Right Here

Lumen Therapy Collective, WPKN
  • 4.8 (10)
  • Mental Health

Right Here is a mental health podcast that explores the psychological patterns shaping our relationships, choices, and inner lives. Hosted by therapists Christopher Mooney, LCSW, and Kenyon Phillips, LMSW, each episode offers grounded, compassionate conversations rooted in clinical insight and real human experience. No jargon. No judgment. Just clear, thoughtful dialogue designed to help listeners better understand themselves and the people around them.

  1. 2d ago ·  Video

    Loving Someone from a Distance

    “I love my mother. I just can't talk to her every day." Sometimes the hardest relationships aren't the ones that end. They're the ones we want to keep, even when being close starts to cost us something. In this episode of Right Here, hosts Christopher Mooney, LCSW and Kenyon Phillips, LMSW explore loving someone from a distance, what happens when a relationship still matters but the closeness needs to change, and why creating space doesn't have to mean cutting someone off. They unpack why certain relationships leave us feeling drained, criticized, or emotionally overwhelmed, and how guilt, family expectations, and loyalty can make stepping back feel like betrayal. The conversation also explores the difference between protective distance and punishment, and why setting limits isn't necessarily about loving someone less. Before wrapping up, Chris and Kenyon offer practical ways to redefine closeness: adjusting how often you connect, choosing what you share, setting limits around difficult conversations, and recognizing when a relationship needs different terms rather than a dramatic ending. Fact: You can care deeply about someone without giving them unlimited access to your time, energy, or emotional well-being. Sometimes loving someone means finding a distance where the relationship can actually survive.

  2. Oct 25 ·  Video

    Keeping Score

    “I called last time.”“I always apologize first.”“I do more around the house.” Most of us don’t set out to keep score in our relationships. We show up, help out, and tell ourselves it’s no big deal. But over time, those little mental notes become a running tally of everything we’ve done—and everything the other person hasn’t. Suddenly, an argument about the dishes is really about years of feeling unappreciated or unseen. In this episode of Right Here, hosts Christopher Mooney, LCSW and Kenyon Phillips, LMSW explore keeping score in relationships—why we do it, how resentment builds, and how unspoken expectations become silent contracts.  They also unpack the difference between fairness and equality. Healthy relationships aren’t always fifty-fifty. Sometimes one person carries more. The problem is when that imbalance becomes permanent, invisible, and never discussed. The conversation also looks at why we give more than we can comfortably offer, hope others will notice, and eventually resent them when they don’t. Chris and Kenyon offer practical ways to recognize the needs beneath resentment, communicate them clearly, and distinguish generosity from obligation. Because the goal isn’t to prove who has done more. It’s to build relationships where neither person needs to keep receipts.

  3. Oct 17 ·  Video

    You're Allowed to Change Your Mind

    Have you ever stayed with something long after it stopped fitting? Not because you still wanted it, but because leaving felt like an admission of failure? A job. A relationship. A friendship. A city. A belief. A role in your family. Even a version of yourself that everyone else got used to. Sometimes the question isn’t “Do I still want this?” but “What does it say about me if I change my mind now?" In this episode of Right Here, hosts Christopher Mooney, LCSW and Kenyon Phillips, LMSW talk about why changing course can feel so much like failure—even when it may actually be a sign of growth, honesty, or new information. They unpack sunk-cost thinking, the pressure to stay consistent, the fear of looking foolish, and what happens when other people have become comfortable with the version of you that no longer fits. They also explore an important distinction: Is something difficult because it matters—or because it no longer belongs in your life? Not every hard thing is the wrong thing. But not every commitment deserves endless loyalty. The conversation gets into the identity piece, too—the grief that can come with outgrowing the person who always finishes, always stays, never needs help, or never changes their mind. And why you don’t have to criticize your former self in order to choose differently now. Chris and Kenyon offer practical ways to change direction with integrity: Ask what you would choose today, separate the cost of the past from the next decision, experiment with smaller changes first, say what has changed plainly, and make room for the grief, relief, fear, and excitement that can all exist at the same time. Changing your mind doesn’t necessarily mean you got it wrong. Sometimes it just means you know something now that you didn’t know then.

  4. Oct 11 ·  Video

    The Need to Be Right

    Have you ever been in an argument and realized you’re no longer trying to understand the other person—you’re only trying to win? Maybe the disagreement started over parenting, politics, money, work, or something as small as how the dishwasher gets loaded. But somewhere along the way, it stopped being about the actual issue and became something bigger: Do you respect me? Do you think I’m stupid? Are you dismissing what I know? In this episode of Right Here, hosts Christopher Mooney, LCSW and Kenyon Phillips, LMSW explore the need to be right—and why disagreement can feel so personal. They look at what can sit beneath defensiveness: competence, respect, control, justice, and identity, along with earlier experiences that may have taught us that being wrong is dangerous, humiliating, or unsafe. The conversation also breaks down how a simple difference of opinion can turn into a fight: the body gets activated, listening disappears, defensiveness takes over, and suddenly the original issue is replaced by a need for validation. Sometimes you can be factually right and still end up relationally nowhere. Chris and Kenyon talk about the difference between being right and being understood, why validation is not the same as agreement, and how curiosity can keep a disagreement from becoming a battle. They also offer practical ways to slow things down, identify what you’re really protecting, separate intent from impact, and pause without abandoning the conversation. The goal isn’t to stop having your own opinion. It’s to stop treating every disagreement like something you have to win.

