In this episode, I explore a concept that immediately stopped me in my tracks: the otrovert.

I first encountered this idea when my wife shared an article with me and said, “This feels like you.” The article introduced the term otrovert—someone who isn’t quite an introvert or an extrovert, but a person who can enjoy people deeply while still feeling fundamentally outside of groups.

That moment sent me down a rabbit hole. I bought the Kindle edition of The Gift of Not Belonging by Rami Kaminsky, read it in a weekend, and then bought the hardcover because I knew this was a concept I wanted to stay with and think alongside my clinical work, my own life, and this podcast.

In this episode, I slow things down and really unpack what Kaminsky means by the otrovert:

– what it explains about personality and belonging

– how it differs from introversion, social anxiety, or misanthropy

– the quiet pain of being “other” in a joiner-oriented culture

– and the unexpected gifts that can come from not being pulled toward group identity

I also spend time carefully exploring how the idea of the otrovert might have a Venn diagram relationship with autism—without collapsing personality into diagnosis or difference into disorder.

This is an episode for anyone who has felt socially capable but never quite drawn to belonging, who prefers depth over groups, or who has always lived slightly to the side of the herd and wondered why.

Sometimes the right word doesn’t box us in.

Sometimes it gives us room to breathe.

In this episode of the Psyche Podcast, I bring together philosopher Eugene Thacker’s In the Dust of This Planet and Junji Ito’s Uzumaki to explore a deeper, colder form of horror—one that isn’t psychological, symbolic, or easily explained.

Thacker writes about the “world-without-us”: a reality that exists beyond human meaning, care, or control. In Uzumaki, that idea takes shape as a spiral—an impersonal force that reshapes bodies, infects a town, and quietly dismantles the assumption that the world is organized around us.

This is an episode about cosmic horror, dread, and the unsettling beauty of patterns that exceed human understanding. We explore why Uzumaki feels so disturbing, how horror can function as a form of philosophy, and what it means to encounter a world that doesn’t offer reassurance or redemption.

If you’re interested in philosophical horror, cosmic pessimism, or stories that linger long after they end, this conversation is an invitation to sit with discomfort—and listen closely to what it reveals.

In this solo episode, I introduce the work of psychoanalyst Karen Horney, one of the most important—and often overlooked—figures in the history of psychoanalysis.

Trained in Freudian theory yet deeply critical of its limits, Horney helped shift psychoanalysis away from instinct and biology and toward relationships, culture, and anxiety. I explore her life and intellectual world, including her interactions with other major analysts and her complicated personal and theoretical relationship with Erich Fromm.

From there, I take a deeper dive into Horney’s core ideas—basic anxiety, the three neurotic trends, the idealized self, and what she famously called the “tyranny of the shoulds.” These concepts remain strikingly relevant today, especially for understanding perfectionism, people-pleasing, withdrawal, shame, and the quiet suffering many people carry into therapy.

Finally, I reflect on why Karen Horney still matters for contemporary psychotherapy and why her vision of healing—rooted in self-realization, relational safety, and compassion for our adaptive strategies—feels more timely than ever.

This episode is an invitation to revisit a thinker who continues to help us understand what it means to lose—and recover—the real self.