to a Life Worth Living, is available now.

  4. 24 Sept

    Ep 45: Channeling the Higher Self: Healing Trauma & Addiction With Taras Machula

    What if connecting to the divine wasn't a mystery — just a signal you'd never learned to turn on? Taras Machula is a certified hypnotherapist who works in the subconscious, treating addiction, trauma, and grief through a method he built himself: the Temple of Divinity. He calls hypnosis a "super highway" to the higher self — and midway through this conversation, he takes Martin through a live, five-minute distance healing on air. In this conversation we explore inner transformation through the lens of the subconscious mind — the separation between the ego (the part of you managing anger, jealousy, and self-protection) and the higher self (unconditional love), why Taras believes every addiction traces back to unresolved trauma rather than moral failure, the shadow work involved in choosing which "wolf" you feed, how trauma can be released without re-living it, and what changed when Taras discovered his own life's purpose wasn't the credentials he chased, but the hearts he could help heal. This is a conversation about the parts of healing that don't show up on a whiteboard — energy, frequency, and the compassion most men have never been taught to receive, let alone give themselves. If this conversation moved something in you, a rating or review helps more men find this work. Martin's book, The Weary Traveller's Guide to a Life Worth Living, is available now.

  5. 9 Sept

    Ep 44: Your Inner Critic Is a Toddler With a Bullhorn: Peter Kenney on Shadow Work

    What if your inner critic isn't a villain — just a toddler holding a bullhorn? Peter Kenney calls himself a spiritual handyman — twenty years helping people move from stuck to unstoppable, after a spontaneous out-of-body experience during a kundalini yoga class rerouted his entire life. His book, The Inner Remodel, treats the self like a house, complete with rooms for fear, the inner critic, and the habits you've never actually stopped to look at. In this conversation we explore inner transformation through the metaphor of a house you've never actually toured — the entryway where you decide how the world sees you, the basement where everything you've buried is quietly waiting, and the room shadow work actually lives in: not a beast to be feared, but "an angry, hurt, lonely, tired, hungry aspect of yourself" that just needs to be seen. We get into the real difference between pain and suffering, why understanding beats willpower when it comes to compulsive behavior, the Eastern concept of samskaras mapped onto Western nervous system science, and what it actually means to stop trying to love yourself and instead realize you already are love. This is a conversation about redecorating from the inside out — one room at a time. If this conversation moved something in you, a rating or review helps more men find this work. Martin's book, The Weary Traveller's Guide to a Life Worth Living, is available now.

  6. 3 Sept

    Ep 43: Diffusing bombs behind enemy lines: Benjamin Lee on PTSD and shadow work

    The measure of a man isn't what he says he'll do under fire. It's what he actually does when the bullets start flying. Benjamin Lee spent his career as an EOD technician, defusing bombs on the front lines in Iraq and Afghanistan. He came home with PTSD, an opioid addiction that started with a legitimate prescription after surgery, and no idea who he was without the uniform. He rebuilt himself more than once — including through a rock bottom that involved real suicidal ideation he doesn't sugarcoat — and now runs the Initiation Source, coaching men through the same process using a framework he calls the Reforge Protocol. In this conversation we explore inner transformation through the lens of a man trained to disarm the most dangerous devices imaginable, who had to learn to disarm himself — what war actually teaches about the measure of a man, the difference between acute and chronic PTSD, the two false identities (war hero, then wounded veteran) he had to let die before he could rebuild, and the Reforge Protocol itself: reveal, examine, face, offload, reclaim, grieve, embody. We also get into Jungian shadow work, why nervous system regulation is the real first step of any of it, and what he calls "the waiting room" — the foggy, directionless space between who you were and who you're becoming. This is a conversation about learning to defuse yourself with the same discipline it takes to defuse a bomb — one wire at a time. If this conversation moved something in you, a rating or review helps more men find this work. Martin's book, The Weary Traveller's Guide to a Life Worth Living, is available now.

  7. 25 Aug

    Ep 41: I'll Be Happy When…. No, You Won't: Steve Barton on Breaking Your Own Terms and Conditions

    What if the "terms and conditions" you've been living under were never real to begin with? Steve Barton took over his father's flower shop at 22 after a stroke sidelined him, built it into the largest in the state, and sold it right before the 2008 crash — then had an out-of-body, near-death experience in the middle of a routine therapy session that cracked his identity wide open. He's now a coach, a longtime student of A Course in Miracles, and author of The Game of Ten and the upcoming Father, the Son and the Aha Moment, co-written with his own son. In this conversation we explore inner transformation set off by something Steve never asked for — the unconscious "terms and conditions" men put on themselves ("I'll be happy when…"), why beating yourself up keeps you stuck instead of making you grow, the difference between chasing self-love and actually becoming aware, and Steve's own emotional healing ritual for letting go of fear, self-doubt, guilt, and shame. He walks Martin through his affirmation practice live on the show, and the shift is audible in real time. This isn't an episode about ego dissolution — it's one where it actually happens. If this conversation moved something in you, a rating or review helps more men find this work. Martin's book, The Weary Traveller's Guide to a Life Worth Living, is available now.

  8. 19 Aug

    Ep 40: De-Masking Men: Dr. Richard Oelberger on Men's Work

    What's left of a man when the job, the marriage, or the mask he's worn for decades finally cracks? Dr. Richard Oelberger earned the nickname "Dr. Zero" doing suicide prevention work on Skid Row alongside the LAPD — going out in the middle of the night to talk people down from the edge. A somatic psychologist and author of The Zero Method, he now runs men's groups and a twice-yearly men's retreat through the Remarkable Men's nonprofit. In this conversation we explore inner transformation through the lens of identity collapse — what actually happens in the body when a man loses the job, marriage, or role he built his entire sense of self around, why chaotic or dysregulated childhoods teach kids to become "mini parents" long before their nervous systems can handle it, the somatic tools Richard uses to release stored anger and grief, and how nervous system regulation — not willpower — is what actually lets a man change a pattern instead of just managing it. We also get into shadow work, the Sanskrit concept of samskaras, and why healing has to come before real transformation can happen. This one gets personal — Martin opens up about his own father's death by suicide, and the two find real common ground in what it costs a man to keep the mask on this long. If this conversation moved something in you, a rating or review helps more men find this work. Martin's book, The Weary Traveller's Guide to a Life Worth Living, is available now.

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About

Odyssey and Alchemy is a weekly long-form interview podcast on inner transformation — men's work, spirituality, mindfulness, and depth psychology — for men ready to do the inner work. Host Martin Prihoda, former Bollywood photographer and author of The Weary Traveller, sits down for deep, unhurried conversations with therapists, teachers, yogis, and healers — exploring how men heal, wake up, and build a conscious relationship with themselves. No life hacks. No quick fixes. Real conversations about the inner life, for men in the middle of their own transformation — and anyone walking that road with them.

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