  5. Oct 5 ·  Video

    The Myth of Closure

    “I just need closure.” We say it after breakups, friendships that fade, family estrangement, betrayal, loss, or any ending that leaves us with unanswered questions. We imagine closure as one final conversation—the explanation, the apology, the truth, the moment someone finally understands what they did to hurt us. But sometimes that conversation never comes. And even when it does, it doesn't always give us what we hoped it would. In this episode of Right Here, hosts Christopher Mooney, LCSW and Kenyon Phillips, LMSW explore the myth of closure and what it means to move forward when an ending stays unfinished. They unpack why uncertainty is so hard to tolerate, why we often confuse closure with validation, and how our peace can become dependent on someone who may be unable, unwilling, unsafe, or simply unavailable to give us the resolution we want. The conversation also looks at what we may actually be grieving: not just the person or relationship, but the future we imagined, the version of ourselves we were in it, the belief that things would eventually get better, or the person we kept hoping someone would become. Chris and Kenyon close the episode by offering practical ways to begin creating your own closure—recognizing patterns even when every detail is missing, naming what you were hoping to receive, deciding whether contact would truly help, and creating rituals that don’t require the other person’s participation.

  6. Sep 26 ·  Video

    Taking It Personally

    They didn’t text back. My boss sounded annoyed. My partner seemed distant. And suddenly your brain has written an entire story: They’re mad at me. I did something wrong. I’m too much. I’ll never be enough. Taking things personally often happens in the space between what actually happened and the meaning we assign to it. An unanswered text becomes rejection. Feedback becomes failure. Someone else’s bad mood becomes evidence that we’ve done something wrong. But an interpretation isn’t necessarily a fact. In this episode of Right Here, hosts Christopher Mooney, LCSW and Kenyon Phillips, LMSW explore why ambiguity can feel so uncomfortable, how rejection sensitivity and past experiences shape the stories we tell ourselves, and why an unclear moment can quickly become a verdict about our worth, competence, or belonging. The conversation also offers a simple way to slow the spiral: separate the event from the story. What actually happened? What meaning did your mind add? And what are two other explanations that could also be true? Alternative explanations aren’t about pretending everything is fine—they’re about refusing to judge yourself on incomplete evidence. Not everything is about you. But the feelings that get brought up are still real. The work is learning how to stay curious long enough to find out what’s actually true.

  7. Sep 19 ·  Video

    The Avoidance Loop

    “I just need to figure out exactly what to say.” Sometimes the hardest conversations are the ones we’ve already had 50 times (in the shower, in the car, at two in the morning), but never with the actual person. We rehearse every possible version, predict what they’ll say, plan our response, and tell ourselves we’re preparing. But often, the rehearsal itself becomes another form of avoidance. In this episode of Right Here, hosts Christopher Mooney, LCSW and Kenyon Phillips, LMSW explore why we avoid the conversations we know we need to have—especially when we care deeply about the relationship. They unpack how temperament, early experiences with conflict, people-pleasing, and our nervous systems can teach us that disagreement means danger and staying quiet means safety. The conversation also looks at what avoidance actually costs. Staying silent may reduce anxiety in the moment, but the issue rarely disappears. Instead, resentment builds, small behaviors start carrying more meaning, and distance grows around something the other person may not even know is wrong. Chris and Kenyon offer practical ways to interrupt the cycle: notice what you’re protecting, put limits around the rehearsal loop, separate fear from fact, and stop waiting for the perfect script.  Because sometimes you don’t need a speech. You just need one honest sentence.

  8. Sep 12 ·  Video

    Attachment Styles 101

    Few things can activate us faster than feeling someone pull away—or feeling someone get a little too close. Those reactions can seem irrational in the moment, but they usually aren’t random. They may be part of an attachment style: a pattern we learned early on for managing closeness, distance, safety, and connection. In this episode of Right Here, hosts Christopher Mooney, LCSW and Kenyon Phillips, LMSW break down the four primary attachment styles—secure, anxious, avoidant, and disorganized—and explain where they come from, how they show up in adult relationships, and why they’re better understood as survival strategies than personality flaws. The conversation explores the classic anxious-avoidant dynamic, what happens in the body when our attachment system gets activated, and why one person may reach for reassurance at exactly the moment another person wants to retreat. Christopher and Kenyon also discuss how greater awareness, safer relationships, therapy, and small changes in how we respond can help us move toward a sense of earned security. You didn’t choose your attachment style. But you can change your relationship to it.

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Ratings & Reviews

4.8
out of 5
10 Ratings

About

Right Here is a mental health podcast that explores the psychological patterns shaping our relationships, choices, and inner lives. Hosted by therapists Christopher Mooney, LCSW, and Kenyon Phillips, LMSW, each episode offers grounded, compassionate conversations rooted in clinical insight and real human experience. No jargon. No judgment. Just clear, thoughtful dialogue designed to help listeners better understand themselves and the people around them.

Information

  • Creator
    Lumen Therapy Collective, WPKN
  • Years Active
    2026
  • Episodes
    38
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2026 Right Here
  • Show Website
    Right Here

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